INGLÊS COMO LÍNGUA-PONTE: UM INSTRUMENTO DE INTEGRAÇÃO, ACOLHIMENTO E ENSINO DO PORTUGUÊS PARA REFUGIADOS E MIGRANTES NO BRASIL

Abstract

The exponential increase in the number of migrants and refugees in Brazilian lands in the last decades has triggered several challenges that must be faced by this population daily. In search of a better life, many urgently seek to integrate into the society of the receiving country. Among many barriers, language stands out as one of the main obstacles to accessing the rights and services considered essential for all human beings, such as education, work, and housing, since due to the lack of specialized professionals, most cannot understand what can be obtained. Starting from the hypothesis that the English language can be an instrument of facilitation and promotion through its role as a lingua franca, thanks to the bilingual and multilingual profile of this public, the present work proposed to investigate how English as a bridge-language facilitates and promotes the teaching of Portuguese, the integration and reception of refugees and migrants in Brazil, keeping in mind its diffusion around the world. Thus, by means of a qualitative research, of applied nature, exploratory objective and field procedure, authors such as Bordenave (2005), Luna Freire and Martorelli (2021), Seidlhofer (2005), Oliveira and Silva (2017), Le Breton (2005) and Caldeira (2012), besides a structured and recorded interview conducted with four students participating in the project “Refugees and Migrants in Paraíba: Welcoming and Integrating” at UFPB to ground the discussions and obtain fairer and more representative data.