Vieira_Social Consequences

Anthropologist Jack Goody and literary critic Ian Watt raised a bold question in 1963: What are the consequences of literacy?
They posited that literacy allows for the objective recording of historical facts, enabling cultures to be passed on accurately, distinguishing literate civilizations from oral ones.
Goody criticized cultural relativism in anthropology which muddled the study of ‘talking man’ with ‘reading and writing man’.
Their focus was on the terms ‘literate’ and ‘nonliterate’, aiming to reduce the ethnocentrism of earlier studies.

Brian Street challenged Goody and Watt's claims by emphasizing the diverse uses of literacy and orality in specific cultural contexts (e.g., Iran's 1970s).
Street viewed the extrapolation of a society’s potential based solely on literacy as reductive.
The 'autonomous' theory of literacy proposed by Goody and Watt has been widely critiqued, leading to the emergence of New Literacy Studies, which focus on the nuanced relationship between literacy, social context, and power.
Literacy intersects with race, culture, gender, class, and identity.

The author believes that Composition Studies provides an ideal framework to explore literacy's consequences.
Rather than being confined to anthropological debates, Composition Studies can focus on writing’s implications and its societal impacts instead.
There are significant, often troubling consequences to literacy worth exploring without rigid oral/literate dichotomies.

In a significant 2002 article, Brandt and Clinton argued that literacy is both shaped by social contexts and actively shapes those contexts.
This perspective examines the material aspects of literacy, recognizing it as a tool with non-neutral purposes.
The appeal to literacy's materiality helps avoid the criticisms of technicism highlighted by Street, and connects with current studies on new media.

The author’s ethnographic research with immigrant communities reveals literacy as a 'navigational technology'.
Case Study 1: Rafael
- A young undocumented Brazilian man who articulates how understanding signs in English aids his movement.
Case Study 2: Cristina
- A Portuguese immigrant underscores literacy as both a skill and an obstacle in her process to citizenship.
- Her experiences illustrate how literacy can limit mobility under bureaucratic systems.

Immigration regulations exemplify how literacy can block or regulate movement (e.g., passports and regulatory texts).
The concept of literacy as a barrier becomes significant in understanding the dynamics of social mobility in contemporary society.
Migrants, through their narratives, can challenge oppressive systems, reflecting the dual roles literacy can play in empowerment and oppression.

The author references Harvey Graff’s findings that migrants were more literate than their non-migrant counterparts in the late 19th century.
Writing Remittances: Immigrants send back letters, emails, and technology that alter the literacy lives of non-migrating family members in their country of origin.
- Contrasting two women from Brazil: one with less formal education now utilizing computers and another feeling alienated despite her education.

For many immigrants, the pursuit of education is an avenue to upward mobility.
- Case Study: Simone
  - A Brazilian college student sharing the challenges associated with writing assignments, exacerbated by her undocumented status.
  - Her experiences highlight anxieties tied to academic literacy and mechanisms that track individuals within educational systems.

Goody's assertion that literacy supports bureaucratic systems holds across different historical contexts.
The need for comparative studies within literacy research is underscored for broader insights.
A shift towards understanding the material implications of literacy emphasizes how texts influence migrants’ lives, leading to increased surveillance and compliance within bureaucratic frameworks.

Ethnography unveils how literacy intertwines with social mobility and individual agency.
The multifaceted roles that literacy plays—navigational, regulatory, and identity-forming—offer a framework for analyzing literacy's profound social consequences.
The significance of understanding literacy through lived experiences cannot be understated.