Confront the anti-literacy culture (Part 2)

Natalie Bennett, Contributor

Some booksellers are quite daring in their anti-literacy stance. You can't miss it. The sign conspicuously located in the periodicals and fiction section of the bookstores and pharmacies that says, 'Do Not Read', in bold, black letters. The meaning is clear - buy or leave.

I used to remove the signs but I no longer patronise places that have these signs. If I can't read, I won't buy. The logic employed by these booksellers openly contradicts the personal and intellectual freedom that comes from reading. They also reinforce the notion that only those who can afford to purchase the books, should be allowed to interact with them in a loving, even pleasurable way. Reading is pleasure.

A significant majority of the Jamaican population lives by its wits and hands, and exchanges its labour for wages. Those persons not only guard, but also clean and maintain the spaces where books are sold, and where readings, book launches and literary events take place. Surely .they too would enjoy reading or listening to a good story on the way to, from, or even during, work without having to budget for it?

Resistance to literacy

That there is only one national literacy organisation certainly helps to fuel this resistance to literacy. When the Jamaica Movement for the Advancement of Literacy (JAMAL) became Jamaica Foundation for Lifelong Learning (JFLL) in 2006, the organisation's core identity - adult literacy - was subsumed under a rather nebulous textbook-sounding concept of 'lifelong learning'. I don't know if the term 'literacy' bore a stigma that prevented the organisation from doing its work. I do know that it can't be helpful to refer to literacy education as something other than what it is, or to frame the costs of illiteracy purely in economic (and instrumental) terms.

The absence of dozens of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) springing up to fill in the significant gaps not covered by JFLL is also indicative of our ambivalence about literacy. Instead, community-based initiatives that promote literacy are mostly spearheaded by non-Jamaicans and Jamaicans abroad. They come and go as they struggle to remain open. Acquiring the ability to read, write and reason is not so easy after all. One is not guaranteed to develop these abilities as a child in school, and it is even more of an effort to acquire them as an adult. Neither love nor literacy is available just so, it seems.

Our political culture is a hotbed of anti-literacy. For example, politicians gladly tell voters that the only book they read (and love!) is the Bible. Not surprisingly, they are more likely to offer personal opinions buttressed by oft-memorised scripture quotes over citing actual scholarship, research and policy reports in any given debate. There are still no organisations that do voter education or distribute basic information so that people can vote intelligently. Forget getting a diversity of perspectives on any issue through the existing print media. It's not exactly fair to blame people for voting against their interests when nobody bothers to use basic tools - a flyer, a brochure, a periodical - to provide knowledge that can counter that ignorance.

At its most dangerous, anti-literacy tendencies are at the foundation for excluding or withholding materials - and thus knowledge - from public consumption. Recent objections to the translation of the Bible into patois included the argument that it would be both pointless and unacceptable to allow Jamaicans to be able to read the language that most people speak, since writing it down would further legitimise its status as a language.

Even the Ministry of Education takes on this censoring role by monitoring what points of view and subject matter students are exposed to, and withdrawing information that is not perceived as worth knowing. Our students have little chance of experiencing the love of reading through entering unfamiliar worlds or experiences not already endorsed by adults in positions of authority.

These anti-literacy tendencies make it rare - and thus surprising - to see people reading at all. Waiting rooms/busloads/sidewalks full and yet, not a book, newspaper, pamphlet, or leaflet in sight. Yes, the occasional reader does show up: women with novels and the Bible, men with [often dated] newspapers and betting sheets, but they are far outnumbered by the non-readers around them, and not all of those non-readers want to remain that way.

Craving for more

When I handed out several hundred sheets containing word-search puzzles to adults in and around downtown areas, people constantly wanted more than the three sheets per person I had initially budgeted.

"That's all? I need a whole book of these!" said one man.

"A person needs to keep their brain active," another man said.

"I like this, I can learn some new words," said another.

"This is a nice thing you are doing," one woman said. "Come back again, yuh hear?"

All it takes to erase this anti-literate sensibility is persistence, imagination and a lot of love. Just think for a moment. What would it mean for our many athletes to champion reading and to become literacy spokespersons themselves? For one-tenth of all the monies spent by telecommunications companies to promote the latest technological gimmicks to be directed towards a multi-year national literacy campaign that aims to put a book in the hands of every newborn child and for every subsequent birthday until that child graduates from high school? For high-school principals to be paired with their primary school counterparts to build tutoring relationships between the schools? For the libraries to develop year-round reading programmes and competitions, promote family literacy, and devise ways for children to interact with writers, artists and illustrators? For students to be encouraged to write books of their own, and to publish, compete and distribute them among their peers?

Wouldn't it be worthwhile for NGOs to emerge whose sole focus is on nurturing a reading public? For art galleries to develop public programmes that encourage children to read and write about art? For churches to offer to host family learning centres in every community? For private sector companies to sponsor reading programmes that are staffed by employees who volunteer? For every politician to regularly visit the classrooms in order to read to the children, and to give priority to creating libraries and reading rooms in their constituencies? For each of us to spend one hour per week reading with one child or adult? That's not all we could do, but doing those things would mean that we decided to show some love of our fellow citizens, of ourselves and of the written word. Finally.

Natalie D. A. Bennett is a teacher, writer and book artist living in the United States. She welcomes comments at gelede@gmail.com.