Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

This article seeks to compare two narrative works based on the similarities in the treatment of the cat character in the plot. The contribution of this article is to highlight the intertextuality between the two stories, to indicate that such coincidences can be attributed to the solid literary tradition based on the symbolism of the cat. We start from the short story “El gato” (1974), by Mexican writer Juan García Ponce, to propose a comparative analysis with the novel El gato que venia del cielo (2002), by Japanese author Takashi Hiraide. For the analysis, elements of the narrative text such as space, time, plot and character configuration are considered in order to highlight the similarities and differences between the two literary works. The results indicate more similarities than differences between the two stories, which leads us to think that both authors resorted to the literary tradition about the cat as a mysterious character due to the ambiguity that its presence represents in the plot. This comparative analysis shows that the symbolism about the cat is consolidated; this would be a way of explaining how two stories that were written almost 30 years apart and with the contrast that the Western world implies with the Eastern world, gave a similar treatment to the character of the cat in a narrative work.

It is likely that, in some foreign language (FL) teaching contexts, social constructs such as learner investment, identity, and capital receive little attention, thereby limiting the opportunities to favor social justice. From a critical social perspective, this descriptive case study analyzes the impact of a pedagogical proposal based on strengthening the identities of 10th grade students at a public educational institution in Cali, Colombia. This initiative emerges as an alternative to address the issue of low investment in the target language (TL) within a context of inequality. The data collection methods included a classroom observation journal, the learners’ productions in the TL, assessments of their performance, and two anonymous surveys on their perceptions of the pedagogical proposal. Through a classical inductive analysis, high investment in the TL, an increase in social and cultural capital, strengthened student identities, and a high acceptance of the approach were identified. These findings suggest that teaching based on the investment model allows students to strengthen their identities and find meaning in their interactions, thereby facilitating the acquisition of capital that can contribute to their well-being. 

In Professor Luis Alfonso Ramírez's work, Discursive Turn: From the Referentiality of Language to Dialogism and Polyphony, we find a new way of navigating and rethinking the vicissitudes of encounter and experience in classrooms, in research, and in studies that explore the nature, what language does, and where it goes. The objective of this review is to discover another alternative to language and to explore a writing that proposes alternative paths, derived from recognizing language as something that provokes shifts in thinking.

This editorial reflects on the ethical-political challenges posed by artificial intelligence (AI) in the production of meaning, communication, education, and social life. Drawing on the notion of the palimpsest, it argues that AI does not generate meaning from scratch; rather, it rewrites and re-signifies prior layers of culture, history, and knowledge, thereby transforming traditional understandings of authorship, agency, and truth. Within this framework, the classroom should be conceived as an ethical, creative, and affective space that fosters critical thinking and digital “careizenship”, resisting the algorithmic standardisation of discourse. Furthermore, the text highlights that while AI expands technical capacities, it also introduces significant risks: the loss of human meaning, the reproduction of social inequalities, manipulation, and the objectification of individuals. This context calls for an adaptive ethics capable of guiding AI’s development through interdisciplinary collaboration and governance aimed at the common good. It emphasises that legislation alone is insufficient; instead, we must rethink the relationship between humanity and technology through ontological, epistemic, aesthetic, and political lenses. Finally, the Platonic myth of the phármakon is revisited to suggest that, like writing, technology can act as both remedy and poison. In response, the editorial proposes a situated maieutics—a practice that encourages authentic dialogue and self-knowledge—and calls for a collective reimagining of AI as a tool in service of human dignity, justice, and democratic coexistence.

This article presents key findings regarding students' perceptions of the formal oral communication practices developed  by teachers in higher education, derived from a multi-case study with a mixed descriptive approach —typical of action research— carried out at Universidad EAN, Universidad Cooperativa de Colombia (UCC), and Universidad Mariana (UM) in 2023. According to the results, at EAN, there is a prevalence of oral presentations of organizational projects for business purposes, characterized by expository, descriptive, and persuasive approaches. UCC promotes practices related to group, individual, and argumentative presentations, based on the principles of cooperation, freedom, equity, and respect for diversity. At UM, dialogical educational practices with a humanistic and constructivist orientation stand out. Likewise, in disciplinary training courses at the three institutions, formal oral communication is more of an informative means than an educational end, following the assumption that students have already mastered oral communication skills. Based on this reading, some methodological perspectives are proposed, which are aimed at pedagogical innovation in formal oral communication as an educational goal in institutions, within the framework of academic literacy. In conclusion, this research confirmed that formal oral communication is recognized by students as a means of information, which requires methodological guidelines for academic literacy that project a holistic pedagogical innovation in favor of training in professional communication skills.   

Today, internationalization in university policies is a topic of great relevance. However, it has often been homogenized through a perspective centered on dominant countries and languages, i.e., on the Global North. From a critical and decolonial perspective, this article reports the results of a project carried out by three Latin American universities in an effort to build plurilingualism and internationalization policies that provide visibility to knowledge produced in the Global South. Through qualitative research, this study is grounded in the voices of Spanish learners from Brazil and Portuguese learners from Colombia as policy actors who, through intercomprehension activities in an international context, aid in identifying elements that should be considered in the construction of more inclusive policies. The key findings of this work evidence the need to integrate linguistic identity to strengthen local knowledge, to view internationalization as a profound cultural practice beyond linguistic aspects, to understand intercomprehension as a way to promote pluridiversity, to and conceive the development of internationalization policies as an act of social justice. 

This study analyzes how female university students construct judgments when narrating episodes of life-threatening risk. From eight personal narratives, 67 evaluative utterances were selected and examined through the judgement subsystem of the appraisal system (Martin & White, 2005). Using a qualitative approach, the analysis integrated the type of judgement (esteem or sanction), its evaluative charge, the mode of realization (inscribed or evoked), its location within the narrative sequence, and the graduation resources that reinforce or mitigate the speaker’s stance. A clear distinction was maintained between the narrative location where evaluation emerges (in structural terms) and the interpersonal nature of judgement. The results show a predominance of social esteem (58%) over sanction (42%), both with negative charge when the protagonists are in contexts of vulnerability. Furthermore, the study shows that interpersonal evaluations that is, attitudinal positionings realized through language tend to emerge in the orientation and complication stages of the narrative. This finding does not contradict the Labovian notion of evaluation as an autonomous structural segment, but rather indicates that interpersonal evaluation plays a significant role from the early phases of the narrative. graduation modulates the interpersonal impact of the story, reinforcing the censure of errors or highlighting acts of resilience. Overall, the judgement subsystem emerges as a key axis for assigning responsibility, questioning norms, and shaping the speakers’ discursive identity as they reconstruct lived experience.

This paper explores the pedagogical implications of Mikhail Bakhtin's theory around three fundamental notions: meaning, subject, and education. Based on a critique of modern conceptions of language and subject as closed and objective entities, it proposes a dialogical, ethical, and evaluative perspective that recognizes the complexity of the educational event. Meaning is understood as a historical, enunciative, and situated construction that manifests itself at the intersection of meanings, values, and ideological accents. In this framework, the subject is not a finished entity, but rather an open, intersubjective, and interobjective configuration that is constituted in relation to the other and the Other—culture—in a process of extraposition and dialogue. From this architecture, education is conceived as an ethically committed practice of meaning, where cognitive, aesthetic, and volitional dimensions are articulated. Understanding, in this context, is not only an intellectual act, but an ethical event that allows the subject to situate themselves, take responsibility, and project themselves into the world. Consequently, a critical pedagogy is proposed that recognizes the word as a means of transformation, difference as a source of meaning, and knowledge as a relational and historical practice. Thus, education ceases to focus on the transmission of content and instead orients itself toward the formation of responsible, heteronomous, and dialogical subjects, capable of inhabiting the world from a situated consciousness that is plural and open to the other. 

This article presents the implementation of the portfolio process as an active pedagogical methodology to strengthen writing skills among first-semester medical students at the National University of Colombia. This action research systematized 440 texts produced by 55 students in three phases: planning, transcription, and revision-editing. The data were analyzed using Nvivo software. The results show significant improvements in cohesion, text structure, APA citation, and expository clarity. Furthermore, the most common errors were identified, and sustained progress was evident after feedback. It is concluded that the portfolio process is an effective, replicable, and formative strategy that promotes self-reflection and improves the quality of academic writing. 

The British miniseries Adolescence, released in 2025, sparked controversy regarding the role of schools and families in addressing the risks young people face on social media, such as radical discourses that lead to violence. To guide reflection, this article focuses on analyzing two key themes of the series: cyberbullying and exposure to hate speeches, through a dialogue with the concepts of digital literacy and digital parenting. Based on this analysis, practical recommendations are proposed for fostering collaboration between schools and families to address these issues. In conclusion, by considering these elements, formative processes can be developed that actively involve parents in fostering young people's digital literacy, enabling them to critically assess the information they encounter online.