Among languages, cultures, and proverbs: the use of dictionaries in the teaching/learning of foreign languages

Proverbs are linguistic expressions of an informative and cultural nature that encompass features that identify cultural specificities with didactic value, moral and practical content. This paper aims at the elaboration of a bilingual mini-dictionary, constituted from the analysis of interlinguistic equivalence between the Japanese and the Brazilian variant of Portuguese languages, which takes proverbs that are part of a Japanese card game that dates back to the Edo period (1603-1868). Known as Iroha Karuta, this card game continues to be used in Japanese culture until nowadays, and, in this work, will serve as a starting point for comparing its meanings in each of the languages involved. Our intention is that this material will be used as a complementary instrument in the teaching and learning of foreign language (FL) regarding the use of proverbs by students of Japanese language courses who have Portuguese as their native language. The theoretical references for this study are Metalexicography and Contrastive Linguistics, more specifically between Japanese and other languages (DALGADO, 1922; UKIDA, 1922), as well as concepts pertinent to the teaching and learning of foreign languages/second languages (LEFFA, 2000; 2016), and Phraseoparemiology (ALVAREZ, 2012; XATARA, 2012). The primary sources are the selected sayings from the mentioned game. The secondary sources are specific traditional and/or digital paremiological dictionaries in the base language, as well as in the target language, that is, Japanese (GAKKEN, 1998) and the Brazilian variant of Portuguese.