Homework3 huijun yu

Huijun yu

Professor Liz

Hylan 301

17 September 2013

Summary

From Gee's perspective, before defining the meaning of the literacy accurately, we should understand several new meanings of an old term----discourse.

In general, the court term of discourse means the methods of using languages, of thinking and of acting behaviors that stimulate other people recognize them. As a master discourse, people should not only summary every parts of the content, but also, more important, need to argue against the background of the social viewpoints, belief and so forth.

In addition, we should put forward some unrecognized functions of discourse for us first: the first one is, in the most cases, discourse will include several opinions and values by means of speaking and acting. Second, discourses cannot be criticized by someone who stand outside out of all of the discourses, except the case that one discourse criticizes another discourse. The next one is that discourse will be defined not only the internal viewpoints, but also the relationship between this discourse and another one. Then, the statement of one discourse will naturally concentrate on its own opinion at the expense of others'. The last one is different level of social power and status will also influent the discourses. For example, the diversity of race and difference between genders. To a certain extent, individual’s behavior represent the discourses he belongs to.

As to the literacy, in common sense, it is difficult to grab the center meaning of the literacy so that the acquisition and learning methods appear. In distinguishing the different between the learning and acquisition, Gee claims: “we are better at what we acquire, but we consciously know more about what we have learned” (P259).The acquisition method which will help us master the second language can deepen our insight through plenty of reading. On the contrary, the learning method which will foster our meta-level skill is another power that will be with respect of reading as well. For instance, oral mode which is the birth right for us is one form of the discourse, separating into the primary discourse---the intimate communication, by the way, primary discourses depend on people's experience and different status, gender, and race people will shape diverse discourses. And the secondary discourse---the usage of the language in the secondary institutes, namely school.

Then we will find that the definition of the literacy is just the usage of the secondary discourse, including the dominant literacy and the power literacy. The first one, dominant discourse, that I want to introduce is mastering the discourse is through acquisition method but the second one, that only someone who master both of the meta-knowledge in both of the discourse can criticize another discourse. In this way, we cannot give up any one of them.

This is the argument of Gee's article.

James, Gee “What is Literacy?” in Language and Linguistics in Context. Eds. Harriet Luria, Deborah Seymour, and Trudy Smoke. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers, London 2006.