The Wheel of Literacy: "Weights, strengths, and directions"

The first step that Travis and I took when trying to create our schema was coming up with a mutual definition for the term, “literacy”.  By establishing a concrete definition of “literacy”, we were able to create multiple connections between literacy and the external factors that support the definition.  Johndan Johnson-Eilola describes the supporting elements of literacy as “social and technological forces of varying weights, strengths, and directions,” and it is this description that grounds our schema and defines the direction that we went in, in terms of our choice of key words and the connections between them (454).  While the overall configuration of our schema was inspired by Elaine Richardson’s application of the center-periphery model, we were able to structure the schema in order to synthesize the texts and demonstrate the main components of literacy (97).

As challenging as it was to establish the connections among all five texts, it became evident that there are five key terms that are responsible for creating Johnson-Eilola’s explanation of “literacy”.  Deborah Brandt lends the idea of accumulating literacy as “piling up” and “spreading out” of text and information, which integrates technology and acts as a mobile channel for distribution of literacy (652).   The social influence of literacy, mainly coined as “Identity”, encompasses Elaine Richardson’s argument that “language is structure and use…used systematically by human beings and are governed by our culture, social practices, and conditions under which we are communicating” (101). Concurrently, the term “identity” is integrated by Richard Ohmann’s description of literacy as “an activity of social groups, and a necessary feature of some kinds of social organization” (685). 

A common thread between the readings was the discussion of the introduction of technology in composition and how technology is altering the definition of literacy from a former belief that is rooted in a more traditional viewpoint.  We wanted to demonstrate this significance by pairing the implementation of technology with “symbolic-analysis,” as introduced by Johnson-Eilola (459).  Patricia Bizzell discusses “foundationalism” and the lengths one must take to avoid the “foundationalism of humanist literacy work,” which is represented by the “Gatekeeping” category (148).  The influence of the changing definition of “literacy” is also in response to Ohmann’s integration of market forces, such as mass media and public education. He connects this concept with technology and cultural identity when asking, “Isn’t the functional literacy rate just about what you’d expect, given how schooling relates to the needs and life chances of the working class? Shouldn’t we expect similar results in computer literacy?” (686). 

Demonstrating the relationship that these terms have with the evolving definition of literacy assist in creating a conversation between Johnson-Eilola, Bizzell, Ohmann, Richardson, and Brandt.  Representing equal importance and influence that these terms have on defining “literacy” was vital in the creation of our schema, thus allowing us to expand on the existing notion that literacy is an ever-changing concept.


Works Cited

Bizzell, Patricia. “Arguing about Literacy.” College English 50.2 (1988): 141-53.

Brandt, Deborah. “Accumulating Literacy: Writing and Learning to Write in the Twentieth Century.” College English 57 (1995): 649-68.

Johnson-Eilola, Johndan. “Negative Spaces: From Production to Connection in Composition.” Literacy Theory in the Age of the Internet. Ed. Todd Taylor and Irene Ward. New York: Columbia UP, 1998. 17-33. Rptd. in Computers in the Composition Classroom: A Critical Sourcebook. Ed. Michelle Sidler, Richard Morris, and Elizabeth Overman Smith. New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2007. 454-468.

Ohmann, Richard. “Literacy, Technology, and Monopoly Capital.” College English 47.7 (1985): 675-89.

Richardson, Elaine. “‘English-Only,’ African American Contributions to Standardized Communication Structures, and the Potential for Social Transformation.” Cross-Language Relations in Composition, eds. Bruce Horner, Min-Zhan Lu, and Paul Kei Matsuda. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 2010. 97-112.