ABSTRACT
Official documents related to Law 10.639/03 provide general guidelines for its implementation in higher education institutions. However, English teacher training courses still lack specific and practical foundations to address the law content in English teaching. It means that many English teachers do not use theoretical and methodological knowledge to work on racial issues in their classes (FERREIRA, 2006FERREIRA, A. J. (2006) Formação de professores Raça/etnia: reflexões e sugestões de materiais de ensino. Cascavel: Coluna do Saber.). This article shows the description of contents, methodology, and theories derived from a university extension project on ethnic-racial issues and African cultures in English teaching. The project involved 9 English teachers who work in elementary and higher education in Salvador (BA) and had a course load of 45 hours. Gradually, since the group demanded, part of the classes turned to be for sharing narratives of discrimination. The event made me realize the importance of speech as a mechanism to comfort the suffering, in addition to being a fundamental input for teachers recreating their social identity of race. Thus, we set a time for the healing storytelling as a methodologically necessary part of this training. The experience not only offered a theoretical basis for teachers to address social, historical, and cultural issues related to blacks but also sharpened their perception of the daily events of racism that they had already seen, heard, or experienced inside and outside the classroom. Teacher’s social identity of race seems to be decisive for them to understand ethnic-racial issues and taking a position on these themes.
Keywords:
English teaching; race/ethnicity; teacher training; healing Storytelling