Literacy and language diversity in the United States

Bilingual Research Journal, Spring 1998 by de Garcia, Jule Gomez

Wiley, T. G. ( 1996). Literacy and language diversity in the United States. Center for Applied Linguistics and Delta Systems, Co., Inc.

Jule Gomez de Garcia University ofColorado

Recurring reports of low reading and writing scores on standardized tests lead politicians and policy makers to uni-dimensional examinations of literacy practices in the public schools, examinations that lead to the installation of more policies promoting more practices that ignore the diversity of language among the students in the newly developed and promoted programs. Wiley's Literacy and Language Diversity in the United States gives a clear, concise, readable synthesis of the issues surrounding literacy in linguistically diverse populations and is a book that most policy makers, educators, parents, and those fearing a new generation of illiterates could benefit from. Indeed, each chapter contains a section titled "Implications for Policy and Practice" that does not dogmatically provide a blueprint for program design, but rather challenges us to raise the questions demanded by the linguistic demographics of the community that literacy policies are meant to serve.

Chapter 1 of this book, "Introduction and Overview," presents the irony that Wiley deals with throughout the rest of the book. Mainstream students, defined in terms of linguistic and ethnic dominance rather than numerical majority, generally outperform minority groups on literacy surveys and measures, and the data are presented to the general and educational public as statistics contrasting the majority and minority groups. The "problem" is presented as one reflecting the differential success of linguistic minority and majority populations, but the "solutions" proposed reflect "literacy in its traditional context of rhetoric and education," (Wiley, p. 2) a context that reflects the inheritance of an English-dominated public school tradition.

Scribner (1988) gives us three basic metaphors underlying most beliefs about literacy: literacy as adaptation, literacy as power, and literacy as state of grace. Literacy as adaptation is "a transformative tool for changing existing social relations. Literacy as power is an instrument for praxis to promote a more just society as it "empowers" students by breaking the `culture of silence' within which they are otherwise confined" (Walsh, 1991). But the dominant metaphor in American society, according to Wiley, is literacy as a state of grace:

Traditionally, literacy as state of grace represents literacy as a kind of salvation in which the literate person or the literati are considered to have special virtues. According to Scribner ( 1988, p. 77), literacy as a state of grace is a metaphor that helps perpetuate the belief that there is an intellectual or "cognitive great divide" between literates and nonliterates. A major focus of this book involves a critique of views derived from this metaphor as it appears in both the general literacy literature. . . and as it is reproduced in some of the dominant theoretical constructs in bilingual education theory . . . (Wiley, p. 3)

In Chapter 2, "Common Myths and Stereotypes about Literacy and Language Diversity in the United States," Wiley treats us to U.S. Census data that contradict the myth that "The United States is most appropriately described as an English-speaking, monolingual nation" (Wiley, p. 8). Refreshingly, Wiley provides data not only for immigrant populations (Table 3, 10), but also for speakers of American Indian and Alaska Native Languages (Table 4, 11), alerting us to another significant piece of the picture of American literacy demographics. Similar data are used to disprove the myth that "The predominance of English and English literacy is threatened," with comparative statistics on the "Decennial Flows of Immigration to the United States 18301990," (Table 5, 13).

The persistence of the myth of monolinguals reflects the dominant relationship of one language over others. It is also perpetuated by attitudes toward dialect and register (i.e., the appropriate level of discourse), whereby one variety of language, the school-taught standard, is seen as being inherently superior to other varieties. Thus, attitudes toward non-English literacy are often tied to negative predispositions toward nonstandard varieties of English. (Wiley, p. 22)

Numbers alone cannot help to dispel myths that involve the attitudes and beliefs about "others" held by those who have grown up in a literate tradition characterized by English monolingualism, and these myths require more discussion, found in full chapters of Wiley's book. Examples of such myths include the following:

English literacy is the only literacy worth noting;

English illiteracy is high because language minorities are not as eager to learn English and assimilate as prior generations were;

Many language minority adults favor English Only policies;

The best way to promote English literacy is to immerse language minority children and adults in English-only instruction.