[HPFGU-OTChatter] Re: Aliteracy - something that doesn't apply to any of us...

[Ebony Elizabeth Thomas]

>--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at y..., heidit at n... wrote:
> > There's an interesting article in the Washington Post today at
> > http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A23370-2001May13.html
> > about people who can read, but choose not to.
> >

Thanks for sharing this, Heidi.  Coming from a context where most of my 
friends and family *are* aliterate by this definition, I can see both sides.

My sisters can read very well, but don't like to and never have.  Yet they 
have other spheres they enjoy and excel in.  The 20-year old is an 
autoworker who is excellent with her hands and is taking an advanced  
machinist course... I took one look at her textbook and shuddered at all the 
complicated how-to diagrams.  I can put stuff together, but I don't like to 
and I know she can do it much better.  She has a voice that could wring 
tears from the stars and practices her singing a lot... I can carry a tune, 
but that's about it.  She was a much better athlete than I was in high 
school.  And so on.

The 17-year old is a visual arts major who has won awards on the local, 
state, and national level for her artwork.  She can draw *anything*.  I 
can't even draw stick figures.  She also has a sense of fashion and style 
that is beyond awesome (inherited from our mother--I was passed by)... she 
designs and makes her own clothes.  Finally, she's a dance minor at her 
performing arts school... and excels at that too.  Me, I have to see a step 
at least 15-20 times before it clicks.

Both of them are fascinated by my love of the Harry Potter series, and can't 
wait to see the movie, but neither of them were enthused about reading the 
series.  They've both read SS, and the 17 year old got halfway through CoS 
(which is a *shock*--they actually were *reading* and it wasn't for 
school!), they both raved about it, but aren't interested in re-reading 50 
times like big sis.  But when HP comes out on DVD/VHS, rest assured that the 
20 year old will buy it, and they'll both watch it over and over again.  
Just like they did with Gulliver's Travels, The Odyssey, 10th Kingdom, etc.

It took me a long time for me to break out of my Percy shell and realize 
their aliteracy wasn't *bad*.  It was just *different*.  While I was 
reading, writing, and playing music, they did other stuff.  And?

I'm sure that all of us, if we're honest, can think of stuff that the 
non-readers we know do in place of reading.  These people can read, but 
choose not to do it more than they have to and think we're weird because we 
read all the time.

So the time that non-readers spend not reading, they develop skills, hobbies 
and interests that we bookaholics don't choose to cultivate.

Also let's consider the fact that universal literacy is a relatively new 
concept in human history.

This is an interesting topic... we had lots of discussion about this in my 
seminar last semester in Literacy and Technology.  The conclusion we came up 
with--we may just have to re-invent our notions of "literacy" and reconsider 
just what constitutes it.

--Ebony


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Ebony AKA AngieJ
ebonyink at hotmail.com

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