THE BRAZILIAN ‘JEITINHO’ IN THE CONTEXT OF TEACHING OF PORTUGUESE FOR FOREIGNERS: BEYOND THE COMMON PLACE

Abstract

The concept of ‘jeitinho’ is present in a series of discourses that express a set of values that Brazilians perceive as their own. Thus, a foreigner in the process of learning Portuguese FL/2L will eventually come into contact with this style of Brazilian social practice. The concept of ‘jeitinho’, however, shows different forms of representation in discourse. Our aim with this work is to approach such concept from a more accurate analysis that moves away from a simplistic discourse, which associates the jeitinho to the image of a Brazilian who seeks to take advantage of everything. In this process, we reviewed the literature that approaches this concept based on analyzes from the Social Sciences, with emphasis on the studies of Barbosa (2006) and Borges (2006). As a possible material to be inserted in a context of teaching Portuguese for foreigners, we chose the reading and analysis of the Brazilian literary chronicle “Dar um jeitinho”. The analysis of chronicles was carried out from the perspective of discursive semiotics, aiming to search for meanings that are related to the concept of jeitinho.