Before this class, I never thought of literacy as social or personal. I always assumed it was based on ability to read and write. After reading these articles i’m questioning if it is really that simple. It seems that literacy is based off of society because in fact, none of it is needed for personal daily use, only for interaction and societal needs. I think Scribner’s literacy as adaptation and literacy as power address this social literacy. The adaptation addresses the need for literacy in a culture. Reading signs, navigating a successful trip to the grocery store, interacting with people you come into contact with on a daily basis are all accomplished through using literacy skills in society. Power, though, is the most social reason for literacy because she argues that literacy gives one a voice, understanding and an ability to have some control in society. The illiterate are naive in some ways and easily taken advantage of by those who are literate. This means society, and way of life are defined by literacy.

But when I think about society’s relationship to literacy, I think about how we have different types of literacy for different social occasions. Like we discussed in class, literacy is not plain and simple, there are all different levels of being literate. Usually, one person is not more literate than another, they just mastered different words, phrases, etc. in their literacy. Many social uses of literacy today are communication, and making connections on the internet. The reading and writing done between peers, friends, and colleagues on the internet are often informal, slang-based, or even abbreviated, but since both parties understand what is being said, then I would say it makes them both competent in literacy. Other people are writing and reading things for work, which is still social, but often more formal and strict than writing between friends. Literacy is judged more strictly in social settings like the workplace.

There are a lot of different jobs, each with their own requirements for reading and writing. A legal position (lawyer, attorney, judge, police officer) must be able to read and write legal reports, statements, etc. This also requires the understanding of legal jargon. Similar to doctors, nurses, etc. needing to know medical jargon, and read medical charts correctly. Even my job, at a restaurant, requires a certain set of literacy skills. Taking orders and typing them into a system accurately is essential, but many things are abbreviated, have code-words or require special buttons in order for them to show up correctly to the cooks. There is a certain amount of literacy required by the customer, also, especially when reading the menu, and paying for their meal. These do not seem like literacy practices, they seem like basic skills to navigate society, but that just proves that literacy is driven by societal needs.

My final thought on literacy in society, is the way we are categorized/judged by our literacy knowledge in society. Getting a job (even that requires little reading and writing) can be determined by the level of literacy. What makes this interesting, though, is that since we have no solid definition of being literate, the judgement is always determined by the one perceiving you. While someone may be competent in society using their literacy skills, the person in control (hiring manager, boss, parent, peer, etc.) decides whether or not you are literate based on their idea of literacy. This is somewhat discouraging, because in society, literacy can define you, yet we cannot define literacy.

Hello everyone. I am Leslie Anderson, a Junior at Chico State. I am an English Education major and hope to become a teacher. I am from a really small town (population 190 people) called Lemon Cove, CA. I attended Long Beach State for two years right out of High School and even though I loved it, I was tired of LA County and southern California so I transferred to Chico last semester. So far I have enjoyed it here. I work at La Hacienda Mexican Restaurant, if any of you know where that is.

As I read Szwed  I compared my literacy to what he was saying. But now that I think about it, I am not a good example of many of things he was talking about because like the rest of you in this class, I am interested in English. We all read and write much more than people, so of course our literacy and our opinion on literacy is formed by our experience as English majors. For me, I enjoy reading books assigned in class, and I often write stories, poems, etc. for fun. So I am using formal-style literacies often. When I ask my non-English major friends about reading they have a whole different take on it. The boys normally laugh and tell me they have never actually finished a  novel and if I ask them what they write, their answer is either the bare necessity of school or work. Girls often have read slightly more, but still not much and much of their writing is letters, social media stuff, blogs, etc. that are written informally. So I realized I am not a good representation of literacy within my age group. But I wouldn’t say any of those people are less literate than I am, we just have different forms of literacy.

In my generation or age group right now there is a mix of literacy styles, ranging from very traditional and formal to text and internet speak style literacies. For the most part, we all know both styles, even if we rely more heavily on one than other. But I begin to wonder, if lacking one or the other makes us illiterate. Maybe the new form of literacy is being able to use both. Are older and technology challenged people considered illiterate because they cannot read something in text speak? And are young, computer-savvy kids illiterate because they can know the meaning of lol without second thought but can’t actually read the words laugh out loud? This article really made me think about literacy and consider the changes being made to it all the time. Then again, I pick up a classic novel and sometimes struggle to understand the meaning because words have changed and structure revised. To the standards of that time, I would be illiterate but clearly in today’s world thats not the case anymore. So change in what we define as literate has been changing over time, but the transition stage, (our generations experience) is that one that struggles most to understand literacy.

I agree with other people in class who say that the basis of being literate is our ability to communicate effectively with one another. As long as there is some commonality that we can all make sense of, then we are literate enough. But personally, I struggle to understand if that is ever possible because I speak, write and read in a language that is the same as my family, friends, and boyfriend, and even though we are all literate we misunderstand each other constantly, we get totally different understandings of the same novel and we write in totally different styles. Of course, the basic meanings of words are all agreed on and understood but just because we are all literate by standard definition doesn’t mean we can communicate effectively or really understand each other. I know this last paragraph was totally off topic, but I just started thinking about this and wrote it down.  Hope that’s okay.