TEACHING UKRAINIAN LANGUAGE IN BRAZIL: MEDIATING THE STANDARD AND THE LOCAL VARIETIES EDINA SMAHA

The term “Heritage language (HL)”, as proposed by Cummins (1983), refers to any other language of family relevance that is not the official language of a given social setting. Although the definition of LH and the use of the term is centered in the English language and in the North American context, it has also been used to reflect immigration contexts where the process of language acquisition shares space with the minority language (Heritage Language) and the majority language (Host Language). In view of this, we will be discussing the linguistic scenario of the city of Prudentópolis – Paraná - Brazil, where the Ukrainian language plays the role of a Heritage Language for many of its inhabitants. More specifically, our objectives are: 1) To reflect on the challenges of teaching the standard variety while integrating and valuing the students heterogeneous and plural linguistic repertoires. 2) To describe how materials were adapted in an attempt to make them more sensitive to the student’s needs and to bring them closer to the standard Ukrainian while enhancing and revitalizing the variety of the Ukrainian language spoken in the community.