O conto policial de Conan Doyle na aula de língua inglesa

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to seek the development of the high school students’ intercultural and communicative competence from public school, through the literary text, specifically four unabridged detective stories by Conan Doyle. We have come from the point that the literary text can bring out many benefits to the teaching and learning process of English, such as, cultural and linguistic enrichment, personal involvement, development of the students’ interpretive abilities (KRAMSCH, 2015; CORBETT, 2010; COLLIE; SLATER, 1987; LAZAR, 2005; DUFF; MALLEY, 2003). Our work has characteristics of a qualitative research as well as a document study, because we have presented one questionnaire with open questions for the participants, high school students from IFRN-Campus Natal Zona Norte, in order to investigate how they understand the relationship between language and culture and if it is possible to improve their knowledge of English by the reading of four detective stories. The result of our research showed that the interviewed students still have a structuralist view, because they believe the study of a foreign language is restricted to lexis acquisition. Hence, we proposed eight intercultural activities to be used in the English classrooms on the aspects of language and culture, presented in the selected detective stories, aiming to corroborate the benefits of the literary text in the English learning process.