TEACHING THE PORTUGUESE LANGUAGE IN A CONTEXT OF FORMATION OF CHILEAN TRANSLATORS

Abstract

 The objective of this article is to examine three didactic materials used in different university courses of Portuguese language for translators of the Spanish-Portuguese pair. To that end, we have related some characteristics that mark the learning culture of our context and articulate them with the widely disseminated studies of the Portuguese as Foreign Language (PLE) area to Spanish speakers (Almeida Filho 1995; 2004; Ferreira 1998; Júdice 2005; 2013; Mendes 2011). We selected three variables for the discussion presented: i. the need to develop proficiency in Portuguese in the communicative and disciplinary fields; ii. the unskilled knowledge (Almeida Filho 1995) of Spanish speakers, leading them to not perceive the peculiarities that differentiate the two languages and that leads them to trust in the ‘easy’ of producing Portuguese; iii. the didactic resources to approach the Portuguese language forthe training of translators. Thus, we identify in the students’ learning culture the ‘easy’, related to understanding, and the ‘difficult’ related to the recurrence of grammar-based teaching. The materials presented guide our thinking on the oral and written production skills expected of our students in terms of language knowledge and practice with the textual genres  equired by the university curriculum.