Introduction
The first point to be made is that literacy impinges on people in their daily lives, whether or not they regularly read books or do much writing. Literacy is embedded in these activities of ordinary life. It is not something which is done just at school or at work. It is carried out in a variety of settings.
Secondly, people can be involved in reading or in writing, and they may participate in various ways, each treating the written word differently. (3-4)
Using an everyday event as a starting point provides a distinct view of literacy. The most common views of literacy start out from the educational settings in which literacy is typically taught, that is, the school classroom. The dominant definitions in society, then, are school-based definitions of literacy. These views of literacy are often at odds with what people experience in their everyday lives. (5)
Everyday literacy gives a richer view of literacy which demands a new definition of literacy, a new way of thinking about what is involved in reading and writing. (5)
Chapter 2: Talking About Literacy
What sort of activity is literacy? (14)
Chapter 3: The Social Basis of Literacy
To repeat, this approach starts from people's uses of literacy, not from their formal learning of literacy. (34)
Literacy has a history. Our individual life histories contain many literacy events from early childhood onwards which the present is built upon. We change, and as children and adults are constantly learning about literacy. (35)
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Defining an ECOLOGICAL view of literacy:
To repeat, this approach starts from people's uses of literacy, not from their formal learning of literacy. It also starts from everyday life and from the everyday activities which people are involved in. It is important to stress that education has not been used as a starting point and by the time discussion gets to schools and learning there will be a different view of what literacy is and what learning is. (34)
The examples I will be using in this chapter are mainly taken from a study of reading and writing in Lancaster, England, which I have been involved in. It was a four-year study of the role of literacy in people's everyday lives, carried out mainly through interviews and detailed observation, reported in detail in the book Local Literacies (Barton and Hamilton, 1998). (34)
This view of literacy starts from everyday events. (34)
We need a social view of literacy (#s 1-4)...we need a pyschological view of literacy (#s 5-6)...Any literacy event has a history, both at the personal and the cultural level (#s 7-8):
- Literacy is a social activity and can best be described in terms of people's literacy practices which they draw upon in literacy events.
- People have different literacies which they make use of, associated with different domains of life. Examining different cultures or historical periods reveals more literacies.
- People's literacy practices are situated in broader social relations. This makes it necessary to describe the social setting of literacy events, including the ways in which social institutions support particular literacies.
- Literacy is based upon a system of symbols. it is a symbolic system used for communication, and as such exists in relation to other systems of information exchange. It is a way of representing the world to others.
- Literacy is a symbolic system used for representing the world to ourselves. Literacy is part of our thinking. It is part of the technology of our thought.
- We have awareness, attitudes and values with respect to literacy and these attitudes and values guide our actions.
- Literacy has a long history. Our individual life histories contain many literacy events from early childhood onwards which the present is built upon. We change, and as children and adults are constantly learning about literacy.
- A literacy event also has a social history. Current practices are created out of the past. (34-35)
An ecological approach is neither innatist or environmentalist; it is about the dynamic interaction of the two, how people fit into the environment, how they form it and are formed by it. (49).
...in order to understand literacy it is important to examine particular events where reading and writing are used. Focusing on the particular is an integral part of an ecological approach; this is different from other approaches which place an emphasis on broad generalizations. An ecological approach to literacy is very cautious of the broad generalizations often associated with reading and writing. It starts out from a belief that it is necessary first to understand something within a particular situation before looking to generalities. This approach suggests certain research methodologies, such as ethnography, and rests on a particular theory of what knowledge is. (36)
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Practices and Events
...there are all sorts of occasions in everyday life where the written word has a role. We can refer to these as literacy events. (35) ...any event that involves the written word (35)
In people's everyday lives they can be involved in a wide range of literacy events. (36)
There are common patterns in using reading and writing in a particular situation. People bring their cultural knowledge to an activity. It is useful to refer to these ways of using literacy as literacy practices. (36)
Together events and practices are the two basic units of analysis of the social activity of literacy. Literacy events are the particular activities where literacy has a role; they may be regularly repeated activities. Literacy practices are the general cultural ways of utilizing literacy which people draw upon a literacy event. For instance, in the example mentioned earlier of a man discussing the contents of the local paper with a friend, the two of them sitting in the living room planning a letter to the newspaper is a literacy event. In deciding who does what, where and when it is done, along with the associated ways of talking and the ways of writing, the two participants make use of their literacy practices. (37)
Literacies and Domains
There is not one way of reading and writing, there is not one set of practices. (37)
Where [...] different practices cluster into coherent groups it is very useful to talk in terms of them being different literacies. A literacy is a stable, coherent, identifiable configuration of practices such as legal literacy, or the literacy of specific workplaces. (38)
There is not a single dimension on which [literacies] can be placed from simple to complex or from easy to difficult. It is important to move beyond the idea, often implicit in literacy programmes for children and for adults, of there being a simple dimension from basic to complex forms of literacy. Literacies do not exist on some scale starting with basic or simple forms and going on to complex or higher forms. So-called simple and complex forms of literacy are in fact different literacies serving different purposes. They do not lead on from one to the other in any obvious way. (38)
The starting point for detailed examination of literacy practices is to realize that literacy may be different in different domains and that school, for example, is but one domain of literacy activity. Other domains may be just as significant. (39)
Broader Social Relations
...situating literacy practices within broader social relations...
People's literacy practices do not reflect abilities in any straightforward way, but rather they are to do with what people feel is or is not appropriate. People learn that there are appropriate practices for specific roles and there are inappropriate practices. Viewing abilities like this represents an important shift in terms of how we think about literacy. The move towards describing people's actions as relative to the situation they are in is a significant step; it represents a move away from overreliance on the idea of a set of fixed abilities which is common in much discussion of reading and writing. (41)
A second aspect of situating literacy practices within broader social relations is that in everyday life people act within various networks. These networks have broad functions covering work, child rearing and other areas of social activity and they are often networks of reciprocal support. Literacy activities are exchanged within these networks. (41)
Literacy as Communication
Literacy events typically involve a written text and talk around the text. (43)
Literacy as Thought
As well as communicating--representing the world to others--literacy is important in representing the world to ourselves. It is part of our thinking; it is part of the technology of thought. Language and literacy are used to define reality, not only to others, but also to ourselves. Literacy, then, as a role in the ecology of the mind. (44)
Values and Awareness
People make sense of literacy as a social phenomenon and their social construction of literacy lies at the root of their attitudes towards literacy and their actions. (46)
Literacy is embedded in institutional contexts which shape the practices and social meanings attached to reading and writing. Within these social contexts, the act of reading or writing becomes symbolic. The very act of reading or writing takes on a social meaning: it can be an act of defiance, or an act of solidarity, an act of conforming, or a symbol of change. We assert our identity through literacy. (46)
Every person, adult or child, has a view of literacy, about what it is and what it can do for them, about its importance and its limitations. Everyone has a way of talking about literacy, they use a set of metaphors to do with literacy, they have what is in effect a theory of literacy. People can talk about reading and writing: their views are also expressed in their attitudes and their actions... Attitudes are also at the heart of whether or not people think they have a 'problem' with reading and writing and whether or not they think it is appropriate to attend adult literacy classes. (46)
Drawing attention to people's awareness and attitudes is also a way of bringing human agency, bringing intentions. An active view of literacy has people with intentions, meanings, and values at its centre. The literacy practices we have today, the schooling we have today, the technologies we have today all result from active human decisions based on people's values. Related to this, all literacy activities have a purpose for people. People do things for a reason, people have purposes. In general, people do not read in order to read, nor write in order to write; rather, people read and write in order to do other things, in order to achieve other ends. (47)
Individual History
Literacy has a history. Our individual life histories contain many literacy events from early childhood onwards which the present is built upon. We change, and as children and adults are constantly learning about literacy. (47)
Every person has a history, and for the discussion here, every person has a literacy history. This goes back to early childhood and the first encounters with literacy practices in home literacy events; it continues with involvement in community and school practices, and on into adulthood with its verying and changing demands. At any point in time a person's choices are based on the possibilities provided by their past experiences. (48)
There are several ways in which literacy is bound up with changes in people's lives. The demands of life change: there are times in people's lives when they need to read and write more, and times when they need to read and write less. New demands can result from changes in work, or they can arise from changes in people's personal lives... In addition, people want to make changes in their lives, and reading and writing can enable them to make such changes. (48)
People learn in their everyday lives and not enough attention has been paid to this everyday or vernacular learning. (48)
One implication of this view of learning is that children are not incomplete beings and adults complete... Notions of incomplete literacy or restricted literacy do not make a lot of sense within this framework. There are not component skills which can be added separately like building blocks to make a complete building. (49)
Social History
Recent history should make it clear how current practices are based on the past, and how they are not inevitable and unchanging, but have developed out of past practices. (49)
Chapter 4: Research Literacy Practices
...an integrated perspective on literacy (52)
...literacy can be seen as a set of social practices which people draw on in literacy events. From this perspective, literacy is located in interactions between people, rather than being a decontextualized cognitive skill--an activity, rather than just an internal attribute. (52)
different literacies are associated with different domains of life (52)
Vernacular literacies--literacies associated with people's private, home, and everyday lives, outside the domains of power and influence--are often hidden. This account of literacy calls for research to make visible and valuable aspects of people's lives which have previously often been unseen and ignored. (52)
...literacy practices are purposeful, embedded in people's broader life goals and practices. Rather than looking at whether people do or do not possess literacy skills, in order to develop a full understanding of what literacy means in people's lives it is necessary to look at how they use literacy as part of the process of making sense of their lives, representing the world to themselves, and working towards achieving what they want, using the resources available to them. Building up relationships with people over time enables the researcher to come to understand what people's broader purposes and life goals are, and how literacy figures within these. (52-53)
...this approach situates literacy in social and individual history. Current literacy events and practices are created out of the past, in an ongoing process of maintenance, development and change. Literacy practices are therefore not absolute and fixed for all time, either for an individual or for a society. In addition these changes often occur through processes of informal learning and sense-making, outside of a formal teaching situation. Therefore, research into literacy acquisition should not merely focus on classroom or school-based learning, but needs also to look beyond this to the way in which people acquire new practices in other domains, such as the home, the workplace and the neighborhood association. (53)
As pointed out earlier, literacy practices vary in different domains of life, such as the home, education and the workplace. This means that there may be different practices and that they may be valued in different ways. (67)
The workplace is a particularly important site for the study of literacy practices. It is where many people spend the majority of their waking hours, and for many people, work constitutes an important part of their identities. (66)
Understanding the ways in which reading and writing differs in different contexts is an essential aspect of literacy learning. (66) --use this for the "Implications/Pedagogical Suggestions" section of the article?
This is a common pattern in ethnographies of literacies in the workplace. These demonstrate that 'literacy skills' in the workplace are not decontextualized competencies that individuals have and can put into action anywhere. Rather, literacy in the workplace depends on who peopl are, their backgrounds, cultures and opportunities, and the contexts in which the literacy practices are taking place. This means that people's identities in the workplace, the ways workplaces are organized, and the incentives or disincentives people perceive for displaying skills all influence the literacies that people engage in. (67)
There is not some finite checklist of literacies, so that at some point a society has complete literacy. Literacies come and go in society and exist in response to specific social practices; old literacies die out and new ones are created. (69)
Chapter 9: The Roots of Literacy
Learning does not relate to just an individual, but it includes the situation, the activity and the participants in it. Also, learning is not a passive activity, as many simple views of the reading process imply; rather it is an active one (as the word 'activity' itself suggests!); the child learns by being involved in an activity, by being part of the interaction. Learning is a social activity and it often involves children changing the ways they participate in an event. Learning does not just take place in situations officially designated for learning such as the classroom but it is a component of all activities. (133)
Learning is always in a context. (134)
If we put together these various parts, the participants, the situation, the activity, a mechanism and ways of participation, we have the requirements for learning. (135)
...children's language is located in social interaction in particular settings (138)
Chapter 10: Emergent Literacy
The point of this chapter in ecological terms is to demonstrate the strong social basis of children's early learning of literacy (141)
In contemporary society literacy, schooling and education are totally intertwined to the extent that successful schooling is largely measured in terms of abilities at literacy, and levels of literacy in different countries are often measured in terms of the number of years of schooling children have received. (174)
Schools are the places associated with the teaching and learning of literacy in our society; it is very hard to free ourselves from their perspective, and to take a look at literacy from a perspective other than the educational one (175).
In all this discussion there are two quite distinct directions in which there can be links between home and school. First, there is whether school practices are reflected in home practices: whether children at home are being prepared for schools' ways of knowing. Second, there is the question of whether home practices are being acknowledged in schools; it is this latter question which is often ignored. As part of this second question it is also true that home literacy does not cease when children enter school, literacy does not shift from home to school. The home environment continues, with its own practices around reading and writing. (For some children, this presents a conflict of values which they have to resolve either by identifying with school or by maintaining home values and not accepting those of the school.) (182)
Chapter 14: Some Implications of an Ecological View
Literacy practices beyond school are extremely varied, and often quite different from those in school. (206)
It is important to see school as one context for learning amongst others. (207)
In everyday life people do not read and write without a purpose. This supports the idea of reading and writing for real purposes in schools. Exercises, materials and activities which only involve reading and writing for their own sakes should be avoided. (207)
Children can reflect on their own and others' literacy practices and become ethnographers of literacy. 'documenting why, when, where and how their parents, grandparents, neighbours or role-models read and write'. (207)
'Adults assessments of their own literacy is defined by their current needs and aspirations in varying roles and contexts (207).
Home-school liaison is not just about initiating parents into school practices and expectations. It should be a two-way exchange and could include collecting information about community practices to inform what happens in schools. (208)
Children tend to feel excluded when their own literacy practices are not valued by the school. (208).
...a socially based view [of literacy] can provide a coherent alternative way of talking about literacy...and a different set of metaphors. To realize that there are different literacy practices in a culture, that there are different literacies and different domains, would be a good starting point. (210)
People have their own needs and purposes based on their own lives. (212)
Literacy work for adults and for children needs to enable them to learn how to learn. (212)
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