Dialogismo, Normatização Discursiva e a perda do “Direito de Dizer” na padronização das redações do Enem: uma análise do Guia e da Cartilha do Participante

Abstract

This dissertation, Dialogism, Discursive Standardization, and the Loss of the “Right to Say” in the Standardization of ENEM Essays: An Analysis of the Participant Guide and Handbook, is linked to the research line Culture, School, and Formation of the Graduate Program in Education at the State University of Goiás (PPGE-UEG/Inhumas Campus). The study aims to analyze how the discursive norms of the National High School Examination (ENEM) influence textual production and shape participants’ possibilities for expression, considering the tensions between institutional practices, pedagogical orientations, and critical literacy. Theoretically, it is grounded in Bakhtin (2003, 2016, 2017) and Volóchinov (2021), who conceive language as a social and dialogic practice constituted through relations among subjects and the historical conditions of production. It also dialogues with Street (1984, 1993, 2014), Kleiman (1995), and Soares (2023), whose contributions discuss literacy models and their pedagogical implications for the teaching of writing. In the linguistic field, the research relies on Antunes (2009) and Marcuschi (2008, 2012) to understand textual genres, written production, and the functioning of language in real contexts of use. The study further considers the broader context of educational policies for the teaching of Portuguese, particularly the guidelines set forth by the Brazilian National Common Curricular Base (BNCC). This is a qualitative investigation grounded in historical-dialectical materialism, employing documental, textual, and discursive analysis procedures. The corpus comprises the ENEM Participant Guide, the Participant Handbook, and two sample essays released by the exam. The study seeks to answer the following question: How does the discursive standardization present in the ENEM Participant Guide and Handbook contribute to the homogenization of essays and to the loss of students’ “right to say”? The findings show that ENEM’s official documents establish a model of writing based on clarity, objectivity, and a supposed neutrality, promoting discursive homogenization and restricting the “right to say”, as they shape the writer-subject according to institutional parameters that minimize the expression of individual experiences, memories, and perspectives. Nonetheless, the study also identifies possibilities for resistance and the construction of a critical literacy that recognizes writing as a social practice and a space for authorship. Finally, the research demonstrates that discursive standardization constitutes a form of symbolic violence by limiting students’ critical positioning, while also highlighting the need for pedagogical practices that reframe writing as a space of creation, authorship, and freedom valuing the diversity of voices and fostering ethical and civic formation.