Entre emoções, resistências e complexidade:

práticas decoloniais de professores de inglês em escolas quilombolas na Amazônia Marajoara

Abstract

Teacher education in English Language (EL) within Quilombola Schools (QS) involves affective, epistemic, and sociopolitical dynamics that exceed traditional models of language instruction. This article analyzes narratives from five English teachers who worked in Quilombola schools in the Marajoara Amazon, examining how emotions, decolonial practices, and processes of self-organization emerge in their pedagogical experiences. The study is grounded in complexity theory (Morin, 2005; Larsen-Freeman & Cameron, 2008), the affective turn in Applied Linguistics (Aragão, 2011; Barcelos, 2015; Zembylas, 2003), and decolonial perspectives (Quijano, 2000; Mignolo, 2007; Walsh, 2018). Methodologically, it adopts an interpretivist qualitative approach, viewing teacher narratives as emergent events of complex adaptive systems. Results show that emotions such as fear, hope, pride, and empathy act elements that shape pedagogical practices and foster contextually grounded curricular reorganization. Decolonial gestures also emerge, bringing English into dialogue with community knowledge and strengthening Quilombola identities. The findings indicate that English teaching in QS constitutes a living ecosystem in which complexity, affect, and decoloniality intertwine to produce pedagogical practices committed to social justice.