Visual literacy in English Language teaching: an investigation about marketing and representation of women

• Grant number: 19/08114-1
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: July 01, 2019
• End date: June 30, 2020
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Linguistics - Applied Linguistics
• Principal Investigator: Daniel de Mello Ferraz
• Grantee: Luiza Araujo Cardeal da Costa
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This project examines the possibilities of using visual literacy in English language classes as a tool to understand advertising messages. In the midst of the rise of the circulation of videos and images in social media together with other traditional media, visual literacy becomes fundamental because it seeks to facilitate the understanding of the meanings and social values transmitted in the most varied contexts. When examining American advertising images and how their discourses are disseminated in society, their pedagogical implications and impacts on foreign language teaching are problematic, and this work seeks to refine the training of English-speaking teachers. In light of this, the objective of this work is to reflect on the challenges of the use of advertising images about women in the classroom, seeking to develop, simultaneously, multimodal reading skills and critical reflection on the socio-historical reality of the student. For this, first, it is necessary the study of recognitions of the processes of signification of the symbols through an ethnographic research carried out via electronic questionnaire. The intention is to examine how the critical study of advertising images relate to visual literacy practices to then prove.