Throughout the semester, we have had many discussions about literacy. We read about literacy in Deborah Brandts Sponsors of Literacy, Andrea Fishmans Becoming Literate: A Lesson from the Amish, and Sylvia Scribners Literacy in Three Metaphors, among other texts. You wrote an essay in response to Mike Roses discussion of literacy(s) in Lives on the Boundary, and you later conducted a research project that explored a chosen topic and its connection to literacy, society, and selfour classs content focus. Initially, these essays, combined with your informal writing assignments, served as a chance for me to get to know you better as a reader, as a writer, and as an individual. Now, near the end of the semester, you have had some time to adjust to the demands and conventions of college writing. You will use your academic writing skills to explore the nature of personal literacy in a final essay assignment.
As weve discussed in class, literacy is a complex facet of society. In Language and Literacy: Studying Discourse in Communities and Classrooms, Eleanor Kutz tells us that literacy involves not just reading and writing but all the ways of using language and of interpreting texts and the world (249). As we move from home, to school, to work, or even to the gym, we modify the language we use for each environment, illustrating the way that our literacies are shaped by particular contexts. As Kutz writes, [o]ur literacies are acquired within particular contexts and they are shaped by those contexts (249). We may flow easily from one literacy to the next as we change contexts: from visiting grandparents to having dinner with friends; from writing essays to sending love notes on Facebook; from reading The New Yorker to The Onion. We may even experience friction in switching between the identities created and supported by our various literacies.
At what place do these all intersect? How does this intersection reflect our personal, cultural, and academic identities? Furthermore, how does our definition of literacy determine what language practices we value? Consider these questions as you think about what literacy means in your own experience.
THE ASSIGNMENT
In 4-5 pages, I want you to reflect on one or more of the following:
The nature of literacy
The roles of literacy in your life
The roles of literacy in the lives of those around you
The ideal role of literacy education in our society
The ideal role of literacy in our personal lives
In your reflection, you should construct a complex and engaging argument/discussion about one or more of the topics listed above, drawing evidence from at least four (4) specific sources to support your ideas:
1. Your personal experiences with literacy (Please make this up)
-Motivations for acquiring your specific literacy and how that influenced your identity, or how it has given or restricted your access to power, etc.
-Significant texts that helped shape your literacy or the literacy of others (books, comic books, music, art, films, newspapers, video games, social media, etc.)
-Important people or institutions that sponsor a kind of literacy (parents, grandparents, coaches, teachers, athletics and art programs, schools, churches, jobs, holidays, governments, etc.)
2. At least one of the readings from our class (linked source)
3. At least two secondary, peer-reviewed sources from outside our class
This essay should:
Demonstrate your ability to use personal experience to make an academic and rhetorically effective argument about literacy
Demonstrate thoughtful analysis of the events that have shaped the literacies of your and/or others lives
Include and discuss the implications of a definition of literacy
Provide the reader with aesthetically engaging narratives that appeal to multiple senses and support the essays main argument/idea
Demonstrate college-level critical and creative thinking skills
Use at least one of the required course readings and two secondary, peer-reviewed sources to inform the argument
Adhere to the conventions of MLA formatting
Last Completed Projects
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