Family Discourse

So I suppose this had to happen. My anthropological lens is seeing different Discourses. Gee's article really opened my eyes and gave a name to what I tried to call societies. Discourse is so much richer, because it includes all the values and non-verbal or intellectual manners in a group. Something I think about is family literacy. I think I've mentioned (possibly too much) that I have a blended family. My two older daughters are my husband's, and the two younger are mine. I spent six years alone after I lost my first husband. I thought of myself and my children as a kind of a triumverate. We created our own family Discourse, because we had no family for 900 miles. Over the years, I gave my children a different upbringing. They have knowledge of so much of history that many parents don't provide their children. Not necessarily the history in the books, but - I'm trying to put my finger on what to call it. They know who Ruby Keeler is. They can identify a Bob Fosse film. They can identify the movie with the phrase "what an ***hole" (Ghostbusters). They know what a 741 is (it's the dewey decimal number for humor under the old library system). They're computer literate (occupational hazard). They have their own political views and we have spirited discussions when the subject arises. They can become VERY spirited, but that's okay. Boscherts don't raise their voices. Lillemons do. And it IS a discourse. Tom (my husband) is very aware that there's a closeness between the three of us that's kind of different. I imprinted on my children and we have a Discourse that our older daughters aren't a part of. It's not anyone's fault, though. It's just what evolved because of our lives. Tom has become a member of our Discourse; he's the only father the children know. He's not 'like' us, but he has his place. And I'm aware that I have to modify our environment when all four children are with us (we try to vacation together every year). For years I saw the Discourse of my husband's family, but never had a name to put to it. I just knew I wasn't a "Boschert". Could I teach my older daughters the literacy of the triumverate? I don't know. I tried putting Bloom's Taxonomy to it. Could they remember it? Could they apply it? Could I analyze it? Some people just accept things the way they are. I have a tendency to analyze. So now I will be trying to remember the new taxonomy to look at what we learn. I've always used the old Bloom. To quote Holden Caufield, "So it goes."

The Power of the Pen and Those That Read It

Last semester I began graduate studies eager to uncover how much I still had yet to discover and learn.   I knew there was so much more to what drove a person to want to learn and how they took in the information that they sought.  I am still, and may forever be, uncovering the layers of the onion known as education.  My most recent "ah has" have absolutely come from the readings and discussions found on Tuesday nights in Adult 650.  Collectively I am discovering a layer that is so much more complex and powerful than I could even begin to imagine.  As the newly discovered (for me) and now revered Paulo Freire mentions in the video posted last week, "Literacy is a fundamental chapter of education as a whole." A "chapter" or layer I believe that is truly underestimated in its power. The words on a page can be used as a vehicle to get a message, skill, or ideology across.  But literacy can also go much further than just the text in one's hands.  What is the individual(s) true understanding of what they read?  Was it the message intended?  Or was it something else entirely?  What experiences and prior learnings do they attribute to what they have read and how they understand it, or even feel about it?  What then do they do with that comprehension? Perhaps these considerations and more were the reasons behind so many efforts historically to oppress individuals and their opportunities for literacy.   As Arnove and Graff cite in their article, "One basic reason for doubting the resolve of political and educational leaders in many countries is that widespread possession of literacy by a populace may lead to unpredictable, contradictory, and conflictive consequence."  Literacy can after all standardize language, expose cultures and perspectives, spread the religious word, and even promote continuous economic growth of a nation.  Literacy efforts can be paused by the limitations of support as resources are instead attributed to war; or literacy can be the key to what begins a war among us.  So while many may not yet truly understand the power that literacy can wield, perhaps sharing another quote from our readings this week may assist in putting it in perspective "literacy…(is) not just the process of learning the skills of reading, writing and arithmetic, but a contribution to the liberation of man and to his full development.  Thus conceived, literacy creates the conditions for the acquisition of a critical consciousness of the contradictions of society in which man lives and of its aims; it also stimulates initiative and his participation in the creation of projects capable of acting upon the world, of transforming it, and of defining the aims of an authentic human development." (Arnove and Graff, 598)  Literacy can truly be power and empowerment.