“Super Literacy” vs. “Cultural Literacy”

The concept of “autonomous” versus “ideological” literacy was a very complex and interesting topic. The idea of “autonomous” literacy is the idea that there should be a singular foundation for literacy imposed on all nations/cultures/societies/etc. by the “super power” literacy. Basically it’s like the colonialism of literacy. “Oh, you have a savage literacy mindset, so we (westernization) are going to come in and show you the right way to be literate”. Street states that the purpose of autonomous literacy is to “[introduce] literacy to poor, ‘illiterate’ people, villages, urban youth, etc.” which will “have the effect of enhancing their cognitive skills, improving their economic prospects, making them better citizens, regardless of the social and economic conditions that accounted for their ‘illiteracy’ in the first place” (77).

This model of literacy is mindboggling and completely negates the importance of cultural significance of literacy. I understand the idea of having a “literacy foundation” and how that will make this whole concept of literacy that much easier, but let’s face it, when has something worthwhile been easy. This also goes against basically everything that we’ve read thus far this semester, which has all talked about how literacy isn’t built in a linear fashion, but is constructed through sponsors, social influences, cultural and economic necessities, etc.

“Ideological” literacy is described as “autonomous” literacy’s polar opposite. This literacy “offers a more culturally sensitive view of literacy practice” (77). While autonomous literacy dealt with the “super power” of literacy, ideological literacy embodies everything else (essentially). However, while ideological literacy may seem like a more well rounded and accepting model of literacy, it has it’s downsides as well. For instance, our group discussed how difficult it would be for a teacher to have to be specially trained based on the needs of a specific community (and for every community that teacher taught in after that). What are group ended up agreeing on is that there needs to be a marriage between the two models that embodies both the literacy needs of a community, as well as a literacy foundation. However, even this can be argued against. I believe that the community must decide which type of model they wish to follow, or how much of each model they wish to adopt.

When watching the Mike Wesch video, I couldn’t help but wonder if the internet could be considered the link between these two models. Through digital space we can find both local and global information. We can communicate with friends who live across the street, who live on the other side of the world.  Content on the internet can be viewed in a variety of ways, whether it’s a youtube video, a news article, aTED talk, a blog, a tweet, a status update…the list goes on and on. The point is, if we want to talk about New Literacy Studies, we need to talk about how digital culture is helping shape literacy as we know it. The real question is why aren’t we using these tools in the classroom every day?