A ciência na linguagem e a linguagem da ciência: uma abordagem discursivo-textual de notícias de divulgação científica para promoção da cultura científica na escola

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the emerging potential of Popularization of Science (PC) texts applied to school contexts and their contributions to the promotion of science education in the Portuguese language classroom. PC texts are analyzed in discoursive level through the theoretical and methodological apparatus of Semiolinguistics proposed by Charaudeau (2013; 2014) and in textual level by the assumptions of Textual Analysis of Discourses proposed by Adam (2011). The corpus of this investigation consists of 81 texts of PC published in Galileu magazine between March 2014 and August 2015, observed and analysed on their discoursive, textual and thematic aspects on the first phase of this study, and 3 texts were selected for a closer look in the final phase of analysis. The methodology applied in discursive level is the analysis of the communication contract that underlies the texts and the various discoursive purposes emerging of them, while in textual level it is the observation of the presence of discoursive representations of science, enunciative responsibilities assigned by the journalists and the views of scientists and journalists in relation to science indicating the argumentative orientation of the PC texts analyzed. The findings are discussed to reflect on the potential of PC texts in the classroom through a discursive-textual looking that may value, at the same time, the linguistic-discursive factors and the scientific discourse characteristics of these texts that aims to promote two targets: language education and science education in the Portuguese language high school curriculum. It is assumed that by making use of PC materials that circulate within the school it is possible to promote science education through texts about science with which students are in constant contact. It is found that the study of PC texts, covered in their discoursive and textual aspects, may effectively contribute to the promotion of science education that allows students to develop the scientific culture needed for citizen action and critical consciousness. It is concluded that the ways in which these texts reach students is what divides the curriculum from one that promotes a view of science focused on science education and one that shows science opposite to its own dynamic, full of variables nature.