MECHANISMS OF LANGUAGE UNDERSTANDING IN CONGENITAL BLINDS a cognitive approach to the construction of meanings
Cognitive Linguistics; Language Comprehension; Congenital blind
This study seeks, through the investigation of atypical cases, to corroborate hypotheses, about typical cases, of how senses are constructed by people who do not present congenital problems of vision. In this way, this research has as main objective to analyze the cognitive mechanisms through which people with congenital blindness understand statements. To do so, we will investigate: the relevance of affordances (GIBSON, 1979; CHEMERO, 2009; DUQUE, 2013) in the understanding of narratives by people with zero vision; how the congenital blind use the metonymy and the focus on the understanding of narratives; and the dimensions of the narrative structure (LAKOFF, NARAYANAN, 2010) used as tools in the process of constructing meanings by blind people with zero vision. Having these as the specific objectives of the research, the theoretical framework is based on the assumptions defended by the Ecological Cognition of Language (DUQUE, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018). Considering the methodological aspects, this research is a qualitative empirical study by inductive, quasi-experimental method, since the selection of those involved was not performed in a random way. We can consider it as a single-case experiment (MONTERO, LEÓN, 2007) or Single Subject (KANTOWITZ et al, 2006) because we understand that the
data obtained through tests will be treated and compared among the subjects belonging to the same experimental group. In order to meet the research needs, we invited the Instituto dos Cegos do Rio Grande do Norte (IERC-RN) to act as a partner institution. The tests performed will have their results described and compared among the participants of the research. The final discussion was constructed and based on the analytical categories adopted for this research and subsidized by the theoretical framework previously presented. In this way, we seek to meet the research objectives and clarify our hypotheses about the problematic that gave rise to this study.