What I like and find interesting in Brandt’s “Accumulating Literacy” article is when she talks about two men from different backgrounds and how they developed and applied their literacy in their everyday lives. Both accounts show that they had to learn new literacy practices due to a change of the times and use of new technologies, although some of the old literacy practices haven’t been forgotten or left behind. These practices may get integrated with the newer literacy practices but both new and old literacy practices help to develop a persons skills and knowledge in literacy. The article talks about all the equipment Sam May used in times of WWII to write his reports and of Charles Randolph’s memorization and Underwood typewriter usage as part of their literacy practices, which are now considered old literacy practices.

Memorization, typewriters, pencils and paper seem to have been left behind in favor of the new technologies out there. Those literacy practices are considered old school but in my opinion I think it can be helpful to have those types of literacy skills (I mean come on, think about it, what if your computer suddenly crashes in the middle of writing a paper that is due tomorrow or in the next few days and all you have is a typewriter left to use? You never know it could happen) and some people still find them valuable skills to have. I admire a person that can memorize a whole lengthy speech; that is pretty amazing. I have had to do this before for various occasions but the last time I can remember was for my senior English class in high school. My teacher gave us a bunch of words, vocabulary or any words that have to do with some aspect of English (example: Elizabethan theatre, meter, onomatopoeia, etc.) and we would make flash cards and quiz our fellow classmates on the definitions or associations of the word for the class and it would help us memorize them so that at the time of our midterm and final we would be able to fill 3-4 blank pages of paper of everything we learned in our class from memorization. At the time I didn’t think I could retain all that information, but I did it. I memorized many words and what not and was able to recall them and fill all those pages of blank paper. That was pretty amazing but by now I have already forgotten as many of us do when a class comes to an end.

I may not use the memorization technique that much but I still do like to use pencils or pens and paper to write besides my laptop. I like the feeling of having a writing instument in my hand and a piece of paper underneath being scribbled on, it feels so much more concrete. I feel like I can do better writing this way first than just typing my words/thoughts out on a word processor because I can scribble and scratch out any words and look over what I have written down, while using a laptop all I have to do is delete, cut and paste so I feel as if I can’t see all the workings of my thought process as I can with written words on a piece of paper.

As far as my family’s literacy practices go, I only talked to my mom. She told me that she first started reading or learning to read in the first grade, so she was about 7 at the time. She told me that she remebers having a teacher’s aid come into her class to read to her and the other kids in class and that the books were really simple books with short sentences, she was trying to remember the name of the books she would be read but couldn’t remember the name “Jan” or “Jane” something or other is all she could recall but I know what she was talking about. I’m sure we’ve all had those books that were popular to read in our own respective times that have a similar character that goes through different situations like learning manners and learning how to share (I remember reading those books). My mom told me that she never really got pushed or encouraged to read by my grandma and grandpa but she would read outside of school because she did like it and she still does like to read (mostly non-fiction).

As far as her writing goes she said she never really learned how to write until she attended Yuba college. She had always placed low in her reading and writing tests that she had to take in school (I’m assuming for tests such as STAR testing). While on the subject my mom recalled that when she was learning to write when she was young, the same teachers aid that would read to her class helped her with her writing and would make her write with her right hand (my mom is left-handed). She said that the aid would pull back her left hand and hold it behind her back and make her write with her right hand. Back then they thought of it as weird or not normal since there aren’t many left-handed people, my mom even had meetings with her mom and teacher as if being left-handed was some kind of disease or illness, which is just so ridiculous but I mean people discriminate and freak out over things that they don’t even understand. So… uh, yeah. That’s all I got.

What I get from Brandt, Williams, Scribner, and Szwed when it comes to social literacy and their views on social literacy, is that social literacy is connected to employment, social class/status, power, education, progress, success, etc. It is seen as a means to successfully maintain oneself in a world that depends so much on literacy in many different aspects of life. It is seen as essential, a necessity to be literate. The simplest of tasks require literacy. Social literacy is viewed as the most important type of literacy and one that is needed in everyday life activites outside of ones personal or individual realm of life.

As opposed to social literacy, individual literacy is determined by an individual and how far and for what reason they want to take their literacy skills. Indvidual literacy focuses on the particular goals and purposes that one has for themselves as opposed to what society pushes on people and what society focuses on as being important in literacy.

Going back to social literacy, all four authors talked about social literacy in terms of education/school and in the workplace. They focus on the importance of being literate to be successful and to achieve desirable status in society. Social literacy is obtained and applied in different ways and in different areas of life and the type of literacy one learns is different depending on their socioeconomic standing, as well as their geographic standing. Not everyone has the same literacy skills or practices as another individual.

On the subject of social literacy for the sake of a job or workplace, there is a certain kind of literacy needed. There are ways to go about the work one does in the workplace and when it comes to obtaining employment, as in composing a resumé or writing a cover letter. These are important literacy skills to have in ones social aspect of life, but different jobs have different forms of social literacy skills that work best for a certian job as Brandt demonstrates in her case studies. The fact remains that literacy is seen as a social thing and important in and for the social aspect of ones life.

Hi. My name is Danielle Mota. I’m from the small town of Gridley, Ca. I am an English Studies major. I transferred to Chico State last semester from Butte College. I’m interested in getting into editing and/or publishing as far as a career goes, but I am also considering some form of counseling as a career so I am considering minoring in Psychology.

In relation to Szwed’s article on literacy, I find my literacy to be split in two. I am literate in a formal aspect and literate in an informal aspect and I find it easy to switch between the two realms as we were discussing in class. I feel that literacy is a broad topic to cover since there is the formal and informal, and private and public settings to literacy. I don’t think that literacy can really be concretely defined, only as far as being able to read and write, but there are different writing styles and different ways in which people read considering all the languages and translations for words out there. I think that as long as we don’t mix our informal literacy with our formal literacy (as far as academics and the work place goes) then the way we write/communicate with others shouldn’t be made into that big of a deal. I know when to use text speak/writing or maybe I should say technology speak/writing (texting, Facebook, Instagram etc.) and when to use a more formal or academic way of speaking/writing.

I do like to read and write, but sadly not when I am required to do it, even though I do do it and can do it and am good at it (so I’ve been told, at writing that is). I don’t write as much for fun as I do read. I write poems once in a great while but that’s about it and reading I do more often for my own enjoyment but only when I’m on break from school. I read and write for school for the sake of having to do it and needing to do it but also wanting to earn a good education and earn a degree, and land a good job for myself when it comes down to it.

Going back Szwed’s article, something that I found interesting and that I agree with is when he said, “But the stunning fact is that we do not fully know what literacy is,” and what I agree with is that we don’t fully know what literacy is because literacy is different for everybody and maybe we will never fully know what literacy is because we are individuals and can’t fully comprehend or understand what literacy is to someone else that is not ourselves.