Popular Culture and Representations of Literacy

by Williams; Bronwyn

• ISBN13: 9780415360951
• ISBN10: 0415360951
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2007-04-16
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Movies are filled with scenes of people of all ages, sexes, races, and social classes reading and writing in widely varied contexts and purposes. Yet these scenes go largely unnoticed, despite the fact that these images recreate and reinforce pervasive concepts and perceptions of literacy. This book addresses how everyday literacy practices are represented in popular culture, specifically in mainstream, widely-distributed contemporary movies. If we watch films carefully for who reads and writes, in what settings, and for what social goals, we can see a reflection of the dominant functions and perceptions that shape our conceptions of literacy in our culture. Such perceptions influence public and political debates about literacy instruction, teachers' expectations of what will happen in their classrooms, and student's ideas about what reading and writing should be.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. vii
Introduction	p. 1
Literacy in everyday life, literacy on the screen	p. 3
Representations of literacy and identity	p. 19
The pragmatic and the sentimental: Literacy and gender roles	p. 21
Who's allowed to read and write? Literacy and social class	p. 41
Writing others: Images of race and literacy	p. 63
Literacy and social contexts	p. 83
Control and action: Literacy as power	p. 85
The perils of misreading: Literacy as danger	p. 105
Literacy myths in the movies	p. 125
The passions of the romantic author: Literacy as individualism	p. 127
The triumph of the word: Literacy as salvation and commodity	p. 145
Conclusion	p. 161
Life is not like the movies (or is it?): Literacy on film and in our lives	p. 163
References	p. 171
Filmography	p. 177
Index	p. 181
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