Pre-Writing Assignment

Part I-Quotes:
1. "We are better at what we acquire, but we consciously know more about what we have learned." -Gee

2."It is sometimes helpful to say that it is not individuals who speak and act, but rather historically and socially defined discourses speak to each other through individuals." -Gee

3. "Writing is simply a thing, something to be manipulated, something inhuman, artificial, a manufactured product. –Ong

4. "Illiterates should learn writing as they learned to tie their shoe-laces or to drive a car." -Ong

5."Learning should lead to the ability for all children-mainstream and non-mainstream- to critique their primary discourses and secondary discourse, including dominant secondary discourse. This requires exposing children to a variety of alternative primary discourses and secondary ones (not necessarily so that they acquire them, but so that they learn more about them.)"-Gee

Part II- The importance of literacy:
Literacy is important to me because I want to go into the field of investigative journalism. Investigative journalism requires its journalists to report internationally on things like overthrown political systems, human trafficking, and drug wars. Being in multiple countries requires investigative journalists to adapt and to become literate in a culture through both acquisition and learning. Not only do investigative journalists take pictures and travel to numerous locales, they have to converse with the locals and government officials to get the necessary information. People are less likely to impart information to someone who gives off the air of an outsider. Also, when (temporarily) living in another country, one has to become literate in that society in order to know what is and is not socially acceptable.

Part III-Rough draft paragraph:
Literacy Has many faces. It both defines a society and is defined by the society that it exists in. For example, an engineering school would have students who had good background knowledge and understanding of the subject. This is an example of literacy being defined by a social environment, if a performing arts major were to transfer to this school with no prior information on the field of engineering, in comparison to her peers-she would be deemed illiterate. This is an example of literacy defining a person. However, if this same performing arts major were to return to her old school, she would then be in an environment where she was literate.