Language ideologies and identity negotiation in autobiographies produced by descendants of Polish migrants in South Brazil

Abstract Summary

Abstract :

In this paper, we analyze autobiographies produced by descendants of Polish migrants in South Brazil focusing on negotiations of identities (Pavlenko & Blacklege, 2004) and language ideologies (Woolard & Schieffilin, 1994). Polish migratory process to Brazil developed in the final years of 19^th Century and initial years of 20^th Century. The migrants were mainly peasants, who migrated to the South American country looking for lands and for better living conditions. Around 1,5 million Polish descendants live currently in Brazil. We analyze autobiographical data generated with teachers of basic education and undergraduate students in two different cities in South Brazil. The participants wrote autobiographical narratives and reflected about themselves, their families, and communities. In these texts, they mobilized the ancestor’s voices to narrate the initial years of the migrants in Brazil. Through ancestor’s voices, these writers recovered the imagination of the migrant Polish community in the Brazilian context. They also negotiate their positions as descendants of migrants and members of the community. Our analysis is underpinned in the dialogical conception of language developed by the Bakhtin Circle. We focus on these voices and how they are mobilized. Bakhtinian concepts of centripetal and centrifugal social forces are used to analyze language ideologies present in the narratives. They wrote about Portuguese and Polish languages in their life. In doing so, they negotiate some language ideologies. Portuguese is seen as the dominant language and the language of school and prestige. Polish is seen as key feature of ethnic-linguistic identity, that is also related to religion and traditional practices, but is also related to peasant origin of the migrants and to the main economic activity of the migrants and their descendants. These language ideologies are related to language policies developed by the Brazilian government in the 1940s, which effects are still felt by some descendants.