Modernidade e diferença colonial nos discursos hegemônicos sobre língua no Brasil

Abstract

This paper discusses the contradictions between hegemonic discourses on language and identity practices in contemporary Brazil. To discuss this topic, I argue that speech acts have repeatedly built hegemonies on language in Brazil, mainly linguistic unity, written/oral hierarchy and linear correspondence language-writing-cognition. These hegemonies refer to three interpretive models of colonial modernity. Such models depend heavily on the modern conception of uniform and well defi ned identity which the world/modern system no longer supports. The contemporary identity practices support two contradictions of hegemonic discourses on language in Brazil. The fi rst contradiction is operated by changes in the world/modern/colonial system design; the second contradiction is operated by silent perseverance and anonymous modern design. The conclusion is a paradoxical one: the hegemonic discourses on language in Brazil, inherited from colonial modernity, currently face in contemporary identity practices forces opposed to its stabilization, while the colonial difference persists.