Educ. 45 Literacies and Social Identities
Fall, 2001 Diane Downer Anderson
Office: Pearson 203 x8065
Office hours: Thursday, 2-4PM danders1
Home: 610-328-3664
Class: Wednesdays, 1:15-4, in the Educational Materials Center, Pearson
You learn to read so you can identify the reality in which you live, so that you can become a protagonist of history rather than a spectatorÉWords only cover the experience of livingÉ the very least you can do with your life is to figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is to live inside that hope. Not admire it from a distance but live right in it, under its roof. What I want is so simple I almost canÕt say it: elementary kindness. Enough to eat, enough to go around. The possibility that kids might one day grow up to be neither the destroyers nor the destroyed.
Barbara Kingsolver
Animal Dreams (1990)
p. 326, 325, 299
Kingsolver gives the reader a scene of reading/literacy theory in her novel Animal Dreams that expresses issues of power, politics, class, dichotomy, and social action. Although many of us, myself included, might be romantically or ideologically drawn to her sentiments, they also represent a positioned view of literacy. In this course we will take up these issues and moreÉ
Course description: Literacy has traditionally been conceived of as unitary, cognitive, functional, and/or academic; it has been closely tied to hegemonies of print over oral literacies, and majority discourses over minority discourses. Recent research and theories, from the fields of anthropology, sociology, social and cultural psychology, and education, have exposed the social and cultural aspects of literacies and their meanings as both political and personal, for groups and individuals. This course will explore reading and writing research and theories, and the intersections and meanings of literacies, sociocultural contexts, and social identities. Participants will be expected to read, write, teach, and learn with others. They will work to understand the ways in which literacy practices constitute various social identities and positions, and the ways in which social identities shape and proscribe literacy practices. Literacies of competence, practice, and sacredness will be examined. Local, social, academic, and historical contexts will be explored.
Topics include: reading and writing in school; orality and literacy; identities of gender, race, class, religion, sexual orientation, and ideology; literacy programs and policies; academic literacies; and locally situated and participatory literacies. The course will draw from readings in anthropology, sociology, linguistics, history; literary/reader response theory, and education.
Fieldwork is required and will be done through the Learning for Life Program on the campus at Swarthmore College. Additional literacy training will be provided by Ms. Julie OÕDell of The Center for Literacy during class time.
Required books:
Either: Sapphire. (1996). Push. New York: Random House.
OR
Schlinck, B. (1997). The Reader. NY: Pantheon Books.
Paulson, G. (1993). Nightjohn. New York: Bantam, Doubleday, Dell.
OR
Hesse, K. (1998) Just Juice. NY: Scholastic
Dawson, G. & Glaubman, R. (2001). Life is so good. NY: Random House.
Fingeret, H. A. & Drennon, C. (1997). Literacy for Life: Adult learners, new practices. NY: TeachersÕ College Press.
Heath, S. B. (1983). Ways with words: Language, life, and Work in Communities and Classrooms. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Shannon, P. (1990) The Struggle to Continue: Progressive reading Instruction in the United States.
Weekly readings on E-Res are noted with an asterisk*.
Requirements:
1. Class: You must attend all classes, workshops provided by the Center for Literacy, and participate in class.
2. Field experience: You must participate as a learning partner with a participating Swarthmore college staff member for 40 hours during the semester. (2-3 hours per week; the CFL training sessions will count towards this.) You will write weekly reflections on working with a learning partner that you will submit as a learning log to a private web site at the Center For Literacy. You will also submit the Goal Attainment Scaling Form to the CFL for evaluation purposes. (Julie will explain these to you early in the semester.)
3. Occasional one-two page synthesis of and/or reflections upon an assigned reading or experience, to be shared in class.
4. Formally Graded Assignments
2 auto/biographical papers:
paper #1: literacy/reading/writing/speaking autobiography
paper #2: literacy/reading/writing/speaking biography/ethnography WITH your learning partner. You and your learning partner will decide how to evaluate this paper and grade it. (a reflection on this will be due at the end of the semester)
Scenes of literacy project and analysis:
(scenes from the media or literature; interviews/conversation with an ÒotherÓ person; literacy vignette/memoir; interview or recording of reading/writing/literacy conversation)
Final Paper/Project :
A. Videography and analysis --
Sometime during the semester obtain permission from another learning partnership to videotape a Learning for Life session. Transcribe selected sections and write a paper in which you analyze the Learning for Life session based on the many things youÕve learned this semester.
OR:
B. More traditional literature review/essay --
Literature review in particular field/aspect of literacy
Literacy program or policy evaluation
Deeper interpretation of text, including media text
Comparison of texts or programs
Program evaluation design for Learning for Life or another campus
literacy project/program
Proposal for literacy program/curriculum which addresses a key issue or
question in the field
The final paper/project will be discussed more thoroughly later in the semester.
Grading: For each paper/project, I will try to be very explicit about my expectations and the criteria with which your work will be judged. In general, your work will be ÒweighedÓ in the following proportions:
Learning for Life partnership: 25%
Class participation: 10%
Final paper/project: 25%
Literacy autobiography 15%
Literacy biography/ethnography 15%
Scenes of literacy and analysis 10%
Class 1: Scenes of Literacy -- September 5
Literacy Interviews; conceptions of literacy; course overview
Class 2: Adults and Literacies -- September 12
Read: [quickly and generously] Dawson & Glaubman (2000); [Skim for key ideas and concepts; mostly for use during the semester] Fingeret (1997); Wagner & Venezky *( 1999; 3 articles that stand in conversation w/ one another); Walkerdine* (1994), Gardener* (1991).
Class 3: The Great Debate -- September 19
Read, in the following order: Chall* (1967); Chomsky*, Smith*, Pearson* (1976); Anderson et al.* (1994); Adams & Bruck * (1995); Daniel et al. * (1999); Dahl * (1999).
Title page
Table of Contents
One chapter of about 5 pages
Class 4: Dichotomies of Literacy -- September 26
Read: Goody* (1977); Ong* (1982); Graff* (1979); Gee* (1990); Street (1994?); Mahiri* (1998); Lugones* (1990); Coles* (1993).
Class 5: Children and Literacies I -- October 3
Read: Heath Part I, (1983)
Class 6: Children and Literacies II -- October 10
Read: Finish Heath; Finn* Ch. 12 (1999); Maybin* (1994)
Literacy biography/ethnography due
Class 7: Scenes of Literacy II -- October 24
Read: Paulson OR Hesse, And Schlink OR Sapphire
Class 8: Historical Contexts -- October 31
Read: Shannon (1990); Anderson (1988); Brantlinger (1998)
Class 9: Stance, Positions, Response -- November 7
Read: Davies & Harre* (1990); Ochs* (1993); Tannen* (1993); Coates* (1993); Rosenblatt* (1994); Britton* (1984); Altmann* (1994);Dickinson* (1970);Trousdale* (1995); Benton* (1983 & 1992); Enciso* (1994)
Taylor* (1996); Fouss* (1994);Eckert & McConnell-Ginet* (1995); Davies * (1997); Baker* (1996); de Pourbaix* (1998); Koballa et al.* (1997).
Class 11: Social Literacies II -- November 21
Read:
The New London Group* (1997); Friere* (1994); Finn Ch. 13 * (1999); hooks* (1990); Rockhill* (1994); Ivanic* (1998).
Proposal for final paper/videography due
Reflection on biography/ethnography due.
Class 13: Scenes from Learning for Life --December 5:
Final paper/project drafts due, copies/presentations to be shared in classÉ
The following books may be useful to you in your work with your learning partner; they are on the Ed. 45 shelf in the Educational Materials Center:
Pauk, W. 1997). How to Study in College, Sixth Edition.NY: Houghton Mifflin.
Kahn, N. (1998). More Learning in Less Time: A guide for students, professionals, career-changers, and lifelong learners, Fifth Edition. Gwynedd Valley, PA: Ways-to Books.
Stillman, P. R. (1989). Families Writing. Cincinnati, OH: WritersÕ Digest Books.
Creme, L. & Lea, M. R. (1997). Writing at University: A guide for students. Philadelphia: Open University Press.
There are additional articles on E-Res that are not on the syllabus; please take a look at them as they might be of particular interest to some of you.