Language and Literacy Theories and Practices

Defining literacy and language

Introduction to Language and Literacy
Theories and Practices core module

Created by Dr. Ilse Fouche & Prof. Belinda Mendelowitz

​Create a concept map on a blank piece of
paper, turned to landscape format, with language
as a term on the one side, and literacy as a term on the other side. Update this throughout the lesson.

Open Ended

What is language?

Open Ended

What is literacy?

Open Ended

What are the relationships between them?

Defining literacy
and language

Read the three basic definitions below.
What is missing from these definitions?

• “Literacy is understood to be the ability to read and write and was ‘formed as an antithesis to illiteracy’ in 1883” (OED department, 1980 in Janks, 2010, p. 2).

• “Literacy is a discrete set of skills that can be taught in similar ways across varying contexts; It is value-free literacy and, as such, can be applied in analogous ways despite the very different needs and experiences of learners” (Mills & Davis, 1997, p. 3)
  
  

• Language is a tool for accurate and correct communication.

Exploring
contemporary
views of literacy and
language

Now we are going to look at definitions that encapsulate a much deeper, more nuanced and more contemporary views of literacy and language.

(i) Read the comments that follow and think about the different views of language and literacy represented by each.

(ii) In groups, discuss your response to these different ideas. Which ideas resonate with you? Which ideas do you oppose? Give reasons for your answers.

(iii) In groups, discuss what the implications are of these different ideas for how one defines literacy and language and implications for teaching

Defining
Literacy

“Literacy is primarily something people do;
it is an activity, located in the space between
thought and text. Literacy does not just reside in people’s heads as a set of skills to be learned. Like all human activity, literacy is essentially social, and it is located in the interaction between people” (Barton & Hamilton,
1998, p. 3).

“Literacy is the ability to decode, encode and make meanings using written texts and symbols” (Larson & Marsh, 2015, p. 5).

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o's
view of
language (1986, pp. 14-15)

              Language, any language, has  a dual character; it is both a means of communication and a carrier of culture…. Culture embodies those moral, ethical and aesthetic views, the set of spiritual eyeglasses through which they come to view themselves and their place in the universe. Values are the basis of a people’s identity, their sense of particularity as members of the human race. All this is carried by language. Language as culture is the collective memory bank of a people’s experience in history.

Contemporary views of language

(continued)

Language is, and continues to be, a visceral site of identity construction where people position themselves and others in relation to their particular beliefs, needs and politics of language. … We use language to articulate our sense of belonging in the world and for this reason we need to understand the relationship between language, identity and belonging (Botsis, 2018, pp. 16-17).

Language is currently understood as a socially, culturally, politically and historically situated set of resources (Blommaert and Rampton, 2011, Heller, 2007) and as part of a multimodal
repertoire that is used in meaning making. (Mckinney, 2016, p. 2).

Open Ended

What do you think is the relationship between language and literacy?

Open Ended

And how does AI relate to this relationship?