The two writers pin point Street’s “grandiose claims for ‘academic’ literacy” which as educators, we all know is on point. I imagine a number of general education students having no problem identifying the large edifice that makes up the power inherent in education, and words like literacy making up the discourse. I get where the the writers are arguing to identify a farce; inequality embedded in using literacy as a ladle to scoop with, but when an educator is savvy, and carefully applies and demonstrates literacy tools for others to adopt for themselves, then the benefit is exponential for students labeled illiterate. Paulo Friere, author of “The Adult Literacy Process as Cultural Action for Freedom and Education and Conscientizacao” does precisely this: he doesn’t attempt to teach ‘a discreet set of skills ‘ as sufficient to support development. He identifies where the cultural literacy within itself, offers support for further literate development. Friere argues for systematic program of generative words, and utilizes syllables to scaffold students. It may not provide an immediate sense of national independence, but his guidance is most certainly and inevitably a tool to provide oneself with a more informed perspective of self awareness.

I believe this is evidence for culturally responsive teaching, and this approach benefits all of us in the burgeoning culture of digital literacy. It may not represent the mainstream idea of education, the one that offers a Gold Standard approval, but anything that adds to the perspective of ones identity is a form of literacy, because there is conscious understanding. This is also called autonomy, and vital to a writer’s perspective of their voice, and that voice in the world. This world we talk about in this class is aka the web. I don’t know if my opinion here is enough to prove an argument, I’m still finishing this article, but I had something brewing and I had to get it down.

Okay, so I finished the article and was ready to take this tangent on to a usable argument for a paper, until I read this on page 366, “This reconception is thus not about handing down skills to others who are not where we are, but about figuring out how we all are where we are, and about how we all participate in making these spaces and the various selves we find here” This is pretty much what I tried to argue in the first place. Although, the space they refer to here still seems more difficult to access from some. Yet, it just makes me all that much more encouraged to do my best to instruct others on how to carve that space, that niche, out for themselves.