The Insistence of the Letter Literacy Studies and Curriculum Theorizing

Originally published in 1992. What kinds of literacy are appropriate for life and work in the late twentieth century? What historically is the relationship between curriculum and literacy, and how is it changing? The essays in this book provide an innovative forum for discussion for what are often two quite distinct enterprises: literacy research and curriculum studies. They re-frame and redraw the traditional boundaries between these two disciplines, examining socio-cultural theories and classroom practices in a diverse and lively debate. They explore readings of the modernist/postmodernist debate and specific studies in curriculum politics and history, rhetoric, language and literacy education, media studies and educational linguistics. This multi-voiced anthology brings together researchers from Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada and the United States in a common critical reassessment of the curriculum/literacy nexus.

Series Editor’s Introduction. Introduction 1. Literacy, Orality, and the Functions of Curriculum William A. Reid 2. Technologies of Learning and Alphabetic Culture: The History of Writing as the History of Education Keith Haslein 3. Texts, Literacy and Schooling David Hamilton 4. Lessons from the Literacy Before Schooling 1800-1850 John Willinsky 5. The ‘Received Tradition’ of English Teaching: The Decline of Rhetoric and the Corruption of Grammar Frances Christie 6. Returning History: Literacy, Difference, and English Teaching in the Post-War Period Tony Burgess 7. Literacy and the Limits of Democracy James Donald 8. Stories of Social Regulation: The Micropolitics of Classroom Narrative Allan Luke 9. Curriculum as Literacy: Reading and Writing in New Times Colin Lankshear 10. Television Curriculum and Popular Literacy: Feminine Identity Politics and Family Discourse Carmen Luke 11. Literacy Studies and Curriculum Theorizing; or, The Insistence of the Letter Bill Green