Critical literacy and discursive dialogic analysis: the role of language in the process of constructing knowledge and critical consciousness

Abstract

This paper aims to discuss the conceptions of language presented by the Bakhtin Circle in the work Marxism and the Philosophy of Language, highlighting the importance of understanding language as a social practice in the teaching of Portuguese from a critical literacy perspective. Marxism and the Philosophy of Language is certainly one of the Bakhtin Circle's most well-known works. The first translation into Portuguese was made from the French version in 1979 and was signed as “Mikhail Bakhtin (Voloshinov).” The translation used in this study, however, was produced directly from the Russian by Sheila Grillo and Ekaterina Vólkova Américo, and published in 2017. With regard to its theoretical and methodological foundations, this is a bibliographical study that adopts a dialogic approach as its theoretical framework, drawing on the works of Volóchinov (2017), Rajagopalan (2003), Moita Lopes (2006), Freire (1989), Kumaravadivelu (2003), and Rojo (2009; 2012). In addition to these authors, other scholars who address topics such as language, culture, and identity are also referenced in order to support a discursive analysis of critical literacy as both a pedagogical and social practice. The study demonstrates that critical literacy and dialogic discourse analysis represent essential approaches to the teaching of Portuguese, fostering the development of students who are aware of their social roles and the implications of language in the construction of their identities.