The quick expansion of the English language around the world has been the subject
of frequent research, as pointed out by Bordini and Gimenez (2014), especially
regarding the teaching and learning of this language. The proportions reached by
English, never seen in any other historical moment, characterizes it as lingua franca,
global and/or international. The reason for this includes the colonization processes by
England, the great United States’ economic and military power and the globalization
and territorial shortening brought by the Internet. In this scenario, English-speaking
countries seem to be the holders of the English rules, as if they were its true owners.
The status of English as a lingua franca (ILF) opposes the hegemonic view of the
language and grants language users the character of ownership; in addition to
pointing out benefits for language teaching and learning, such as: a feeling of
belonging for trainee teachers, legitimacy and safety when teaching and overcoming
what is called copying the native's English. Therefore, this work aimed to analyse the
Pedagogical Project of the Language and Literature Course (PPC) of the Federal
University of Tocantins (UFT), to find out if there is any mention of English as ILF, its
approach and configuration in the current document. To do so, I am guided by the
following questions: 1) Does the Pedagogical Project of the Course in English
Literature and its respective Literatures at UFT contemplate the teaching of English
as a lingua franca? 2) Do the disciplines of the PPC privilege discussions about the
status of English in the world or do they promote the homogeneity of the English
language? If there is mention of teaching English as a lingua franca, is the PPC in
line with the disciplines' bibliographic references? To achieve the objectives, this
research was based on the qualitative interpretative paradigm with documental data
collection; the context of the research is the Literature Course at UFT, Porto Nacional
campus. Based on the analysis, it is possible to state that there is mention of the
statute of the ILF, but the bibliographical references are mostly American and
English, corroborating with the hegemony of the English language by these
countries.
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