Critical Literacy, fairness and hope

By Lindsay Williams

Introductory comment: First published in Independent Education, the article provides a plain English explanation of Critical Literacy, and discusses three implications of Critical Literacy for English teachers. It concludes that the ‘critical’ element is essential in a balanced English program, and a necessary part of liberal democracies such as Australia.

Critical Literacy is interested in the relationship between the ‘world’ and the ‘word’ – that is, the part that language plays in influencing the way groups of people talk about the world and interact with each other.

Think about it - each of us belongs to a number of different ‘clubs’ which have rules for: appropriate language; acceptable values, beliefs, attitudes and assumptions; acting and behaving. Membership of various clubs (technically called ‘Discourses’) plays an integral role in shaping our identity, affecting the way we are in the world.

In addition, these club memberships influence the way we ‘talk’ about the world and other people. For example, a developer may look at a piece of eucalyptus forest and advocate for its potential as a housing estate. An environmentalist may focus on the site’s importance as a wildlife habitat. A government making a decision about the forest’s future is likely to be presented with generally opposing and quite partial views on the matter. Caught between environmental and economic discourses, the government may place some conditions on the development but is unlikely to reject it completely given the dominance of the economic discourse in contemporary society.

This hypothetical situation illustrates a little of the complex relationships among discourses, language and power.

Thus, a Critical Literacy approach asks:

1. What sort of text is this and what is it about?
2. Who is writing for whom?
3. What relationship is established between the writer/speaker and reader/listener/viewer?
4. How is language being used?
5. What values, beliefs, assumptions and knowledge have been emphasised?
6. What view of the world is on offer?
7. What has been omitted or downplayed?
8. What are the consequences of going along with or rejecting the view of the world on offer?
9. Whose interests are served and not served by this text?
10. What action can be taken to either support or challenge this world view?
11. What are the implications of Critical Literacy for English teachers?

Firstly, students cannot do critical work without having a well-developed understanding of Standard Australian English, the language of power and influence in our society. This means learning the core genres of our culture and the basic resources of language (structure, cohesion, vocabulary, grammar, paragraphing, punctuation, spelling, non-verbal features, visuals and sound).

Students also need to experience seminal texts of human civilisation, provides them with valuable cultural capital. In turn, and along with knowledge of Standard Australian English, this can lead to more effective participation in Australian (and the global) society. However, it is also important that students understand how language varies according to the context in which it is used, and the effects of that variation.

All students need to understand that it is not always necessary, desirable or effective to use Standard English. The power of advertising, for example, comes from the ability to tap into the language, values and beliefs of particular target groups. In addition, though, students need to value and celebrate their own, local variations of English – variations that can promote community cohesion and pride.

The second implication is the need for critical engagement with texts, studying them through the lens of the questions listed earlier. Take the example of Sally Morgan’s My Place. Morgan describes a conversation with her sister, Jill, in which she reveals that they are "boongs", even though their grandmother insists they are Indians. This derogatory self-labelling by indigenous Australians needs to be considered in the context of the role language plays in shaping Australian race relations and how particular views of race have, in turn, shaped the way we speak and write.

As a part of a course incorporating Critical Literacy, students could also study Shakespeare. For example, while studying The Tempest and finding pleasure in the sophisticated use of language, students might consider how the ‘themes’ in this plays may be applicable to modern times, the importance of forgiveness and saying ‘I’m sorry’, for example.

However, The Tempest also contains largely unquestioned assumptions about the relationship between the coloniser (Prospero and his daughter Miranda) and the colonised (Ariel and Caliban), assumptions which, it can be argued, have also impacted significantly on white Australia’s treatment of and relations with indigenous Australians.

Questioning and challenging these assumptions in a contemporary classroom is essential.

The third implication is the central role of creation, imagination and innovation. Imagination, of course, is important when reading (e.g. students need to imagine themselves as a character) and undertaking critique (e.g. to imagine alternative ways events could have been portrayed). Once students have analysed and evaluated texts, they need to consider what they can do to either support or challenge the values, beliefs, attitudes and assumptions they have identified.

This could mean experimenting with the resources of language in order to imagine a ‘new’ world. The process of innovation implies that students will use language in a transformative manner, not merely reproducing generic recipes. Thus, rather than being mere consumers of texts (even critique is a form of consumption), students should experience the power and pleasure of being creators of their own, unique texts.

Powerful models for this should be brought into the classroom and celebrated. Conclusion The ‘critical element’ is an essential ingredient of a balanced English program. It is not a matter of Critical Literacy or ‘the basics’. Rather, ‘the basics’ can be taught in a more rigorous, meaningful manner within the context of critical concerns. Moreover, there is no monolithic Critical Literacy movement.

Instead, it is a set of broad beliefs about and approaches to language which will be applied differently depending on the students’ socio-cultural and economic circumstances. Ultimately, though, the values at the heart of Critical Literacy are central to liberal democracies such as Australia: freedom, equity and access, fairness, respect for difference, care and concern for others, and hope.

© Lindsay Williams, 2005

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