Book Summary of An Introduction to The Ecology of Written Language by David

Barton

Chapter 1: An integrated approach to literacy

 Introduction

The goals of school and education are often taken for granted, but today, these goals
are increasingly being questioned. Questions about reading and writing arise in many places,
such as in discussions of declining educational standards; in calling for the use of plain
English in documents; in debates about the economic costs of education, the need for an
educated workforce, the impact of new technologies on our lives, the need for adult literacy.
Many people talk and make assumptions about literacy, both inside and outside of education.
Business leaders complain about the lack of knowledge in the world of work. These
politicians want to eliminate the literacy disaster. Radical educators seek to empower and
liberate society. Literary critics differentiate between good writers and bad writers. Teachers
diagnose reading difficulties and identify programs to overcome them. Preschool teachers
have witnessed the rise of literacy. These people have a precise definition of what literacy is.
They have different theories about literacy, different ideas about problems and what should
be done about them. Public debate in the media often contradicts what happens in schools.
The idea of a literacy crisis constantly appears in the newspapers, but the public debate about
literacy is not particularly complex; ignorance of the language is common and even the
simplest approaches are adopted. Some of the current conflicts revolve around the meaning of
literacy, and to some extent these conflicts can be seen as struggles between different
definitions of literacy. The aim of this book is to try to understand the different ways people
talk about reading and writing, and to bring together new visions of literacy developed in
various fields.

 Literacy in everyday life.

The first thing that needs to be emphasized is that literacy affects people’s daily lives,
whether reading books regularly or writing. Literacy is part of daily life activities. This is not
something that only happens at school or work. For most students, reading skills at home may
be different from reading skills at school. Second, many people can participate in reading or
writing and they can participate in many different ways, each handling writing differently.
There are many ways of reading in a particular situation with a particular text. Different texts
are recognized as different texts and read in different ways, there are many ways to derive
meaning from them. Viewing television news, reading the morning newspaper, sorting
different letters from the mail can make different participants act in different ways.

Everyday activities can be the beginning of a different perspective in literacy. The

most common view of literacy begins in educational settings where literacy is often taught.
The dominant definition in society is school-based literacy. This view of literacy often
contradicts what people experience in everyday life. This can be done in a very simple way if
the type of reading and writing that people do every day is different from the type of reading
and writing at school. This may be found in society’s more general conception of literacy.
Everyday literacy offers a richer vision of literacy, requiring new definitions of literacy, new
ways of thinking about what it means to read and write.

 The study of literacy

To help see what the future holds, here is a short list of some areas where we are
seeing renewed interest in literacy and places to look for ideas. Everyone working in this field
is moving in the same direction. In various scientific disciplines, the term literacy is
shorthand for a more complex view of what it means to read and write. In each of these
fields, individuals who have contributed to contemporary literacy studies include: historical
development; study different cultures and subcultures; Oral culture without writing;
language, writing, bilingual literacy; written and spoken language; social understanding of
new science and technology; early childhood literacy, reading and writing processes; study at
school and elsewhere. These topics are discussed in the book. In all these fields, people
wonder about what it means to be literate. Despite these similarities, in some respects the
approaches used are different, based on different underlying philosophies, asking different
questions, and using different methodologies. We need a way to talk about literacy that
begins to unify the various aspects that have been explained so far. The authors provide an
overview of current approaches to literacy in these fields and ensure that the approaches
contribute to a general understanding of reading and writing.

 Outline of the book

This section in chapter one tells the reader what will be discussed in the following
chapters, which relate to the areas of literacy as previously mentioned.

Chapter 2: Talking about literacy

 Metaphors for literacy

This second chapter discusses the importance of new ways of thinking in reading and
writing. This chapter examines some of the metaphors used to talk about literacy. After
outlining the theoretical implications and importance of metaphor in language, this chapter
explores a number of different ways of talking about literacy, including everyday use and
how metaphor shapes literacy theory. Definitions of literacy proposed by politicians,
researchers, and dictionaries are examined. The field of literacy studies is introduced and the
final section discusses the ecological metaphor and its application to the field of literacy.

The idea of literacy that underlies much educational practice views literacy as a skill
or set of skills. This has a major influence on the design of literacy programs at all levels of
education. Reading and writing activities are divided into a series of skills. These skills are
categorized into levels starting with pre-reading skills and then taught at specific levels, with
each skill building on the previous skill. Learning to read and write becomes a technical
matter and successful readers and writers are competent readers and writers. As an
educational definition of literacy, this vision is very strong and can spread throughout society.

It is important to realize that this idea of skills is a specific way of thinking about
literacy. There are metaphors everywhere for reading and writing, some very obvious, some
less so. Everyone has views about literacy, and opinions on the subject are often strong. This
opinion is expressed through metaphor. However, different metaphors have different
implications for how we view illiteracy, what actions can be taken to address it, and how we
describe those affected by it. Other metaphors require training, empowerment, special
education, or social support. Note that some metaphors fall within the field of education,
while others cover the fields of counseling, therapy, and other fields.

 Theories and metaphors

So far, when discussing literacy theory, one of the main professional theories
underlying the media, politicians and parents is to view literacy as a set of skills. It is a
professional theory, embodied in textbooks and instructional materials, taught in institutions,
supported by legal infrastructure, and guides most literacy instruction in public schools, high
schools, and colleges. This also permeates life and becomes part of society's everyday
literacy theory. Ideas about skills and qualifications become the way parents talk about their
child's progress; This approach might suggest, for example, that it is best for teachers to teach
reading as a set of reading skills, that learning to read should be separated from other
learning, and that parents should not be independent in their children's learning to read.

The leak between everyday theory and professional theory occurs in two directions. In
addition to professional theories influencing everyday discussions, there are also influences in
the opposite direction. Professional theories are mainly presented in everyday language.
Words like intelligence and evolution have taken on a more technical meaning thanks to the
efforts of researchers. However, professional theory is incomplete and is partly expressed in
ordinary language. Undeniably, everyday use will fill the remaining gaps in these theories.
Literacy teachers are guided by professional theories outlined in training, but teaching is also
guided by everyday knowledge, complementing professional theories. This is unavoidable
and is part of the nature of theory. Another consequence of this combination of different
types of theories is that it is unclear whether general academic theories, such as the gap
between speech and literacy, or the superiority of letters compared to other writing systems,
are largely everyday theories or specialized theories.

 Definitions of literacy

Literacy is a relatively new word and has an expanded meaning. The term
encompasses a new and broader perspective on reading and writing, and is used in a number
of disciplines, and terms such as emergent literacy are used in education. As we have
mentioned, literacy is expanded in other ways to mean having competence and understanding
in a particular field, with terms such as computer literacy, economic literacy and political
understanding. Society speaks about different cultures, so different media can be discussed,
and film culture, for example, can be compared with written culture.

 Literacy studies

One way literacy research is linked to broader shifts in thinking is the way the subject
is framed as a critical topic. All education is necessary insofar as it involves learning to
reason, evaluate and think clearly. This is fundamental and important, but will no longer
apply if all educators are required to be critical and empowering. Another important
implication is what is being done here, examining, analyzing and deconstructing the term
literacy and providing critical discourse on the subject. Deconstruction like this can lead to a
critical review of the use of media, media images, and the provision of education by today's
society which can hopefully be achieved constructively.
Chapter 3: The social basis of literacy

 Practices and events

Both the terms literacy practices and literacy events need to be explained. The first
basic unit of analysis is the event; There are many incidents in everyday life where writing
plays a role. We can call this a literacy event. Talking about literacy events is necessary to
describe how literacy is actually used in people’s daily lives. A specific example of a literacy
event is when adults read stories to children in the evening. This literacy event is interesting
because it is often a routine event with repeated forms of interaction. Events like this are
important for understanding child and adult literacy. This term is broader than that and
includes all activities related to writing; In some activities, especially in the field of
education, the explicit goal is learning, but this does not apply to most literacy activities. In
people’s daily lives, they can participate in various literacy activities. One man we worked
with in the Lancaster study went from discussing the contents of the local newspaper with a
friend to organizing shopping and texting his son without a phone, three very different
literary events.

 Literacies and domains

Knowledge is a stable, coherent, and identifiable configuration of activities such as

legal knowledge or specific workplace knowledge. In multilingual situations, different
literacy abilities are often associated with different languages or scripts. These sciences are
forms of practice and here it is necessary to explain a little how they are related to each other.
There is no direction that can take it from simple to complex or from easy to difficult. It is
important to go beyond the idea, often implicit in literacy programs for children and adults,
that there are simple dimensions from basic to complex forms of literacy. Literacy does not
exist on a certain scale, starting from basic or simple forms and progressing to more complex
or advanced forms. What we call simple and complex forms of literacy are actually different
forms of literacy that have different goals.

 Broader social relations

Community literacy activities do not directly reflect capacity but are tied to what is
considered appropriate or not. People learn that socially, there are practices that are
appropriate for certain roles and some that are not. Examining these abilities represents an
important shift in the way we think about literacy. Deciding to describe people's actions
based on the situations they face is an important step; ir represents a departure from the over-
reliance on the notion of a fixed set of abilities that is common in many discussions of
reading and writing. Furthermore, we must not lose sight of the fact that roles are associated
with power and that much of literacy is studied in unequal power relationships, between
parents and children, between teachers and students.

 Literacy as communication

As part of communication, literacy telling other people about the world. It concerns
spoken language. The idea of written language has evolved significantly since it was
considered written speech. Written language functions differently from spoken language, and
any choice between writing and speaking often has implications beyond the simple choice of
medium. Writing allows us to go further than just spoken language; we can fix everything in
time and space. Writing creates text. Because it is often reproducible and testable, written
language can be a powerful form of language; we need to consider how writing expands the
possibilities of language. It should be clear, therefore, that any view of literacy is part of a
theory of language and that this view of language, or at least parts of it, intersects with
literacy.

 Literacy as thought

Literacy is an ideal field to connect psychology and society. Symbolic systems lie at
the interface between social structure, technology, and thought. Symbolic systems such as
writing mediate between individual cognition and social phenomena. Not only literacy
research, language research itself also has the potential to link social and psychological
aspects. Language is a symbolic system that connects what happens inside our heads with
what happens outside. Language becomes a mediator between himself and society. It is a
form of representation, a way of representing the world to ourselves and others. Language is
an incredible communication system that allows us to think and talk about the world around
us. This system allows us to talk about things that exist and do not exist, and to reflect,
abstract, and generalize our experiences; we can create a world that allows us to reflect on
internal circumstances and language.

 Values and awareness

Value is also seen in the importance of literacy compared to other activities, such as
practical and physical activities. Sometimes reading and writing conflict with work,
sometimes with free time. One idea we see repeatedly in our research is that people think
reading is better than doing nothing, but doing real work is better than reading. There are
examples of this in research on people who talked about literacy in the early 20th century.
There are other examples in contemporary literacy research. Ambivalence towards literacy
seems to be a strong element in contemporary culture. As we can see, reading and writing are
not just cognitive activities: emotions flow through them.

 Individual history

There are many ways to link literacy to changes in people’s lives. First, people read
and write at certain times in their lives. In a person's life, there are times when a person needs
to read and write more, but there are also times when a person needs to read and write less.
New requirements may arise due to changes in the workplace, or may arise due to changes in
a person’s personal life; for example, parents may face changing needs as their children grow
older and attend school. Additionally, people want to make changes in their lives, and reading
and writing can help them make those changes.

 Social history

New social practices present various possibilities and limitations. So, in the new
workplace, people will have to track their work and keep notes in new ways, as well as
change the way they communicate. There are social changes that increase the need for
literacy, but there are also other changes that reduce this need. Another example related to
modern technology is the choice between sending a message via email or using other
technology. In each particular case, the choice is complex and involves availability, cost,
technical capacity, reliability and other factors. All these possibilities change the basis of
communication in human relationships. Hopefully, looking at past examples, such as the
popularity of printing, can shed light on the changes occurring today.
Chapter 4: Researching literacy practices

 Researching literacy as social practice

The links between local literacy practices and wider social relations suggest that in
addition to detailed local observations, literacy research needs to broaden its focus outward,
using methods other than historical research or social theory to create an understanding of
broader situations. a place where literacy events take place. The importance of power
relations in shaping patterns of literacy practice means that literacy researchers must develop
an understanding of power processes in the communities they study, research and apply a
critical approach, in the sense of uncovering power relations that are often hidden. Because
literacy practices are part of social relations, which are shaped by social institutions and
power relations, certain literature is dominant, visible, and more influential than other
literature. Vernacular literacy (knowledge embedded in individuals, families, and everyday
life in society, outside the sphere of power and influence) is often hidden. Interpretation of
this literacy requires research that aims to make visible and valuable aspects of people's lives
that were previously invisible and neglected.

 Research methods

Large studies such as Local Literacy often require researchers to spend time in a
particular community, using a variety of methods to develop a comprehensive picture of the
details of the community and local life. This literacy practice is called the ethnographic
method. Data collection in ethnography can include observation and participation in literacy
events, through notes, audio recordings, and videos; formal and informal interviews and
conversations; collections of texts and objects created within the community and externally
generated documents; use photos both as data when taking photos and as a basis for
interviews; historical methods, including oral history interviews and working with archival
documents. This may involve methods such as questionnaires, which are used as a method to
develop an overall picture.

 Local and community literacy practices

The diversity of literacy can be found at home. There are six areas in which reading
and writing are important: life organization, personal communication, personal entertainment,
life recording, comprehension, and social participation. Regional language literacy is
different from more formal literacy because it is learned informally and integrated with
practical applications in people's lives. Literacy practices are more formal, more normative,
and determined by the formal goals of an organization rather than the life and goals of society
itself. Access to superior literacy is controlled by experts and teachers. Regional language
literacy is more likely to be voluntary and self-generated, and can also be a source of
creativity, discovery and originality, resulting in new ways of doing things.

 Multilingual literacy practices

Most people in the world know more than one language. It could be that in their daily
life they use many languages; There may be differences between the language used at home
and the language used at school or in wider society. It is also possible that most people in the
world are bilingual and therefore use more than one language in their lives. These languages
may or may not be written. Different ideas about literacy are associated with different
languages. This idea can be applied to bilingual or multilingual situations and offers other
possibilities depending on whether the language is written or not and depending on relative
knowledge of the language and its writing system.

 Literacy is gendered

Literacy is a highly gendered activity, so that in all the domains mentioned so far,
patterns of literacy activity vary by gender. In many ways, literacy practices reflect broader
gender differences in society, but this is not a simple map. From the first children's books,
there have been a variety of books for boys and girls, often color-coded by gender. Children
are more likely to be read to by adult women than by adult men, and the teachers they
encounter in kindergarten are more likely to be women. Throughout the school year, girls on
average perform better than boys on tests related to reading and writing.

 Workplace literacy practices

The workplace is a very important place to learn literacy skills. This is where many
people spend most of their time, and for many people, work is an important part of their
identity. The scope of reading and writing activities in the workplace is often formal, limited
and limited, but at the same time, sharing, copying and collaborating are commonplace in
workplace literacy. Ethnography of workplace literacy practices provides a more complex
picture. Of course, in some workplaces that have adopted new management methods such as
total quality management, flat hierarchies, and increased teamwork, the need for
communication and literacy levels have changed.
 The social patterning of literacy practices

To understand the role of literacy in society, it is important to consider social models

of literacy practices and their relationship to power in society. This may be relevant for those
whose access to certain literacy activities is limited. When looking at historical examples or
studying other cultures, limitations are always apparent. There is an idea of limited literacy
that is used to characterize certain societies. To explain the limitations of literacy in society,
factors such as religious restrictive practices and the mismatch between literacy and regional
languages can be mentioned. The idea of limited literacy assumes the opposite of complete
literacy, which is found only in the early literacy of the Greeks.
Chapter 5: Literacy embedded in language

 Literacy and language

Everything that is said about literacy presupposes a general vision of language; it is

based on language theory. It is important to consider these views on language and to clarify
the relationship between views on language and views on literacy. This approach is based on
a constructivist view of language, which, as mentioned previously in relation to metaphor and
thought, views language as playing a central role in the mental models humans construct
about the world. There are other constructive implications. Language is constructed
historically, it is also constructed as children learn, and it is constructed every time someone
uses it. This view of language is becoming increasingly dominant. In general, the study of
language has undergone a revolution in recent years, with the mainstream view moving away
from the study of systems simply described in terms of their structure and viewing language
as a dynamic social activity that serves social purposes. Here I would like to briefly introduce
aspects of language that are important for understanding the ecology of literacy. The main
idea is that there are various forms of language that we can call discourse; that it creates
written texts; and that these texts mediate human experience.

 From registers to genres and discourses

Genre is a socially constructed writing convention, an accepted convention of doing

something, and tied to the author's purpose. For teaching, it is helpful to be able to identify
and describe the conventions of a particular genre. It is easy to define and define these
conventions, listing the characteristics of different genres; This is a question at the heart of
the gender debate that began in Australia. The genre approach to teaching writing is at the
heart of the heated debate about how writing is taught in schools. Discourse is an important
concept here because it can be used to emphasize that language is only part of social
interaction, so that talking to a baby or a bank manager is good behavior involving not only
appropriate language but also appropriate behavior. in appropriate situations.

 Texts and intertextuality

There are many different linguistic forms, not homogeneous units. These forms of
language produce texts and various types of texts. Some genres are more precise and clear
than others, and genres may be clearer in written language, which is often more standardized
and systematic than spoken language. However, when something is written down, it becomes
a text that can be used as a reference, including of course spoken language, because speech
can be written in a certain way. . We can comment on and analyze texts, whether they are
written business letters, poems, forms, or transcripts of spoken conversations. Once written,
texts can be examined, dissected, and analyzed in a variety of ways. Analysis of a text, in any
language, is carried out by sociologists, psychologists, linguists, etc. and is called by many
different names such as discourse analysis, text analysis, conversation analysis, depending on
the analyst's goals and theoretical beliefs.

 Taking meaning from texts

From what has been said so far about the constructed nature of language and topics
such as intertextuality and mediation, it is clear that deriving meaning from a text is not a
simple matter, it is simple if you just know the meaning of the words and put them together.
in the grammar category. The constructivist perspective on reading and writing suggests that,
like all actions that produce meaning, people are active, not passive; they interact with texts
and perform operations such as selecting, organizing, and connecting to create meaning. This
is still a psychological view of reading, but it is a more complex view and needs to be more
compatible with social views of reading.

 Language mediates

Language mediates our experiences, and written texts can do this in powerful ways. In
its most basic sense, reconciliation means bringing two things together, and this is done
through a medium. The idea of language as a medium has many meanings. Related to the
concept of mediation, it is suggested that language mediates our experiences. All experiences
are mediated, where we construct a vision of reality. One of the most important mediators of
experience is language. The vision of language that we construct internally is influenced by
the language that is available to us. The words we use to name an experience enable us to
encode, organize, and remember it.
Chapter 6: Configurations of language

 Written and spoken language are different

The first step in studying written and spoken language begins with the differences in
modality, namely the medium in which the language is produced, and then examines the
structural differences between written and spoken language. The difference in methods is
truly extraordinary. Spoken language exists in a real-time, continuous auditory environment,
and is accompanied by hesitations, errors, pauses, false starts, and redundancy; there are
paralinguistic characteristics such as voice quality and kinesthetic characteristics such as
gestures and body language. It is quickly destroyed or lost so it must be understood or
remembered in real time. Written language is characterized as the opposite of spoken
language in all these characteristics. It exists more intuitively and longer than spoken
language. Because it is intuitive, language analysis in sentences, words and segments is
provided in the text. There are no speakers; doubts and errors have been eliminated and there
is no longer a general context or opportunity for feedback or interruption. Written language is
“out there,” prepared, formal, and decontextualized.

 Continua from written to spoken

The second step in understanding the difference between written and spoken language
is to accept that casual conversation and literary texts are two extremes and that letters to
friends and classroom lectures may lie somewhere between those two extremes. The idea is
that each instance of language lies on a continuum from written to spoken language. A
continuum has the idea of a line drawn between two points. When one tries to organize letters
to friends and lessons in class on a continuum, one quickly realizes that there is no continuum
but rather several continuities or dimensions. When it comes to writing, every dimension is
different. All kinds of dimensions are proposed, some referring to the way language is
produced, others referring to the structural characteristics of the text or other aspects. Another
set of proposed dimensions is grouped around ideas about the explicit nature of written
language and the meaning conveyed by the two modes. The meaning in written language is
explicit, whereas in spoken language it seems more implied. In written texts, the meaning lies
more in the text (sentence meaning), whereas in speech, the meaning lies more in the
speaker's meaning (speaker's meaning).
 Configurations of language

The idea of a continuum or multiple continuities separating written and spoken

language is a view that oversimplifies the relationship in many ways. First, when we focus on
what is considered outside of conversation in relation to the literary essay, other forms of
writing and discourse are overlooked. When other forms, such as personal letters, are
examined in detail, it becomes clear that they do not actually lie somewhere between a
conversation and an essay. Furthermore, if we look at technologies other than pen and paper,
we again see a very different form of language that does not lie somewhere between a
conversation and an essay. Even in many literacy events, what is written and spoken cannot
be separated. In the end, we see that writing and speaking are so closely related that good
writing requires speaking strategies.

 Decontextualized and explicit?

There are two ideas regarding written and oral argumentation: written language is
explicit and decontextualized. Features of written language are then linked to specific
decontextualized and explicit reasoning skills, and we make connections between these
reasoning skills and learning to read and write. It is clear from the discussion of language that
none of the following statements is true; the written language is unclear and decontextualized.
Related to this is the idea that written language is clear, contains the meaning of the text as a
whole, so that there is no need to refer to context to understand it. This is the aim of certain
forms of written discourse that have historically developed to become more explicit and
autonomous. Legal language is the most prominent example of this, with the idea that
everyone who interprets the law will interpret it in the same way. The belief that written
language is explicit and context-free has been used to argue that there are major differences
between oral and literate cultures. However, if we assume that because explanatory texts are
explicit facts, explanatory texts are the only source of explanation in a culture and that
cultures without explanatory texts do not have a particular logic, then this is a wrong
argument.
 Reference

Barton, D. (2007). Literacy: An Introduction to the Ecology of Written Language. Oxford:

Blackwell.