Critical Literacy for Information Professionals 9781783301508, 9781783300822

Citation preview

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page i

Critical Literacy for Information Professionals

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page ii

Every purchase of a Facet book helps to fund CILIP’s advocacy, awareness and accreditation programmes for information professionals.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page iii

Critical Literacy for Information Professionals

Edited by

Sarah McNicol

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page iv

© This compilation: Sarah McNicol 2016 The chapters: the contributors 2016 Published by Facet Publishing, 7 Ridgmount Street, London WC1E 7AE www.facetpublishing.co.uk Facet Publishing is wholly owned by CILIP: the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals. The editor and authors of the individual chapters assert their moral right to be identified as such in accordance with the terms of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Except as otherwise permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, with the prior permission of the publisher, or, in the case of reprographic reproduction, in accordance with the terms of a licence issued by The Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to Facet Publishing, 7 Ridgmount Street, London WC1E 7AE. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN 978-1-78330-082-2 (paperback) ISBN 978-1-78330-105-8 (hardback) e-ISBN 978-1-78330-150-8 First published 2016 Text printed on FSC accredited material.

Typeset from editor’s files by Flagholme Publishing Services in 10/13 pt Palatino Linotype and Franklin Gothic. Printed and made in Great Britain by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page v

Contents

Contributors .............................................................................................................................vii Introduction ..............................................................................................................................xi Sarah McNicol PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY ...........................................................................1 1 Renegotiating the place of fiction in libraries through critical literacy........................3 Sarah McNicol 2

Death of the author(ity): repositioning students as constructors of meaning in information literacy instruction......................................................................................19 Jessica Critten

3

Reading health-education comics critically: challenging power relationships.....................................................................................................................31 Sarah McNicol

4

Reframing librarians’ approaches to international students’ information literacy through the lens of New Literacy Studies .......................................................43 Alison Hicks

5

Using new literacies to discuss disability in the library ...............................................57 J. J. Pionke

6

‘Anyone can cook’: critical literacy in the workplace ...................................................65 Andrew Whitworth

7

Social justice, adult learning and critical literacy ........................................................79 Jennifer Lau-Bond

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page vi

VI

CRITICAL LITERACY FOR INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE ..........................................................................91 8 A picture is worth a thousand words: teaching media literacy ..................................93 Michael Cherry 9

Curricular and extra-curricular opportunities to engage school students in critical literacy in England.........................................................................................................105 Rebecca Jones

10 New media and critical literacy in secondary schools ..............................................115 Joel Crowley 11 Critical literacy and academic honesty: a school librarian’s role and contribution ...................................................................................................................123 Anthony Tilke 12 Engaging undergraduate communications students in critical information literacy............................................................................................................................129 Rachel Elizabeth Scott 13 Exploring pedagogical implications of students’ search mediation experiences through the lens of critical information literacy ........................................................139 Sarah Clark 14 Diffusing critical web literacy in a teacher-education setting: initial reflections and future planning ......................................................................................................151 Evangelia Bougatzeli and Efi Papadimitriou Further information..............................................................................................................161 Index......................................................................................................................................165

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page vii

Contributors

Evangelia Bougatzeli works as a member of the Laboratory Teaching Staff of the Primary Education Department, Faculty of Education, Aristotle University, Greece, where she is also a PhD candidate. Her main responsibilities are the organization and implementation of the Department’s IL course and the teaching of web literacy in the language and multi-literacies courses of the Department. For twenty years she worked in the University’s Libraries System, mainly as a reference and user services librarian. Evangelia has an MA degree in Library and Information Studies from Robert Gordon University, Scotland. Her research interests are information literacy; web literacy in tertiary and primary education; and multi-literacy practices. Michael Cherry is the Teen and Youth Librarian at the Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library in Evansville, Indiana, USA. Michael received his Masters of Library and Information Science from the University of Pittsburgh in 2010. In addition to receiving an advanced degree in library science, he has also earned graduate degrees in art education and art history. Michael specializes in multimedia learning with a focus on digital and media literacies. He is the author of ‘Animation Programs at the Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library’ in the book How to STEM: science, technology, engineering, and math education in libraries (Scarecrow, 2014). Sarah Clark is Associate Library Director at Rogers State University (RSU), Oklahoma, USA, and is responsible for instruction and assessment activities at the RSU Libraries. In addition, she is a PhD candidate in Educational Leadership and Policy Studies (Higher Ed) at Oklahoma State University. Sarah is currently completing her dissertation, which explores the information

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page viii

VIII

CRITICAL LITERACY FOR INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS

search mediation experiences of students through the lens of Critical Information Literacy. She has presented at local, national, and international groups and multiple regional workshops and conferences, including the 2010 Distance Library Services Conference in Cleveland, Ohio, and the 2013 LILAC Conference in Manchester, UK. In addition, her research has been published in The Journal of Library Administration and the Journal of Information Literacy. Jessica Critten received her MLIS and MA in Interdisciplinary Humanities from Florida State University, USA, in 2011. Her research interests include the cultural and ideological dimensions of information literacy, critical pedagogy, and media studies. Jessica currently works as Assistant Professor and Instructional Services Librarian at the University of West Georgia, USA. Joel Crowley is the school librarian at Ark Burlington Danes Academy in West London. He has worked in school libraries for four years, where his areas of interest include information literacy teaching and the use of graphic novels and other forms of sequential art with reluctant readers. Joel became interested in these areas while studying for a Masters in Library and Information Studies at University College London. He also completed a dissertation researching the use of web-scale discovery services in Research Libraries UK (RLUK) libraries. Previously to working in school libraries, Joel worked in various information sector environments including local history and video archives. Alison Hicks is a PhD Candidate in Information Studies at Charles Sturt University, Australia as well as the Romance Languages Librarian at the University of Colorado, Boulder, USA. Originally from the UK, she has an MA in French and Spanish from the University of St Andrews, Scotland and an MSIS from the University of Texas, Austin, USA. Her research centres on sociocultural approaches to information literacy (with a focus on world language learning and intercultural settings) and her work has appeared in the Journal of Information Science, the Journal of Information Literacy and Portal, among other publications. Rebecca Jones is Learning Enrichment and Support Co-ordinator at Malvern St James School in the UK. She is responsible for the management and delivery of Library services as well as managing Learning Support, English as an Additional Language (EAL) and More Able Pupils. She teaches the Extended Project Qualification and A-Level Communication and Culture as well as delivering Information Literacy skills lessons and projects. She is an active committee member of the CILIP School Library Group, and the schools representative on the CILIP Information Literacy Group.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page ix

CONTRIBUTORS

IX

Jennifer Lau-Bond is an Adjunct Faculty Member in the Professional and Liberal Studies Department at Roosevelt University in Chicago, Illinois, USA. She is also an Adjunct Librarian at Harper College in Palatine, Illinois, USA. Since graduating from the University of Michigan with a Master of Science in Information in 2003, she has worked in academic libraries in reference, instruction and distance learning, and in library science education activities. She also has a Bachelor of Arts in English and Women’s Studies from Albion College, Michigan, USA. Sarah McNicol is a research associate at the Education and Social Research Institute, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK. She has worked as an Information Studies researcher since 2000, and has particular interest in information literacy; lifelong learning; and school and children’s libraries. She previously worked as a school librarian and a lecturer in a Further Education college. She has published widely in the information studies field and has previously guest edited a number of journals including Library Review and Library Trends. She is also regularly involved in organizing conferences and training events for library professionals. Efi Papadimitriou is Assistant Professor in Linguistic and Visual Literacy in the School of Primary Education at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. She has a BA in Philology (Linguistics) and a PhD in Psychology and Teaching of Language from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (UOA), Greece. Her research interests centre on the areas of multimodality, multimodal discourse analysis, new literacies, multimodal semiotics, visual and critical approaches to teaching (linguistic) literacy, intersemiosis and metasemiosis. Either alone or in collaboration with others she has published numerous articles and chapters in both national and international journals and in edited volumes. J. J. Pionke is the Applied Health Sciences Librarian at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA. She likes riding her motorcycle, getting tattoos, baking, and of course books. Rachel Elizabeth Scott is an assistant professor and Integrated Library Systems Librarian at the University of Memphis in Tennessee, USA. In addition to teaching an introduction to research methods course, she also regularly offers library instruction to students in social science and humanities courses. Her research focuses on various aspects of information literacy and music bibliography. She has recently placed chapters in ACRL, Facet Publishing, Rowman & Littlefield and Theatre Library Association anthologies, and articles in Music Reference Services Quarterly, The Reference Librarian and Tennessee Libraries.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page x

X

CRITICAL LITERACY FOR INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS

Anthony Tilke has spent nearly 20 years in the international school sector. He has worked with several International Baccalaureate (IB) programmes, including the Diploma Programme. His doctoral thesis (with Charles Sturt University, Australia) focused on the impact of an international school library on the IB Diploma Programme, which subsequently fed into his book The International Baccalaureate Diploma Program and the School Library: inquiry-based education (ABC-CLIO, 2011). He is an accredited IB workshop leader, both ‘face-to-face’ and online, and has contributed ideas and content to the IB for various documentation. Before working internationally, he was school and youth library adviser with the then Library Association (now CILIP), and has written several books for Facet Publishing. Andrew Whitworth is Senior Lecturer at the Manchester Institute of Education, University of Manchester, UK, and Programme Director of its MA course in Digital Technologies, Communication and Education. He is the author of Information Obesity (2009) and Radical Information Literacy (2014).

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page xi

Introduction

Sarah McNicol

What is critical literacy? As is the case with information literacy, there is no single accepted definition of critical literacy. One way of describing critical literacy, however, is as a process that ‘challenges the status quo in an effort to discover alternative paths for self and social development’ (Shor, 1999). This description highlights two key components of critical literacy. Firstly, critical literacy is concerned with the social and cultural contexts in which texts (including not simply written texts, but digital texts, multimedia, visual materials and so forth) are both created and read. Secondly, critical literacy has a focus on practical action and community engagement; it is not concerned with merely abstract knowledge. The approach taken in critical literacy is not to read texts in isolation, but to develop an understanding of the cultural, ideological and sociolinguistic contexts in which they are created and read. The use of critical literacy involves a commitment to equity and social justice through the explicit inclusion of those marginalized on the basis of gender, sexuality, ethnicity, class or other forms of difference. Closely related to Paulo Freire’s critical pedagogy, which he described in Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1970), critical literacy focuses on issues of power and is intended to develop the skills, dispositions and strategies to enable readers to challenge ‘text and life as we know it’ (McLaughlin and DeVoogd, 2004). A fundamental notion of critical literacy is that all texts are constructed and serve particular interests. This means that it is important to consider who constructed a text and for what purpose. Furthermore, texts contain value messages; as texts are constructed by people, who all have their own views of the world, no text is completely neutral and objective. For example, when they write, an author or creator makes conscious and unconscious choices about what to include and exclude and how to represent the things or people

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page xii

XII

CRITICAL LITERACY FOR INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS

they depict. However, it is not just the author who has an important role; equally, the reader is an active participant in creating meaning from the text. Just like authors, all readers bring different experiences and knowledge which help them to make meaning from a text. This means that each person interprets a text differently and multiple ways of reading a single text are not just possible, but inevitable. In contrast to more conventional approaches to resource evaluation, with critical literacy there is no single ‘correct’ way to read and respond to a text.

Critical Literacy for Information Professionals This book reflects on the significance of critical literacy for libraries and on the ways in which they support various user groups across library sectors, including schools, public libraries, universities, workplaces and healthcare. The book has two aims: firstly, it is intended to help readers to reflect on the significance of critical literacy for libraries and the ways in which they support various user groups; and secondly, it allows library and information professionals to discover practical ways to introduce critical literacy approaches. The book is therefore divided into two parts. Part 1 contains a number of more theoretically focused chapters that consider some of the different theoretical approaches to critical literacy. These are linked to wider societal debates such as conceptions of the ‘truth’ of information, social justice, internationalization and inclusion. Part 2 illustrates these theoretical concepts through more practically focused case studies, including a variety of approaches that librarians have used to engage users in critical literacy. These examples illustrate how critical literacy can be introduced to a range of library users and in different settings. The relevance of theory for information professionals is frequently debated (for example, Secker et al., 2015): is it important for library staff to understand theory, or should they simply ‘get on with the job’? I would argue that an understanding of theoretical concepts is empowering for information professionals. Theory allows us to see and understand the world in different ways; it allows us to move beyond our habitual ways of doing things. Theory is also highly useful when working with other professionals from outside the sector; the language and constructs of critical literacy offer librarians new ways to engage with educators, community activists and so forth. However, the real power of theory is its ability to explain and inform practice. For this reason, all the theoretical approaches to critical literacy described in this book are illustrated with practical examples from information or library settings. These are intended to help practitioners better understand how more abstract ideas can be transferred into everyday practice. Just as there are multiple definitions of critical literacy, there are also a

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page xiii

MCNICOL INTRODUCTION

XIII

number of different theoretical perspectives from which to study critical literacy. The first three chapters of this book focus on critical literacy within the context of reader response theory, a form of literary theory that focuses on the experiences of the reader and their engagement with a text. In Chapter 1, Sarah McNicol introduces reader response theory and the idea that texts can be read from different ‘stances’, including a critical stance that questions whose viewpoint is being represented and who has power in the text. The chapter then discusses how fiction reading in libraries, and in particular reading groups, can make use of such a critical stance to support libraries’ work to promote inclusion. In Chapter 2, Jessica Critten links similar ideas from reader response theory to information literacy instruction in a university library. She analyses the ways in which focusing on the student as the constructor of meaning, rather than on the text’s author as is conventionally the case, can empower students and open up a more complex discourse about our ideas of ‘truth’. She also explores the implications of such an approach within the Association of College and Research Libraries’ (ACRL, 2015) new Information Literacy Framework, in particular the ways in which authorship and authority are configured in this document. Chapter 3 again uses aspects of reader response theory, but with a focus on health literacy and the visual medium of comics. In this chapter, Sarah McNicol considers how taking a critical approach to the reading of comics may empower patients by subverting conventional ideas around patient–clinician relationships, as well as working to overcome the stigma surrounding illness. Critical literacy is closely related to other conceptions of literacy, most notably New Literacy Studies and new literacies. Chapter 4 takes a New Literacy Studies approach, placing emphasis on the contextual and subjective aspects of literacy. New Literacy Studies is understood as a social practice that is embedded in broader social and cultural contexts. Alison Hicks draws on her PhD work at Charles Strut University in Australia and makes use of this theory to explore and expose common misconceptions about international university students’ information practices. She demonstrates how New Literacy Studies questions a privileging of culturally dominant literacies and encourages us to view difference as an asset, rather than a deficiency. In Chapter 5, J. J. Pionke, an applied health sciences librarian, focuses on students with disabilities and considers how new literacies are used in relation to new media. In particular, she explores how the notion of ‘mindsets’ (Lankshear and Knobel, 2006) can begin to change prevailing attitudes towards disability. She describes how this might be achieved by moving from an ‘abler’ culture that sees disability as an ‘add-on’ to an ‘includer’ culture that embraces the concepts of universal design and accessibility for all. Another related concept, that of radical information literacy, is introduced

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page xiv

XIV

CRITICAL LITERACY FOR INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS

by Andrew Whitworth in Chapter 6 as an alternative approach to critical literacy education in the workplace. Radical information literacy emphasises the importance of dialogue in the methods and processes that control and redistribute authority over information practices and Andrew argues that this can maximise the capacity for ‘stewarding’, or taking responsibility for a community’s technological resources by all members of a community. The final theoretical approach considered is one that connects critical literacy to adult education theories, specifically Knowles’ (1990) notion of andragogy; McClusky’s (1970) theory of margin; and Mezirow’s (2000) conception of transformative learning. In Chapter 7, Jennifer Lau-Bond writes about her experiences as an instructor and librarian at Roosevelt University, where she has drawn on each of these in her interactions with mature students. Each of the theories and methods described draws on ideas of critical literacy, as well as the wider social justice agenda integral to Roosevelt’s ethos. After considering how critical literacy can be conceived from these diverse theoretical perspectives, Part 2 moves towards more practical applications of critical literacy. It includes case studies from practitioners serving a wide range of users within public, school and university libraries. In a number of cases, critical literacy has been incorporated into formal course design, while in others a more ad hoc approach has been adopted, with librarians integrating critical literacy into their day-to-day interactions with students or clients. While each chapter draws on examples from a specific setting, for example a school or university, many of the ideas and techniques described can be transferred to different sectors. Furthermore, by exploring the possible practical applications of critical literacy across sectors, information professionals from different settings can start to reflect on how they might make links and work together more closely. For example, how could a university library support school or public library-based critical literacy initiatives? Or are there ways in which school librarians might better prepare their students for higher education by adapting critical literacy approaches developed by university librarians? Chapters 8 to 11 focus on information professionals working with young people of secondary school age. Chapter 8 is based on a project designed to teach incarcerated youth literacy skills beyond traditional reading and writing, with a focus on critical media literacy. Michael Cherry, a teen and youth librarian, describes the design of a media sensitization programme for at-risk young people run by the Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library in Indiana, in collaboration with a nearby Youth Care Center. He describes how young people have responded to this initiative, which is intended to empower them to make choices about media and the way it impacts on their lives. In Chapter 9, Rebecca Jones, a school librarian in the UK, writes about opportunities in the curriculum in English schools, as well as extra-curricular

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page xv

MCNICOL INTRODUCTION

XV

opportunities, to integrate critical literacy into schools. She focuses on the role of the school librarian in a range of activities, including project-based learning and mock elections, and explores how these experiences frequently lead to changes in students’ thinking and can translate into practical actions beyond the classroom. Joel Crowley, a librarian at an academy school and sixth form in London, also discusses the ways in which critical literacy has relevance for those working with secondary school students, but he focuses on the role of new media. In Chapter 10, he considers how students make use of new media and how the school librarian can support them in engaging with resources such as Wikipedia and YouTube in a more critical way. Anthony Tilke, another school librarian, but one who has worked in Singapore and now works in the Netherlands, considers critical literacy in relation to a more conventional facet of information literacy instruction: academic honesty. In Chapter 11, he presents a short case study focusing on the potential involvement of the school librarian in the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme. The remaining chapters provide examples from post-secondary education. In Chapter 12, university librarian Rachel Elizabeth Scott writes about her experiences teaching undergraduate students studying a communications course at the University of Memphis. A key component of her approach is ‘giving voice’ as students are encouraged to actively contribute to sessions and take a critical questioning approach to the exploration of sources to construct a compelling speech. In Chapter 13, Sarah Clark explores the critical literacy skills of first-year composition students in a community college. In an exploratory multiple case study of their information-search mediation encounters, she examines their lived search-mediation experiences using data gathered via interviews and visual data generated by participants. She then reflects on the potential implications of these experiences through the lens of critical information literacy. In Chapter 14 Evangelia Bougatzeli and Efi Papadimitriou describe an intervention to raise critical web literacy skills and awareness that was implemented within a Greek university teacher-education syllabus. They outline activities and approaches that information professionals may wish to use when working with teaching staff to introduce similar courses and syllabi elsewhere. The authors reflect on the particular challenges of introducing such a course within a traditional education system that is highly focused on knowledge transmission. Promisingly, they show how this type of approach can start to have an impact on trainee teachers over a period of time. The chapters within this book therefore illustrate the potential of critical literacy approaches within a diverse range of information settings and with

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page xvi

XVI

CRITICAL LITERACY FOR INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS

a variety of user groups. While the authors introduce critical literacy concepts in ways that are accessible to readers who are new to this subject, they also appeal to those with greater knowledge by exploring critical literacy from a range of theoretical perspectives and linking these ideas to current debates in information studies. Furthermore, by demonstrating how ideas of critical literacy can be transferred into practical approaches, they make these concepts directly relevant and applicable to the day-to-day work of professionals working in libraries and information services. I very much hope that the Critical Literacy for Information Professionals will encourage library and information workers, as well as information studies students, educators and researchers, to further explore the ways in which critical literacy can contribute to the development of information studies, both in theory and in practice. With this in mind, the book concludes with a list of further resources related to the key themes of the book. This book will, I hope, be the start of a journey. In the case of those working as information professionals, I hope that some of the practical examples provided will encourage them to try similar approaches in their own libraries or information services. Moreover, I also anticipate that reflecting on the broader issues discussed will prompt some librarians to introduce elements of critical literacy into their practice in ways as yet unimagined. For those of us working in information studies education and research, I hope that this book will add to debates about the nature of ‘literacies’ and, drawing on concepts from both within and beyond our field, help to further our understanding of how libraries and information services can respond to their communities in more critical, engaged and active ways.

References ACRL Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education Task Force (2015) Framework for Information Literacy in Higher Education, www.ala.org/acrl/standards/ilframework. Freire, P. (1970) Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Herder and Herder. Knowles, M. S. (1990) The Adult Learner: a neglected species, Gulf Publishing Co. Lankshear, C. and Knobel, M. (2006) New Literacies: everyday practices and classroom learning, Open University Press. McClusky, H. (1970) An Approach to a Differential Psychology of the Adult Potential. In Grabowski, S. (ed.), Adult Learning and Instruction, Adult Education Association of the USA. McLaughlin, M. and DeVoogd, G. (2004) Critical Literacy: enhancing students’ comprehension of text, Scholastic. Mezirow, J. (2000) Learning as Transformation: critical perspectives on a theory in progress, Jossey-Bass Publishers.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page xvii

MCNICOL INTRODUCTION

XVII

Secker, J., Coonan, E., Hensley, M. K., McNicol, S. and Shields, E. (2015) Information Literacy: the relevance of theories and models on practice, LILAC 2015 Conference, Newcastle, UK, 8 April, https://campus.recap.ncl.ac.uk/Panopto/Pages/ Viewer.aspx?id=c6ffbd18-351d-4f45-8660-4e6a30e3c458. Shor, I. (1999) What is Critical Literacy? The Journal of Pedagogy, Pluralism & Practice, 4 (1), www.lesley.edu/journals/jppp/4/index.html.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page xviii

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 1

PAR T 1

Theories of critical literacy

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 2

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 3

CHAPTER 1

Renegotiating the place of fiction in libraries through critical literacy

Sarah McNicol

Introduction As many of the chapters in this book indicate, within librarianship and information studies, critical literacy is usually linked to information literacy and is most often focused on the use of non-fiction texts. Outside libraries, however, critical literacy is commonly explored through various forms of fiction. This chapter considers how, by adopting critical literacy approaches, librarians across all sectors may find opportunities to encourage readers to read fictional texts from a critical stance and thus find new ways to explore the different notions of ‘truth’ presented, as well as widen their range of reading strategies. The chapter starts by describing how critical literacy forms part of wider literary theory and relates to other approaches to reading. It then describes methods of promoting fiction in libraries in the light of this theory. Finally, it considers the potential of critical literacy in this respect, particularly within reading groups and as part of libraries’ work to promote social inclusion.

Reader response and critical literacy Critical literacy can be seen as forming part of a wider literary theory that explores different ways in which texts can be read. This section sets critical literacy within the framework of reader response theory, before considering critical forms of reading more specifically.

Reader response theory Reader response theory is a form of literary theory that focuses on the experiences of the reader and their engagement with a text. It differs from

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 4

4

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

many other forms of literary theory which tend to focus on the form and content of the text, or on the role of the author. For scholars who work within a reader response framework, the reader plays an active role in shaping a text, to the extent that an active reader might be described as a co-author. Rosenblatt’s (1994a; 1994b) transactional theory of reading is a key idea in reader response criticism. In this approach, a literary work is conceived not as an object, but as an experience to be shaped by the reader, based on guidance provided by the author through the text. This guidance takes the form of ‘clues’ (Allen, 1988) or reading ‘instructions’ (Iser, 1989). Rosenblatt (1994a, 25) proposed that a ‘literary work exists in a live circuit set up between reader and text’. Each person has their own reaction to a text based on personal experience and background (Iser, 1989), and so they create an overall meaning by relating the author’s words to their own experiences. As Walsh (1993, 16) describes in her work on picture books, a book requires ‘the creative imagination of the reader … to fill the gaps in the framework and so complete the work of the writer’. Just like authors, all readers have different experiences and knowledge which help them to make meaning from the text. As a result, there is no single ‘correct’, or absolute, meaning but, rather, a series of more or less equally valid alternative interpretations. Furthermore, for the reader, meaning is not fixed; it can change during the course of reading and can be modified after the work has been read. The relationship between reader and text is therefore not fixed, but can be thought of as a series of events.

Reading and stance Rosenblatt (1994a) describes reading as having two stances, efferent and aesthetic, positioned at either end of a continuum. A stance defines the ways that a reader relates to a text and it reflects their purpose for reading; their attitudes towards a particular text; their expectations of that text; and the ways in which they interact with it. An efferent stance signifies a factual perspective, while an aesthetic stance represents a more emotional focus. Typically, an efferent stance involves a more literal reading, with the goal of extracting information. An efferent reading can be thought of as factual, analytical and cognitive. A reader who is reading primarily from an efferent stance directs their attention outward, focusing on the knowledge they expect to take from the reading event. The reader concentrates on ‘the information, the concepts, the guides to action’ (Rosenblatt, 1994a, 27) that are contained within the text in order to create public, rather than private, meanings. The aesthetic stance, on the other hand, is a more emotional reading, and frequently focuses on the personal journey a reader takes during the act of reading. An aesthetic stance is characterized by a reader focusing on their immediate participation in the reading event as he or she ‘participates in the

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 5

MCNICOL RENEGOTIATING THE PLACE OF FICTION IN LIBRARIES

5

tensions, conflicts, and resolutions of the images, ideas, and scenes as they unfold’ (Rosenblatt, 1994b, 1067). This involves a ‘distancing from “reality”’ (Rosenblatt, 1994a, 31) when the reader focuses their attention on the ‘associations, feelings, attitudes and ideas’ (Rosenblatt, 1994a, 25) that are aroused by the text and ‘savors the qualities of the feelings, ideas, situations, scenes, personalities, and emotions that are called forth’ (Rosenblatt, 2005, 9) to create their own, private, meanings. Texts do offer clues to the reader about what stance to adopt; for instance, it is usual to expect that a poem will be read from an aesthetic stance and a car repair manual from an efferent one. However, stance is not tied exclusively to particular kinds of texts. In other words, a reader can choose to read any given text aesthetically or efferently, or using a combination of both approaches. For example, a reader may read a novel in one way for pleasure reading and in a very different way if they are being examined on the same novel as part of a literature course. Typically, as they engage with a text, readers make meaning using both stances and, although they may make greater use of one than the other, they often adopt different stances during the reading of a single text. Although librarians support readers in working with both stances, the reading of fiction materials is most usually aligned with an aesthetic stance (reading for pleasure), while an efferent stance is adopted with non-fiction resources (reading for information). Information literacy instruction has, therefore, most frequently adopted an efferent stance, as readers are encouraged to focus on finding useful information to take away from a text. In much of their work with fiction texts, on the other hand, librarians most often encourage an aesthetic stance in which the reader’s attention is focused on the more personal or emotive elements of the text. There is, however, an alternative, the critical stance. This stance encourages the reader to respond to a text in a different way: by questioning the version of ‘truth’ it presents.

The critical stance While the aesthetic stance offers an emotional perspective and the efferent stance a more factual approach, the notion of critical literacy builds on Rosenblatt’s ideas and adds a third stance. This alternative, the critical stance, was introduced by McLaughlin and DeVoogd (2004). The critical stance differs from the other two stances because it does not accept what is printed as truth, but questions who has the power in a text; whose viewpoint is being presented; and what the author appears to want the reader to think. This stance also considers whose voices are missing from the text and how these alternative perspectives might be represented. Reader response theory is highly significant here, as, when reading from a critical stance, readers use

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 6

6

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

their background knowledge and experiences to make sense of relationships between their ideas and those presented by the author of the text. In this process, they play the role of text critics (Luke and Freebody, 1999) who have the power to envision alternate ways of viewing the text. Lewison et al. (2008) describe different behaviours which can define a critical stance. For example, readers may question the everyday world around them; interrogate the relationship between language and power; analyse popular culture and media; examine how power relationships are socially constructed; or consider actions that can be taken to promote social justice. Fundamental to a critical literacy approach is the understanding that a reader does not read texts in isolation, but develops an understanding of the cultural, ideological and sociolinguistic contexts in which they are created and read. A basic notion of critical literacy is that all texts are constructed and serve particular interests. This means that it is important to consider who constructed a text and for what purpose. Furthermore, texts contain value messages; as they are constructed by authors who all have their own views of the world, no text is completely neutral and objective. Critical literacy theorists therefore view texts as social, cultural and political constructions. This means that texts do not have a single, fixed meaning, but can mean different things to different people at different times. As each person interprets a text differently, there is no single ‘correct’ way to read and respond to a text. Rather, multiple ways of reading an individual text are not just possible, but inevitable. When they write, an author makes conscious and unconscious choices about what to include and exclude and how to represent the things or people they depict. However, it is not only the author who has an important role; equally, the reader is an active participant in creating meaning from the text and reflecting on the ways in which different viewpoints and power relationships are represented in the text. Crucially, the use of critical literacy involves a commitment to equity and social justice, for example through the explicit inclusion of those marginalized on the basis of gender, sexuality, ethnicity, class or other forms of difference. In learning to engage with a text critically, readers are empowered to challenge the assumptions made in texts and to reconsider their own responses in light of such social justice considerations. This approach can be applied to any genre. To give an example from the reading of picture books, Walsh (1993, 18) describes how the reader of Anthony Brown’s Piggybook ‘must carefully scrutinize the detailed pictures and must decide whether to take up Browne’s challenge of examining an exposé of stereotypical gender roles, or simply to enjoy the book for its humour’. Critical literacy approaches, therefore, invite readers to explore the power issues that exist in texts. They also stress the importance of reading against the text by looking for what the text omits and for contradictions within the text (McLaughlin and DeVoogd,

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 7

MCNICOL RENEGOTIATING THE PLACE OF FICTION IN LIBRARIES

7

2004). Readers are encouraged to question the assumptions made within texts; to discuss different possible meanings; and to examine how authors can attempt to influence readers. A critical reading therefore becomes an inherently reflexive activity that encourages readers to recognize and question their own assumptions. Bishop (2014) synthesized the components which have been consistently articulated as ‘core principles’ (Comber and Simpson, 2001) or ‘transformative elements’ (Lewison et al., 2002) in critical literacy pedagogy. Reviewing the literature, she identified these concepts as: (a) mobilizing learners as social actors with knowledge and skills to disrupt the commonplace; (b) conducting research, analysis and interrogation of multiple viewpoints on an issue; (c) identifying issues focused on socio-political realities in the context of the lives of the learners; (d) designing and undertaking actions focused on social justice outside of the classroom; and (e) reflecting upon actions taken and creating vision(s) for future project(s). As these elements indicate, critical literacy is not simply a theoretical exercise, but is explicitly connected to practical actions. It is not sufficient for people to gain abstract knowledge of their social reality through reading texts; they also need to reflect on this knowledge and transform it through action based on critical reflection. Freire (1970) described this as praxis: informed concrete action linked to certain values. While the elements described by Bishop (2014) relate to critical literacy within a formal education context, they can equally be applied to a library, or other nonformal or informal learning experience where people come together to interrogate and discuss texts; relate these to their own life experiences; and use these reflections as the basis for actions within their local communities. The possibilities of this structure will be developed further below with regard to reading groups in libraries.

Approaches to promoting fiction reading in libraries The importance of promoting recreational reading, and in particular fiction, has long been recognized as an important part of the library’s role in society. There are numerous initiatives and events designed to promote the act of reading, in particular reading for pleasure, in libraries. Some of these take place at an international level – for example, World Book Day and World Book Night. There are also national events and activities, which in the UK include Chatterbooks reading clubs, Bookstart, the Summer Reading Challenge, the Young Readers Programme and Children’s Book Week. There are similar initiatives elsewhere; to name just a few: the Russian National Programme for reading promotion; Banned Books Week and Picture Book Month in the United States; National Simultaneous Storytime in Australia; Nal’ibali national reading-for-enjoyment campaign in South Africa; and

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 8

8

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Denmark is Reading. These, of course, occur in addition to regular events such as reading groups and storytimes that are run in many libraries, and local and regional events like author visits and literature festivals. Considering these activities from a reading-stance perspective, these types of approaches can usually be thought of as promoting an aesthetic stance, as they place emphasis on emotional responses to texts and to the reader’s reading journey. As Train (2003) comments, whereas children’s and young people’s librarians in public libraries commonly offer advice on fiction reading, traditionally, adult fiction librarians have tended not to intervene in their users’ choice of fiction and, perhaps, even question the ethics of intervening in an adult’s selection of fiction reading. It is therefore unsurprising that, in general, more attention has been paid in libraries to fiction reading promotion for children and young people. While reading promotion is often thought of as a public library activity, encouraging reading for pleasure is also a crucial element of the work of school libraries. In a recent research project, school librarians detailed the many ways in which they support and promote reading for pleasure, including: author visits; one-to-one support; posters around the school and in the library; notes in registers announcing new titles; information in student planners; use of the school website or intranet; social media; displays and activities; inclusion in newsletters; and competitions (McNicol and Duggan, 2015). However, the fact remains that, among children’s and school librarians, emphasis is usually placed on promoting reading for enjoyment and to support literacy development rather than to encourage more critical perspectives. Moving through the education system, although encouraging reading for pleasure has rarely been considered a key role for academic libraries (Mahaffy, 2009), examples of reading promotion can be found. In Elliott’s (2007) survey, 71.4% of participating United States libraries had a recreational reading or browsing collection and Sanders’ (2009) survey of academic libraries in three south-eastern states of the United States found that 64% of respondents offered a separate collection of books for users’ leisure or recreational reading. Furthermore, Gladwin and Goulding (2012) found instances of book swaps, displays and author events in UK university libraries. However, while in theory Gladwin and Goulding’s respondents supported recreational reading for the benefits it provides for their students, in practice, few believed it was the university library’s role to facilitate fiction reading (outside course requirements); 59% of questionnaire respondents felt that recreational reading collections did not belong in an academic library. So, while, in theory, academic librarians might be considered to be in the strongest position to promote a critical approach, support for fiction reading is rarely considered an important focus of their work.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 9

MCNICOL RENEGOTIATING THE PLACE OF FICTION IN LIBRARIES

9

Changing approaches to reading promotion It is interesting to reflect on the history of reading promotion and reader development in libraries from a critical literacy perspective. The reader’s advisory interview originated in the United States in the 1920s. In this approach, the librarian was positioned as an educator, ‘leading the reader in a particular direction that they felt would be beneficial to them’ (Train, 2003, 37), as they offered suggestions based on information provided by the reader about their reading tastes. Such approaches, in essence, can be seen as replicating what Freire (1970) described as the ‘banking model’ of education, in which students are viewed as empty containers into which educators must deposit knowledge. In contrast, Freire’s ideas of critical pedagogy position students as active agents capable of the type of dialogue and critical thinking which are central to critical literacy. Although highly structured methods of reading promotion such as reader’s advisory are no longer commonplace, fiction librarians may still emphasize the importance of a ‘neutral stance, giving information rather than advice on reading’ (Kinnell and Shepherd, 1998, 103). In this respect, they might be thought of as aligning themselves with colleagues from non-fiction reference services and, to some extent, promoting an efferent reading stance by emphasizing objectivity and information rather than emotional reactions to literature. Furthermore, it is important to note potential tension here, as critical literacy does not accept the possibility of such a ‘neutral stance’. For example, decisions the librarian makes about which book to select or omit from this information-giving process inevitably have implications for power relationships. Approaches to reading promotion have changed significantly in more recent years. For example, reader development has had a high profile in public libraries in the UK and elsewhere for several decades. Through reader development work, librarians have developed innovative methods of encouraging readers to widen their reading horizons. In whatever setting they take place, reader development initiatives, as described by Van Riel (1992), focus on reading as a creative act that can increase confidence in reading and bring isolated readers together. The aim is to ensure that reading is more enjoyable and more satisfying for the reader. Although there is a social and collective aspect to reader development, the focus is on the experience of reading rather than its wider implications within society. At first glance, therefore, reader development might appear to be closely aligned with an aesthetic stance and focused on the reader’s emotional response to a text. However, reader development activities do not preclude a critical approach. Indeed, reader development proponents insist that as well as a reader’s journey being personally ‘transformational’ (Weibel, 1992), it can enable them to form a stronger ‘connection to the world’ (Kendrick, 2001, 81) through new experiences and interactions with people resulting, in some cases, in changes

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 10

10

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

in the way in which individuals perceive and view the world (Weibel, 1992), an important component of critical literacy. In summary, reading promotion and reader development activities in libraries have tended to support the development of an aesthetic stance; while critical approaches are certainly possible within these types of activities, even in libraries in educational institutions, supporting a critical stance in relation to fiction reading is not commonplace.

Critical literacy and fiction reading in libraries As described above, in librarianship and information studies literature critical literacy is usually discussed in relation to non-fiction resources, particularly focusing on the links between critical literacy and information literacy. In educational studies, however, ideas of critical literacy are more frequently conceived in relation to fictional texts. This takes advantage of the fact that, while fiction can have a powerful impact, it can also act as a ‘safe’ arena to explore challenging ideas. To give just a few examples, Borsheim-Black et al. (2014) engage with critical literacy through canonical texts such as Of Mice and Men; Chun (2009) describes how the graphic novel Maus, which foregrounds racism and immigrant otherness, can be used as a teaching resource to facilitate critical literacy; and Simmons (2012) explores ways to utilize students’ interest in fantasy literature to support critical literacy by focusing on Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games series to address how elements of the trilogy relate to violent acts in the real world, including hunger, forced labour, child soldiers and the sex trade. As these examples illustrate, critical literacy is an approach that can be applicable across a wide range of genres.

Linking social inclusion and critical literacy Social inclusion has been an important aspect of reader development initiatives in libraries for a number of years. For example, Framework for the Future (DCMS, 2003) and A National Public Library Development Programme for Reading (MLA, 2004) in the UK recognised the value of reading groups in helping libraries to deliver on social inclusion agendas. As critical literacy is concerned with issues of social justice and critical reflection leading to social change, applying a critical stance to reading is likely to offer opportunities to address social inclusion issues. In this context, reading groups and other reader development activities may present ways to reconsider fiction reading within a critical literacy context. Reader development and, in particular, reading groups have often been seen as ways to reach groups who are in some way marginalized; for example,

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 11

MCNICOL RENEGOTIATING THE PLACE OF FICTION IN LIBRARIES

11

looked-after children, prisoners, people with English as an Additional Language or people with health conditions or disabilities. One organization currently working in this field is The Reader Organization, which runs a number of projects in the UK, including Reading in a Secure Environment (RISE), which brings readers in mental healthcare and criminal justice sites into contact with authors, and Wirral National Model Project, which includes over 100 weekly reading groups in care homes, day-care centres, women’s centres and other community locations. Of course, the majority of public library authorities run, or support, reading groups; many are general groups, but others are aimed at particular age groups (e.g. teenagers); genres (e.g. poetry, science fiction, crime); or social or cultural groups (e.g. Asian women, adults with low literacy levels). Reading groups are also a common activity within school libraries and are occasionally held within academic libraries and other types of libraries such as prison libraries. Reading groups may present significant opportunities to address social justice concerns. Such groups undoubtedly encourage and support reading from an aesthetic stance, emphasizing the role of reading in personal development, but they can also lead to discussions from more critical perspectives as groups consider how a text relates to their experiences and those of other members of their community, for instance. While an aesthetic stance can be thought of as relating to the individual’s private response to a text, critical literacy more readily lends itself to group or ‘socially interactive’ (Guthrie, 2004, 4) examinations of texts that occur within reading groups. In an example from a school setting, Taliaferro (2011) reports on a qualitative action research study examining high school students’ aesthetic and efferent responses to a novel set in Afghanistan, and their development of critical stances. One of the findings was that class discussions provided a context for students to adopt stances that were not evident in their individual written responses to the novel. In fact, it was precisely these discussions which provided scaffolding to help students to adopt critical stances. However, while research has been conducted into how recruitment to library-based reading groups and their structure may, or may not, support social inclusion agendas (e.g. Hyder, 2013), considerations of how the texts that are read and the discussions that happen within reading groups may impact on these issues is less often considered. In particular, the role of reading groups in the development of a critical stance toward fiction reading has not been a focus of research.

Ways of developing a critical stance within reading groups As Bishop (2014) notes, the context of formal schooling is frequently seen as a limitation hindering the possibility of social action as a result of critical readings.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 12

12

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Failure to put principles into practice and to fully enact learning through active interventions in authentic spaces extending outside the classroom can limit the impact of critical literacy approaches within formal education. In this context, reading groups run in libraries and elsewhere in communities, especially those with a focus on inclusion, offer interesting opportunities to introduce a more engaged critical stance to people’s reading experiences. There are many approaches to teaching critical literacy which might be applied in a library, and in particular a reading group, context. Some possible ways to structure reading group discussions that support a critical stance are described below.

Interrogating a text Critical literacy encourages readers to go beyond passively accepting a text’s message, however reliable or credible the author might be considered to be. One useful structure for actively interrogating a text is Sandretto’s (2011) set of ‘critical literacy questions’. Although this was produced for use in a classroom, it could be equally relevant to reading group discussions. This resource divides the critique of a text into the following themes: textual purposes; textual structures and features; construction of characters; gaps and silences; power and interest; whose view/reality; interrogating the composer; and multiple meanings. Readers are encouraged to consider questions such as, ‘What kind of person, and with what interests and values, composed the text?’; ‘What knowledge does the reader/viewer need to bring to this text in order to understand it?’; and ‘How else could the text have been written?’. This resource can be used in various ways, for example, to interrogate a single text or to compare two or more texts under one of the sets of themes presented. Of course, the wording of questions could also be adapted to meet the needs of different types of readers, such as those who are younger or with low literacy levels.

Juxtaposing texts A common, and fairly straightforward, way to introduce readers to critical literacy is to present them with two juxtaposing texts on the same topic to consider; for example, texts by authors with different political viewpoints. By comparing how the authors present characters and situations, readers can develop an awareness of how similar stories can be understood differently, depending on the ways in which they are selected and presented. Reading two biographies of the same individual or two novels or accounts describing the same historical events are examples of ways in which texts might be juxtaposed and discussed in a reading group.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 13

MCNICOL RENEGOTIATING THE PLACE OF FICTION IN LIBRARIES

13

Contextualizing Asking readers to interpret a text without any contextual clues can help to illustrate the ways in which texts can have many meanings. An example might be presenting a poem or individual account of an event with no geographical or cultural details to help to situate it. When readers are asked to consider what they think it is about, the different knowledge and memories they bring can become apparent, affecting how they relate to, and interpret, the same account. A short extract could be used for this purpose, perhaps as an introduction before the group starts to read a longer novel.

Alternative endings Asking readers to provide alternative endings to a novel read in a reading group is another activity that may support the development of a critical stance. Another possibility for works that have been adapted or reworked (as other novels or in alternative media such as film) is to consider the reasons why authors or scriptwriters may choose to change the ending of a well-known text. What messages do they want to send to the audience by doing so?

Role reversal Asking readers to retell a story by changing the age, sex, ethnicity or another significant characteristic of the main protagonist(s) helps to illustrate, and challenge, some of the assumptions which can be made about particular social groups. Unless we read a text critically and consider (perhaps less obvious) alternatives, it is all too easy to accept the version of social reality presented by the author without questioning. This exercise can also help to show who the author intended as the audience for their original text and to explore the question of whether the text might exclude or marginalize certain readers, intentionally or otherwise.

Retelling from another character’s point of view Asking members of a reading group to retell an event from another character’s point of view can be a useful way to introduce readers to some of the ideas underpinning critical literacy, especially power relations. Taking a minor character who is almost overlooked in the original version and considering the events described from their perspective can be illuminating. As an example, Tom Stoppard’s play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead is a famous example of a text that focuses on minor characters from another text, in this case Hamlet. What differences become apparent when the focus is shifted away from the most powerful characters and onto those whose voices

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 14

14

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

are less often heard? What gaps or silences in the original text does this exercise highlight?

Alternative settings Changing the place and/or time in which a story is set can lead to greater understanding about the assumptions suggested by the author, especially about global inequality issues, cultural differences in power relations and the domination of particular ideologies. Although this section has focused on the application of critical literacy to library reading groups, there are, of course, other ways in which a critical stance could be introduced to readers; for instance, displays highlighting power issues and focusing on voices usually missing from mainstream texts, or competitions to produce insightful alternative endings to widely read novels.

Challenges of critical literacy and fiction promotion Introducing critical approaches towards fiction reading in a library setting is not without its problems. As Borsheim and Petrone (2006, 82) acknowledge, in a formal education context, ‘because of the nature of critical research, students are likely to ask questions that some people prefer they not ask about topics that some people prefer they not address’. The same could undoubtedly be said with regard to such activities in libraries, across all sectors and geographical locations. A crucial consideration for librarians who encourage readers to take a critical stance towards fiction is that this does not simply require them to bring books and readers together. Rather, critical literacy requires a deeper engagement from librarians as they work alongside their communities to encourage and, where appropriate, assist them in transforming their responses to a text into actions. Undeniably, moving beyond traditional, more apparently neutral, outreach and community engagement in this way can be politically, as well as personally, challenging. There are other reasons why adopting a critical literacy approach in a library setting can be highly demanding. Giving readers the confidence to be comfortable with the notion that there is no single ‘correct’ way to read a text requires considerable time and skill. Critical literacy enables readers to see connections between the texts they read and the ‘real world’ as they come to realize how the experiences and opinions of both the author and reader are integral in shaping any text. However, while these ideas can be powerful, they can also be unsettling for both readers and librarians.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 15

MCNICOL RENEGOTIATING THE PLACE OF FICTION IN LIBRARIES

15

Conclusions The development of critical literacy can, therefore, be supported in libraries via methods similar to those used to promote reading for pleasure and to support social inclusion, in particular, the provision of reading groups. With their considerable experience of such methods, librarians with expertise in reader development activities are well placed to support readers in adopting critical approaches to fiction. An emphasis on critical literacy may not only be useful in public libraries; it may also allow libraries within educational establishments and other sectors to introduce reading promotion activities in a form that may seem more closely aligned with their core mission. However, while the basic methods may be familiar, it is important to remember that the ultimate goal of critical literacy activities is to foster a critical stance, rather than (or in addition to) an aesthetic one. Too little is currently known about the activities that take place within reading groups with regard to their possible impact on social justice issues. This chapter has suggested some ways in which reading group activities and discussions could be framed within a critical literacy context, but more research is needed into the possible benefits and challenges of implementing these in practice. Although this chapter has focused on the library profession, it is important to remember that librarians are not alone in this endeavour. By working with radical educators, authors, poets and other artists to support a critical, as well as aesthetic, approach to fiction, librarians can potentially extend not only the types of texts readers engage with, but also the ways in which they engage with them. Using reading groups and other methods of reading promotion to support a critical literacy stance may be powerful in providing readers with skills and strategies to challenge social and political systems. This approach may also result in practical social action within local communities, in addition to engaging readers in more active forms of reading and offering them more creative ways to critique texts.

References Allen, C. (1988) Louise Rosenblatt and Theories of Reader-response, Reader, 20, 32–9. Bishop, E. (2014) Critical Literacy: bringing theory to praxis, Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, 30 (1), 51–63. Borsheim, C. and Petrone, R. (2006) Teaching the Research Paper for Local Action, The English Journal, 95 (4), 78–83. Borsheim-Black, C., Macaluso, M. and Petrone, R. (2014) Critical Literature Pedagogy: teaching canonical literature for critical literacy, Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 58 (2),123–33. Chun, C. W. (2009) Critical Literacies and Graphic Novels for English-Language Learners: teaching Maus, Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 53 (2), 144–53.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 16

16

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Comber, B. and Simpson, A. (2001) Negotiating Critical Literacies in Classrooms, Lawrence Erlbaum. DCMS (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) (2003) Framework for the Future: libraries, learning and information in the next decade, Department for Culture, Media and Sport. Elliott, J. (2007) Academic Libraries and Extracurricular Reading Promotion, Reference and User Services Quarterly, 46 (3), 34–45. Freire, P. (1970) Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Herder and Herder. Gladwin, R. and Goulding, A. (2012) Recreational Reading in University Libraries in the United Kingdom, New Review of Academic Librarianship, 18 (2), 140–64. Guthrie, J. T. (2004) Teaching for Literacy Engagement, Journal of Literacy Research, 36 (1), 1–28. Hyder, W. (2013) Reading Groups, Libraries and Social Inclusion: experiences of blind and partially-sighted people, Ashgate. Iser, W. (1989) Prospecting: from reader response to literary anthropology, John Hopkins University Press. Kendrick, S. (2001) A Librarian’s Thoughts on Reading. In Katz, B. (ed.), Readers, Reading and Librarians, Haworth Press. Kinnell, M. and Shepherd, J. (1998) Promoting Reading to Adults in UK Public Libraries, British Library Research and Innovation Report 72, Taylor Graham. Lewison, M., Flint, A. S. and Van Sluys, K. (2002) Taking on Critical Literacy: the journey of newcomers and novices, Language Arts, 79 (5), 382–92. Lewison, M., Leland, C. and Harste, J. C. (2008) Creating Critical Classrooms: K-8 reading and writing with an edge, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Luke, A. and Freebody, P. (1999) Further Notes on the Four Resources Model, Reading Online, www.readingonline.org/research/lukefrebody.html. Mahaffy, M. (2009) In Support of Reading: reading outreach programs at academic libraries, Public Services Quarterly, 5 (3), 163–73. McLaughlin, M. and DeVoogd, G. (2004) Critical Literacy: enhancing students’ comprehension of text, Scholastic. McNicol, S. and Duggan, J. (2015) Evaluation of the 2014 School Library Pack, Book Trust, http://booktrustadmin.artlogic.net/usr/resources/1390/slp-report-final-14may-.pdf. MLA (Council for Museums, Libraries and Archives) (2004) A National Public Library Development Programme for Reading Groups, The Reading Agency. Rosenblatt, L. M. (1994a) The Reader, the Text, the Poem: the transactional theory of the literary work, Southern Illinois University Press. Rosenblatt, L. (1994b) The Transactional Theory of Reading and Writing. In Ruddell, R., Ruddell, M. and Singer, H. (eds), Theoretical Models and Processes of Reading, 4th edn, International Reading Association. Rosenblatt, L. (2005) Making Meaning with Texts: selected essays, Heinemann. Sanders, M. (2009) Popular Reading Collections in Public University Libraries: a

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 17

MCNICOL RENEGOTIATING THE PLACE OF FICTION IN LIBRARIES

17

survey of three southeastern states, Public Services Quarterly, 5 (3), 174–83. Sandretto, S. (2011) Critical Literacy Questions, www.slanza.org.nz/uploads/9/7/5/5/9755821/susansandrettohandout.pdf. Simmons, A. M. (2012) Class on Fire: using the Hunger Games trilogy to encourage social action, Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 56 (1), 22–34. Taliaferro, C. (2011) Ninth Grade Students’ Negotiation of Aesthetic, Efferent, and Critical Stances in Response to a Novel Set in Afghanistan, http://digital.library. unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc103398/m2/1/high_res_d/disseration.pdf. Train, B. (2003) Reader Development. In Elkin, J., Train, B. and Denham, D. (eds), Reading and Reader Development: the pleasure of reading, Facet Publishing. Van Riel, R. (ed.) (1992) Reading the Future: a place for literature in the public library, Arts Council and Library Association. Walsh, S. (1993) The Multi-layered Picture Book. In Pinsent, P. (ed.), The Power of the Page: children’s books and their readers, David Fulton Publishers. Weibel, M. C. (1992) The Library as Literacy Classroom: a program for teaching, American Library Association.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 18

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 19

CHAPTER 2

Death of the author(ity): repositioning students as constructors of meaning in information literacy instruction Jessica Critten

Introduction In ‘The Death of the Author’, Barthes (1977, 146) writes that a text is ‘a multidimensional space in which a variety of writings, none of them original, blend and clash. The text is a tissue of quotations drawn from the innumerable centres of culture’. He asserts that the meaning of a text is fluid, and open to the interpretations of the reader. Foucault (1979a) further deconstructs authorship in ‘What is an Author?’ by taking the author away from the centre of the meaning-making process and exposing the role of the reader in the construction of a text. This notion is, in many ways, counter to the traditional work of bibliographic and information literacy instruction, which is concerned almost overwhelmingly with establishing authorial intent and determining expertise. This dogged focus on ‘authorship’ results in a curriculum in which popular and scholarly sources are positioned on either side of a value-laden binary, and where the process of critical evaluation – purportedly the heart of the project of information literacy – is often an effort to discern existing meanings, rather than challenge them. This emphasis on authorship also does nothing to recognize the ways in which a reader’s relationship with a text is, fundamentally, a discourse in which meaning is continually negotiated and filtered through one’s own lived experiences and values. In the spirit of Barthes and Foucault, this chapter is not solely about authors and authorship. Instead, it focuses on the conversations that arise when information literacy attempts to de-centre authorial intent and turn the lens back on the reader, or learner, as the constructor of meaning. When a learner is empowered to locate their own sense of ‘truth’ in a text, the discourse opens up into an examination of how those truths are, in themselves, constructed. To understand the importance or impact of an information source, one has

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 20

20

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

to consider the audience response to a particular text and address interpretation as much as, if not more than, authorial intent. The focus I propose here is not an outright poststructuralist rejection of authorship but, rather, a recognition of the unique ways in which the field of information literacy should holistically consider its interactions with authorship. This chapter starts with an exploration of the notion of ‘reading as interpretation’ within a reader response framework and contrasts these ideas to those frequently advocated in library instruction curricula. The following section suggests a number of ways in which librarians might reject simplistic, positivist approaches and turn the focus back on the student to emphasize their role in the processes of reading and knowledge creation. The chapter finishes by highlighting the implications of a learner-centred approach within the new ACRL (Association of College and Research Libraries) (2015) Framework document, and especially its conception of authorship and authority.

A hermeneutic framework: reading as interpretation This chapter can be situated in the larger context of reader response criticism, which, as Tompkins (1980, ix) notes, ‘argue[s] that a [text] cannot be understood apart from its results. Its “effects”, psychological and otherwise are essential to any accurate description of its meaning, since that meaning has no effective existence outside of its realization in the mind of the reader.’ Note that this approach does not assert that reader-centred interpretation is necessarily relativist. The reader does not have carte blanche to interpret a text in a way that is completely separate from the text. Rather, it is the case that ‘The convergence of text and reader brings the literary work into existence’ (Iser, 1980, 50). Readers create meaning in the ways that their interpretations ‘blend and clash’ (Barthes, 1977, 146) with the text, which is also the way that texts serve to create new knowledge in the reader. The reader response approach is a practical application of the philosophy of hermeneutics, which is, put simply, the study of interpretation. In moreor-less defining the modern critical practice of hermeneutics, H. G. Gadamer (1977) evokes Plato and Aristotle to argue that knowledge is dialogic. That is, because our lived experiences and corresponding knowledge base are limited and bounded, we learn through dialogue with the ‘other’ (be it person, situation or text) in which we compare what we know to the new information that we do not know. In this figuration, neither reader nor text are static entities; rather, they are participants in a hermeneutic process in which a reader becomes exposed to more discourses, which allows them to interpret texts in increasingly richer and, often, more personal ways. A reader-centred approach does not argue that there is no value in

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 21

CRITTEN DEATH OF THE AUTHOR(ITY)

21

exploring what was intended to be expressed in a text. There would be no literature or, for that matter, research or information literacy without the act of reading-to-understand. Even if we argue that the sentiments expressed by an author do not necessarily belong to them wholly, or that those words are not sacrosanct, they can still enrich us. However, Gadamer (1977) asserts that meaning does not just exist within the text or within an action, and therefore meaning is not determined only by the author’s intentions. Meaning is ascribed through the relationship between the text and the person who seeks to understand it: the reader. There are any number of possible meanings that any text or action can have, but they are only realized through the process of interpretation. Another approach to considering the ways in which interpretation shapes our interactions with information might be to replace the word ‘meaning’ with the word ‘significance’. The word ‘significance’ suggests importance, and that when something is significant it necessarily will have some kind of impact and resonance. Interpretation is not just the way that something becomes understood; it is also the way that certain ideas and actions are privileged above others. One’s interpretive framework guides and shapes what information might be considered and what information might be unexamined entirely. A straightforward example might be of a student who does a quick and simple search in a search engine on a research topic. As they scroll through their results, they will more than likely choose the ones that prominently display familiar words or ideas. These might not be the best results, necessarily, but they are the most significant. Another example could be a student researching a controversial topic about which they feel very strongly. They might find a wellresearched and thoughtful piece on this subject that does not resonate with them because it makes assertions that run contrary to their own personal beliefs. A student looking for information that confirms the position they wish to take might not find contradictory information significant or resonant enough with their lived experience to consider it. That one’s interpretation can so negatively affect one’s search for information brings into relief how necessary it is to study interpretation and the role of the reader or student as fundamental to the research process explicitly.

Positivism, libraries and information literacy Barthes (1977, 142–3) historicizes our fascination with, and perhaps fetishization of, the author as a product of ‘English empiricism, French rationalism, and the personal faith of the reformation’. In other words, privileging the author and their intentions is an inheritance from a time when positivism was the dominant scientific (and philosophical) epistemology. Positivism (and later logical positivism) asserts that knowledge (or, at least,

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 22

22

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

the knowledge worth entertaining) should be gained empirically and is subject to a system of verification to establish a system of unchanging laws. Positivism has fallen out of favour in the social sciences as new paradigmatic turns, emerging out of critical theory, reject the premise that human beings can be known objectively and studied in the same way as the natural world. Moreover, these theorists would challenge the very premise that science can fundamentally be objective, as methodology is as constructed as any other product of human endeavour. As a manifestation of a positivist epistemology, therefore, author-focused understandings assume that there is a direct relationship between the text and the perceived originator of the text. In other words, the author writes something that is then consumed and accepted as that author’s intended meaning and truth. Text/author-centred criticism may be considered within the theoretical boundaries of intentionalism, that a work should be judged in terms of the intentions of its author(s). As Fay (1996, 142–3) notes, this theory asserts that ‘the meaning of the act is already contained in it by virtue of the intentionality that it embodies. Meaning is something already present waiting to be grasped, a meaning which exists independently or those who seek to discover it.’ This approach makes meaning static and unchanging in a world that is constantly changing. One might respond that a text-centred approach allows for authors to be shown to be wrong, especially as time passes and one is able to consider a text retrospectively. If that is true, how is a text supposed to be read and understood in the meantime? Does one accept what they are reading as truth until such time as it is disproven? A hermeneutic approach asserts that because knowledge is always situated as a response to a reader’s interaction of the text, it is always subject to critique and understood to be a manifestation of a changing world. It is also understood that there might never be a final, definitive understanding of that text or action. In ‘What is an author?’ Foucault (1979a, 107) asserts that rather than being a source of truth and knowledge, ‘authors’ only perform the ‘function’ of writing. He argues that people continue to hold on to the idea of the author for its ‘classificatory function’; that is, giving name to an author allows us ‘to group together a certain number of texts, define them, differentiate them from and contrast them to others’. This ‘classificatory function’ is desirable, especially to library and information workers for whom classification and organization is a central professional responsibility. However it can be seen as another way that librarianship seeks to understand complex and political relationships to information simplistically and empirically. The ubiquity of a positivist epistemology in librarianship suggests that the work of an instruction librarian is to assist a seeker towards finding and understanding some kind of existing ‘truth’. In this interpretation, information is itself a kind of empty data, as yet untouched by any kind of

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 23

CRITTEN DEATH OF THE AUTHOR(ITY)

23

interpretation or theory (Breivik and Gee, 1989). Luke and Kapitzke (1999, 489) argue against this ‘anachronistic and dysfunctional’ figuration, which positions ‘knowledge as external to the knower’, something to be discovered out in the world rather than inside themselves. Here, any possible truth to be discovered would be one disengaged with underlying but fundamental goals of information literacy, including ‘the social construction and cultural authority of knowledge, the political economies of knowledge ownership and control, and the development of local communities’ and cultures’ capacities to critique and construct knowledge’ (Luke and Kapitzke, 1999, 483–4). Moreover, as Kapitzke (2003) notes, if books are conceived of as spaces where an author’s fixed meaning is located and actualized as knowledge, then libraries, as the traditional, nostalgized location of books become an extended container-of-a-container of knowledge. This conception of books (and, by extension, libraries) is problematic because it contributes to the continued perception that libraries (and librarians) are neutral spaces. Gadamer (1977) would warn against the information literacy curriculum mentioned above, which tries to discern a ‘method’ towards finding a finalized ‘truth’. He asserts that because the dialogic process of hermeneutic interpretation is always ongoing, there is no ultimate truth or final state of shared understanding to be found. He rejects the positivistic insistence on method, asserting that there can fundamentally be no method to uncover a truth that either does not exist or cannot be reached. This presents a problem for library instruction practitioners, who often rely on structured approaches to teach information literacy concepts: what kinds of texts are considered scholarly? And how can those texts be read and used to create new knowledge? Without such discernible steps towards understanding, library instructors have to return to the realm of the conceptual. This is not impossible, and may not even be very difficult, but it has many implications for what library instruction might look like on a practical level.

Students as constructors of meaning: implications for practice The notion of an individual author challenged by Barthes and Foucault but valorized in traditional information literacy instruction divorces the text from the sociocultural context of both its production and consumption and imposes an orthodoxy of meaning upon the text. That is to say, the human being who puts pen to paper is not a contained, neutral being; they are pulling from what Barthes (1977) calls a ‘dictionary’ of existing, historicized and temporal discourses. As such, Olsson (2010, 69) writes, ‘the meaning ... of a work is not something governed or determined by the author, but rather is a social construct created (and constantly re-created) by the reader/s at a particular point in space and time’.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 24

24

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Instead of favouring the author in our practice as instruction librarians, we should turn our gaze back to the student. When a student interacts with a text, they are ‘authoring’ it through their interpretation and ideologies. They are giving it a meaning that is personal and filtered through their own lived experience. Regardless of what an author may intend, the reader or student ultimately decides what something means. With a focus on the learner as locus of meaning, we can begin to resituate the direction of our practice, not outwards to discerning the author’s meaning, but inwards to examining the construction of our personal ideologies. This section investigates the implications of this position in practice, specifically focusing on library instruction.

Making connections In a paper presented at the Georgia Conference on Information Literacy entitled ‘The Professional Epistemology of Library Instruction’, Smith (2009) details an interaction with a student in which he realized that, more than the opportunity to find more resources to help them understand a topic better, what the student may have really needed from their interaction with a librarian was an opportunity to work out their relationship to the information in the text. Smith writes, ‘Reading, and talking about what one has read, along with writing: these are the material practices of research.’ That is to say, it is reasonable to conceive of the domain of the librarian as including certain types of interactions with students. During such interactions, in addition to (or perhaps in place of) straightforward discussions about where to find certain texts, there is a dialogue between librarian and student about what is contained within that text, and ways in which the students’ beliefs, values and prior knowledge influence their reading. Kapitzke (2003, 47–8) notes that a positivist view of the library as a warehouse of books that contain facts necessarily positions the librarian as a ‘fact provider’, someone whose job it is to merely retrieve and regurgitate facts. This traditional conception of a librarian no longer resonates as the library becomes increasingly digital and diffuse. Instead, she writes, librarians should focus on helping researchers to ‘add epistemological value through connecting and cohering seemingly unrelated texts’.

Reading with prejudice Gadamer (1977) writes that we cannot interpret a text without prejudice. He does not aim to characterize prejudice as something that is fundamentally bad, a kind of insurmountable bias. Rather, prejudices are just the ‘prejudgments’ we make about an experience. He writes: ‘[Prejudices] ... are

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 25

CRITTEN DEATH OF THE AUTHOR(ITY)

25

simply the conditions whereby we experience something – whereby what we encounter says something to us’ (p. 9). We enter into a process of understanding with these prejudices already present and informing how we make sense of the matter at hand. Discussion can bring these prejudices, which are often subtle or even subconscious, into relief. As we engage in a process of dialogue with someone or something else, our prejudices come into contact with theirs. Here, we can begin to recognize what those prejudices are and the ways in which they might conflict, or align, with other perspectives. What this means for practice is that when we privilege the student as a constructor of meaning we are not doing so uncritically. The library classroom should be a place where students confront their prejudices and the (oftenconflicting) ideologies or prejudices presented in a text. The work of the instruction librarian is to expose students to other ‘horizons’ and to ask them to be reflective about the implications of their beliefs and actions in the process of interpretation. The student-centred approach outlined in this chapter does not advocate for understanding as a process of cherry-picking only things that agree with the reader; ideas may equally resonate when they make one question where their values come from.

Research as empowerment When information literacy is seen only as a process of discerning existing meaning, it gives power to the author thereby positioning the reader as passive receiver. Thinking of students as constructors of meaning is also one way in which we begin to explore what is at the heart of the real project of education (and, therefore, information literacy), which is empowerment. Decentring the author effectively subjectifies the learner by putting them at the heart of the text and relocating who has the power of representation. Critical pedagogue Paulo Freire (1970) describes traditional schooling as functioning through the ‘banking concept’ of education, in which the student is a receptacle of information that never becomes real, meaningful knowledge. The teacher, as an authority, ‘issues communiques, and makes deposits which the students patiently receive, memorize, and repeat’ (p. 72). Banking systems figure students as ‘objects’ who exist in, and are subject to the oppression institutionalized in, educational systems. Freire (1970, 75) writes: ‘Implicit in the banking concept is the assumption of a dichotomy between human beings and the world: a person is merely in the world, not with the world or with others; the individual is a spectator, not re-creator.’ Viewing a text as the expression of an author’s ultimate truth and reading a text solely as an effort to discern that truth perpetuates the same sense of inequality and oppression. As Freire notes, traditional conceptions of authority are too often engaged in the service of oppressive structures. He advocates instead for a system of

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 26

26

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

problem-posing education in which ‘[t]he teacher is no longer merely the onewho-teaches, but one who is himself taught in dialogue with the students who in turn while being taught also teach’ (p. 80). This dialogic system of learning echoes Gadamer’s (1977) hermeneutic figuration in which knowledge is gained through the back-and-forth between text and interpreter.

Implications for models of instruction As might have already become obvious, this level of dialogic engagement with the student-as-constructor-of-meaning is not well suited to many current models of library instruction. The most well-worn model, the ‘one-shot’, is probably the least ideal environment for the kinds of conceptual work that are necessary in the student-centred approach outlined here. Not only are librarians not given enough time to work with students, they often do not have any say in how a research project is conceived. Also, one-shots are often spaces in which librarians feel beholden to the requests of the disciplinary faculty member who requested a session with the librarian. In this, librarians might not feel as though they even have the autonomy to determine their own curriculum. Instead, an instruction librarian who wishes to explore the role that interpretation plays in research might be better suited to work closely with a disciplinary faculty member to co-create research assignments that emphasize interpretation (as described in Chapter 12, for example). Librarians might also find, as Smith (2009) did, that individual research consultations are rich opportunities to more meaningfully engage with students-as-constructorsof-meaning. Many instruction librarians are able to teach their own information literacy courses. Although many of these courses might also be subject to programmatic or policy pressures to create a certain curriculum, the librarian does have an opportunity to be more assertive about the content of the course, and also what they might look for in their students’ assignments. Whatever model instruction librarians find themselves adopting, they should be aware that embracing a truly student-centred approach is also fundamentally rejecting an author-centred approach with a long history of support as positivist method. Being able to take this stance is a privilege for many but, as a site of resistance against what might be ineffective curricula that can perpetuate oppression, it is certainly worth advocating for.

Interpretation and the Framework For all intents and purposes, the ACRL Information Literacy Framework in Higher Education (ACRL, 2015) (henceforth known as the Framework) was

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 27

CRITTEN DEATH OF THE AUTHOR(ITY)

27

intended to supplant the ACRL Information Literacy Standards, which were seen as too prescriptive and not sufficiently engaged with a world of information that is made more complex by the presence of the internet. The Framework approaches information literacy more conceptually, as a field best understood through a number of threshold concepts (described as ‘frames’ in the Framework), which are concepts that allow a student to progress in their understanding of an idea or subject. The Framework has been (and continues to be) a controversial document but still does much to shape practice in informing the development of information literacy curricula in institutions of higher education in the United States and across the world. The following section addresses the implications of a reader/learner-centred approach upon it as a policy document, and within one of its ‘frames’ in particular. The Framework was designed to be interpreted and localized as needed, which means that the most interesting criticisms of it may lie in the specific ways in which it has been (and will be) implemented by practitioners, rather than in close readings of the text. In this spirit, the Framework can be seen as a manifestation of the thesis of this chapter, that intention does not determine interpretation. That is, the meaning that the ACRL Framework Committee intended when they wrote the text of the Framework may not be how people who read the Framework choose to actually use it. To be clear, this is a success of the Framework, perhaps its biggest success. Seale (2015) offers a compelling criticism of this position, arguing that, as a body ascribed with authority by academic librarians, ACRL’s presence in the document still gives the Framework a sensibility of prescriptiveness, of being a set of standards, even as it was purposefully designed not to be a set of standards. Interestingly, arguing that ACRL has a prescriptive authority as the author of the Framework, even as it claims not to, and that the Framework is essentially a set of standards, even as it claims not to be, demonstrates, again, the power of individual interpretation in our interactions with the Framework. The content of the Framework is not static; it is constantly being determined and re-determined, based on who is reading it and what that reader needs from it. One of the most complex issues the Framework takes on is the relationship between authorship and authority. The frame ‘Authority is Constructed and Contextual’ asserts that authority is situated and should be considered with a measure of scepticism. However, authority is described as ‘constructed’ in the Framework insofar as ‘various communities may recognize different types of authority’ (p. 7). If authority is constructed in this way, the only value that a text has is the one imposed upon it by those with the power to make that determination. Asserting that something has the credibility that authority signifies because it is recognized as authoritative in certain communities does not challenge the oppressive structures that might exist in those communities. Instructors might want to interrogate the implications of the constructed

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 28

28

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

nature of authority, or to problematize the processes that determine scholarly authority, including peer review and neoliberal hiring and tenuring practices, in higher education. This conception of authority often manifests practically in information literacy instruction as failing to interrogate information sources with higher levels of perceived authority and trustworthiness. There is a sense that these sources can somehow be accepted without the level of scepticism and critical evaluation given to sources with a less privileged origin (for example, the view that scholarly sources need not be vetted as closely as information written on blogs). The effect of this is that information is often put into camps of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ based almost entirely on its authorship, which leaves littleto-no space for students to locate themselves within the text. When they are called upon to critically evaluate the author’s messages, the learner does not play a part in shaping meaning, only in trying to discern the existing, intended meaning. The Framework has asserted that the goal of the learner (in becoming an ‘expert researcher’) should be to reflect on how one might be a more responsible and ethical consumer of information, or how one might thoughtfully evaluate the wealth of opinions with which one is confronted. While these are all tremendously valuable dispositions to cultivate, they do not speak to the learner themselves; neither do one’s lived experiences nor the political and social forces that have shaped values play a part in the meaning-making process. However, all of these dimensions have affected how the learner interprets and creates information and are just as important as, if not more so than, understanding and evaluating authorial intent.

Conclusion: the author is dead, long live the author Foucault (1979b, 115) once said, ‘All my books ... are little tool boxes ... if people want to open them, to use this sentence or that idea as a screwdriver or spanner to short-circuit, discredit or smash systems of power, including eventually those from which my books have emerged ... so much better!’ I would like to conclude by suggesting that this chapter, a piece that privileges personal interpretation, be read in that spirit. I would argue that someone who sees the value in the close reading of a text (as I often do) might also see the utility of a situational, reader-centred approach as a site of resistance. Deemphasizing the ‘author’ allows us to reframe our practice to present research not as a search for an ultimate truth or a right answer but, rather, as a way for us to make connections between ideas, and to analyse and problematize the ways in which discourse communities assign and privilege kinds of authority. Most importantly, the approaches described in this chapter allow us to empower the student as someone whose emotions, lived experience and knowledge all contribute to making meaning.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 29

CRITTEN DEATH OF THE AUTHOR(ITY)

29

References ACRL Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education Task Force (2015) Framework for Information Literacy in Higher Education, www.ala.org/acrl/standards/ilframework. Barthes, R. (1977) The Death of the Author. In Image-music-text, Fontana. Breivik, P. S. and Gee, E. G. (1989) Information Literacy: revolution in the library, Macmillan. Fay, B. (1996) Contemporary Philosophy of Social Science: a multicultural approach, Wiley-Blackwell. Foucault, M. (1979a) What is an Author? In Harari, J. V. (ed.), Textual Strategies: perspectives in post-structuralist criticism, Cornell University Press. Foucault, M. (1979b) Interview with Roger-Pol Droit, La Monde. In Morris, M. and Patton, P. (eds) Michel Foucault: power, truth, strategy, Feral Publications. Freire, P. (2003) Pedagogy of the Oppressed (30th anniversary edn), Myra Bergman Ramos, trans., Continuum Books. (Original work published 1970). Gadamer, H. G. (1977) Truth and Method, University of California Press. Iser, W. (1980) The Act of Reading: a theory of aesthetic, Johns Hopkins University Press. Kapitzke, C. (2003) Information Literacy: a positivist epistemology and a politics of outformation, Educational Theory, 53 (1), 37–53. Luke, A. and Kapitzke, C. (1999) Literacies and Libraries: archives and cybraries, Pedagogy, Culture, and Society, 7 (3), 467–91. Olsson, M. R. (2010) Michel Foucault: Discourse, power/knowledge, and the battle for truth. In Buschman, J., Given, L. M. and Leckie, G. J. (eds), Critical Theory for Library and Information Science: exploring the social from across the disciplines, Libraries Unlimited. Seale, M. (2015) Enlightenment, Neoliberalism, and Information Literacy. Paper presented at the Canadian Association of Professional Academic Librarians conference, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, 2 June. Smith, D. (2009) The Professional Epistemology of Library Instruction. Paper presented at the Georgia Conference on Information Literacy, Savannah, Georgia. Tompkins, J. P. (1980) Reader-Response Criticism: from formalism to post-structuralism, Johns Hopkins University Press.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 30

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 31

CHAPTER 3

Reading health-education comics critically: challenging power relationships

Sarah McNicol

Introduction Although they may not be widely used at present in health information settings, educational comics can be found about a wide range of illnesses. While some topics, such as AIDS and sexual health, are particularly well provided for, there are also educational comics about rarer conditions, including primary immunodeficiency, hepatitis B and tuberculosis among others. Healtheducation comics may have a number of purposes, including raising awareness (for example of disease symptoms); preparing patients (for instance what to expect from a medical procedure); assisting with decision making (such as deciding between treatment options); promoting self-management of chronic conditions; or simply increasing understanding and acceptance of a condition. In combining elements of information leaflets with sequentially illustrated narrative, health-education comics have the potential to do much more than simply convey facts about an illness; they can also support patients in dealing with the social and psychological aspects of a condition. Or, to put it another way, in addition to being read ‘efferently’ to find information, educational comics can also be read from a more emotionally engaged, ‘aesthetic stance’ (Rosenblatt, 1994; see Chapter 1 for a more detailed discussion of efferent and aesthetic stances). Comics have been argued to be ‘a very non-threatening medium’ as well as a ‘personalising medium’ (McAllister, 1992, 18), and one which ‘universalises the illness experience’ (Green and Myers, 2010). The fact that comics can effectively portray both actions and feelings means that they ‘may be a very effective tool in creating empathy and compassion’ (Green and Myers, 2010). This chapter sets out to explore whether educational comics can be read not only to provide information and emotional support, but also critically. A critical reading of health-education comics may mean, for example,

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 32

32

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

questioning the traditional hierarchical power relationships that can be experienced by patients, or developing a better understanding of the ways in which people with health conditions are viewed in society more widely. A key aspect of critical literacy is questioning who has the power in a text: whose viewpoint is being presented, and whose is excluded? In the case of health education, reactions to these questions when reading a text have a clear potential to impact on real-life situations. This chapter starts by briefly exploring the implications of clinician-patient power relationships in healthcare, before defining critical health literacy. The remainder of the chapter discusses the ways in which health-education comics might be read critically, drawing on data from a recent research project that explored, amongst other topics, the potential use of comics in healthcare consultations and how comics might be used as a means of empowering patients in their daily lives. The chapter concludes by reflecting on the implications of the use of health-education comics for our understanding of critical health literacy.

Power relationships in healthcare interactions Traditionally in healthcare interactions, the doctor, or other healthcare worker, is viewed as being in a more powerful position than the patient, as they have control over what advice and medical treatment is made available (Stoeckle, 1987). A key component of this convention is the healthcare professional’s greater medical knowledge, which means that the patient usually has little option but to trust the accuracy of their expert diagnosis and recommendation. In recent years, of course, medical information has become increasingly easy to access via the internet and this, alongside a growing emphasis on patient choice, has undoubtedly had an impact on traditional power relationships. Many studies have shown that a high proportion of people have used the internet to search for health information, and that they discuss this information with their doctor. Buckland and Gann (1997), for example, suggested that the internet challenges previous hierarchical models of information giving by freeing patients from the passive reception of information and empowering them to seek answers actively. In a practical study of this process, Broom (2005) found that accessing information and/or support online could have a profound effect on men’s experiences of prostate cancer, providing a means for them to take back some control over their disease, as well as limiting inhibitions in face-to-face encounters. This is important for healthcare, as studies have shown a positive relationship between sense of control and enhanced coping ability (e.g. Kiecolt-Glaser and Glaser, 1995). One way in which patients might regain greater control is through the development of improved health literacy.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 33

MCNICOL READING HEALTH-EDUCATION COMICS CRITICALLY

33

Critical health literacy There are many definitions of the term ‘health literacy’. In the past, definitions have tended to focus on the functional literacy aspects: the literacy and numeracy skills necessary to access health information and healthcare. However, many (e.g. Greenberg, 2001; Nutbeam, 2008) argue that this approach ignores the broader set of cognitive and social skills that individuals need in order to use health systems effectively. Taking inspiration from Freebody and Luke’s (1990) work, Nutbeam (2000) devised a model incorporating three levels of health literacy: basic/functional; communicative/interactive; and critical. In this context, critical health literacy can be viewed as ‘higher level cognitive skills and social skills required to critically analyse information, and to use this information to exert greater control over life events and situations through individual and collective action to address social, economic and environmental determinants of health’ (Chinn, 2011, 61). Often in practice, however, criterial health literacy is explored solely within a positivist framework (see Chapter 2) and is largely equated to what health librarians might describe as information appraisal or evaluation: assessing the validity, credibility, reliability and so forth of information (e.g. Ishikawa et al., 2008; Steckelberg et al., 2009). Chinn (2011, 62) describes this as a ‘rather rarefied and academic’ approach to critical health literacy. As she points out, this assumes ‘that the underlying messages of biomedical research are basically neutral and benevolent’, an assumption that most advocates of critical literacy would question emphatically. More radical approaches are not unknown, however; for example, in some of the methods used to assess public understanding of the social determinants of health (income, education, environment etc.) (Nutbeam, 2000; Wang, 2000). However, much of the research in this area has been concerned with abstract concepts, rather than with an interrogation of, and response to, texts within a critical literacy framework. As Chinn (2011) points out, while individuals often struggle to handle connections between health and disadvantage as abstract concepts, they can, and do, express such ideas through contextualized narrative descriptions of life experiences. She further stresses the need for more qualitative research to examine how individuals interact with health information in real-life situations. Furthermore, Sykes et al. (2013) argue that, to date, critical health literacy has been largely concerned with facilitating greater individual control over life events and much less attention has been given to the wider social and political emphases of critical literacy. This chapter considers some of these debates within the context of health-education comics.

Reading comics critically Comics and graphic novels are frequently said to be ‘more than the sum of

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 34

34

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

their parts’; they are not simply illustrated narratives, but ‘operate on a system of co-presence’ (Beaty, 2011, 108). Reading most comics requires the ability to ‘read’ both words and images. In comics, the two systems of codes, word and image, sometimes function independently, but at other times interact. So, although images and text need to work together, this does not necessarily mean that the two components always convey the same message. For example, a picture may show a character’s outward behaviour, while a thought bubble conveys his true feelings. Furthermore, even if the words and images appear to be telling the same story, they do not necessarily present events at the same time, in the same order, or from the same viewpoint. This creates a form of narrative polyphony where multiple voices, or viewpoints, are presented within a text. This feature means that comics need not have a single, clear message; on the contrary, they are often characterized by the presence of multiple messages. The process of reading comics can be less straightforward than it might first appear, as it is not just which words and images the creator choses to include in the panels of a comic that are important. Comics present a series of static images, or ‘visual fragments’ (Groensteen, 2007), and it is left to the reader to connect these, through the gutters or blank spaces between the frames, in order to construct meaning. Iser’s (1989) notion of ‘gaps’ – absences of connections that readers must fill in order to make sense of the text – becomes critical in understanding the act of reading a comic. It can be argued that what is omitted (left in the gutter) is just as significant as what is included within the panels and it is the reader’s interpretation of these ‘gaps’ which allows them to make sense of the story. What the reader imagines in the gutter, hidden from view, emerges to them from their unique interpretation of the narrative. In fact, the comic-book reader has been described by McCloud (1994, 68) as the author’s ‘silent accomplice’ and ‘equal partner in crime’. This role as an active participant demonstrates Rosenblatt’s transactional theory of reading, in which a literary work is conceived not as an object, but as an experience shaped by the reader under the guidance of clues in the text (see Chapter 1 for further explanation of this theory). Rosenblatt (1994, 25) proposed that a ‘literary work exists in a live circuit set up between reader and text’. In reading a comic, however, the situation is more complex, as there are three components: reader, written text and visual language. The reader takes both the words and images presented by the author and creates an overall meaning by relating both components to their own experiences. As a result, there is no single ‘correct’, or absolute, meaning but, rather, a series of more or less equally valid alternative interpretations. Thus, comics might be argued to be texts which have a particularly powerful potential to subvert the traditional hierarchy between author/creator and reader.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 35

MCNICOL READING HEALTH-EDUCATION COMICS CRITICALLY

35

The following section shows how some of these ideas were translated into practice in the reading of health-education comics in a recent research project.

Studying health-education comics readers A small-scale research project was undertaken to investigate the ways in which educational comics might provide support to patients and their families in dealing with the feelings and attitudes associated with health conditions, as well as improving understanding of factual information (McNicol, 2015). Potential interviewees were identified from among students in the Health, Education and Information departments at Manchester Metropolitan University in the UK. Eleven volunteers were purposively selected to ensure a mix of gender and age as far as possible and to include people with a condition themselves as well as others who had a family member with a health condition. In total, one man and ten women were interviewed. As would be expected among university students, most interviewees were young adults. Five interviewees had a health condition themselves and six had a relative (parent or grandparent) with a condition. The interviews focused on comics for eight different health conditions, including both mental and physical illnesses. Participants were asked to read between two and four comics relating to their condition prior to taking part in a semi-structured interview. This allowed them to juxtapose different texts and different methods of representing a particular condition. These comics were used as stimulus materials during the interview. The comics were obtained from a variety of sources. While many health-education comics are created by commercial publishers (e.g. Medikidz) or healthcare organizations and charities (e.g. The Lupus Initiative, Learning About Diabetes) to raise awareness of conditions or promote positive health messages, others are created by individuals with, or with a relative who has, a particular condition and who wish to share their experiences (e.g. Abram, 2014; Demetris, 2012). Interviewees discussed the ways in which comics could be used in interactions with healthcare professionals and to empower patients in everyday life, including raising awareness of health issues in wider society. Each of these potential uses relates to the ways in which comics might be read critically.

Potential use of comics in healthcare consultations Interviewees felt that health-education comics might be used to open up a discussion during a consultation and their use in this setting could be initiated by either a healthcare professional or a patient. One interviewee described how comics might empower a patient by allowing them to share something

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 36

36

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

with a clinician that was difficult to express verbally. By focusing on the patient’s experience, not simply the medical facts about a condition, comics can provide patients with alternative ways of voicing their feelings or concerns: I think it’s just a good starting point for a dialogue … I had to go to my GP and [I] had it written down: ‘I can’t talk to you, but this is what I’m feeling’. You could quite happily hand those over [and say], ‘This is what I feel at this moment in time’. (Interviewee J)

In the majority of the comics used in this project, the patient was at the centre of the story; healthcare professionals played minor roles. Medical staff were usually portrayed as kind and helpful, but generally one-dimensional characters; their role was that of an unassailable expert who imparts information. This presents little opportunity to disrupt the traditional patient– clinician power relationship. However, in one case the doctor was presented as a more human figure, leading the interviewee to comment on the ways in which this might encourage the reader to view doctors in a more rounded way, rather than simply as figures of authority whose word could not be questioned: She’s [the doctor] alright … She does care about the patients quite a bit, which is a side to show of doctors because I think people sometimes have a view that they’re a bit straightforward thinking, they’re just there to get the job done; they don’t really have emotions with other people … (Interviewee A)

Some interviewees thought that healthcare professionals might be best placed to recommend comics to their patients as sources of information. In this way, healthcare professionals can be seen as acting as mediators, facilitating access, but also suggesting to the patient how they might benefit from reading a comic. However, there is a danger that this can act to simply reinforce their perceived roles as powerful experts and knowledge gatekeepers. It was interesting that several interviewees felt that health-education comics were a form of health information that needed to be curated and explained to patients, rather than leaving it open to the patient to form their own interpretation: They can’t just give it to you … ‘I’ve just been diagnosed with something serious and you’re giving me a comic?’ But if they explain why they’d given it to you and show you why it’s relevant to you then I don’t see why it couldn’t be used. (Interviewee B)

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 37

MCNICOL READING HEALTH-EDUCATION COMICS CRITICALLY

37

They have to be selected very carefully; you have to know the patients and how they would react before showing them … (Interviewee G)

However, several interviewees felt that comics could be empowering in helping patients to reconsider, and take greater control over, their relationships with healthcare professionals, for example in the way in which they approach consultations: the ‘Ask Me 3’ [Maury and Morgan, n.d.] with the three questions it tells you at the end; she [interviewee’s mother] found that extremely useful. She said, ‘I’d have never thought of it like that’. I think now she knows that, when she goes to see consultants she’ll bear that in mind. She found that really useful. (Interviewee C)

Interviewees thought that comics could also prompt patients to raise their own concerns with healthcare staff, drawing attention to issues that might not be identified as relevant by professionals but could be highly significant to the life of an individual patient: planning for the future and worrying about medication and stuff. These [comics] bring up those issues that nobody really talks to you about in hospital … they don’t have time to discuss your concerns, whereas these open up those avenues to discuss. (Interviewee B)

In addition, interviewees pointed out that comics could be used not just in consulting rooms, but also in other settings in which patients find themselves interacting with those in conventional positions of power. For example, in a school, comics might help to facilitate a discussion between a child and learning mentor. As in the case of patient–clinician interactions, this might help to redress unequal power relationships by giving the child an alternative way to express themselves: something like that in a library in a school … I think would be really, really good because I think it could start a conversation with a learning mentor or somebody like that … my son, he hasn’t got the words to express how he’s feeling, but he could get the picture … and say, ‘That’s how I feel today’ … (Interviewee J)

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 38

38

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Empowering patients in their daily lives The potential impact of health-education comics was not limited to patient– clinician interactions, though. As people who had experienced living with a condition over a period of time, the interviewees rarely learnt new facts about their condition through reading the comics provided. However, their comments suggest that, by reflecting on the narratives presented, they did gain increased self-awareness of their actions and responses, and of the ways in which they were currently managing their condition. This could, in itself, be an empowering experience: It just brought it back to my awareness. Because I live with it all the time I don’t even think about it … it brought things up into my mind that were in my mind but … suppressed. Definitely has helped in that way … It made [me] realize … I try to think that I haven’t got it, so I was like, ‘I have got it and this is what I’ve got to deal with’. It made me realize that I’m doing alright considering … (Interviewee B)

I really wanted to write them down and keep reading them because they’re gonna help me in the future … I never realized that when I was crying or feeling lonely that all this … are coming from these feelings. (Interviewee K)

While interviewees were keen to emphasize that comics should avoid reproducing trite clichés commonly associated with various conditions, they did want the overall message presented in the comics they read to be a positive one, thus empathizing the fact that patients can have control over the ways in which they react to, and deal with, their condition. In short, it is not necessary to simply accept the inevitability of a disempowered position: Interviewee: It was a bit gloom and doom; they’re a bit dark aren’t they; everything seems a bit bad for them … things keep going worse for them. Interviewer: Would you have preferred it more positive? Interviewee: Yes, slightly more positive. If people read that and they start thinking, ‘Oooh, uh-oh …’ It’s all bad news, but there’s obviously good things as well that can happen … Maybe a bit more about what the good things were rather than just the bad. (Interviewee A)

While the main protagonist in the majority of the comics used was the patient,

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 39

MCNICOL READING HEALTH-EDUCATION COMICS CRITICALLY

39

family members did frequently feature and, although they were sometimes not particularly well developed as characters, they did offer the reader a route to alternative perspectives. So, while most comics did not appear to have been created explicitly to support families, they did have significant potential to help relatives to better understand what a patient was experiencing and feeling and why they might behave in certain ways. Interviewees believed comics might be helpful for this purpose because they are accessible; easy and enjoyable for someone to read; and because the combination of words and images might put across a point differently, and more effectively, than text alone. Some felt that comics might be particularly helpful to approach a topic which was less easy to discuss: my mum doesn’t like to tell people how she’s feeling, so a lot of people in the family just wouldn’t know. So I think this is quite a good thing, say, ‘I’ve got this, just have a read of it’ and you make a mental note, ‘Oh, that’s why they’re like that on certain days’ ... this gives you an insight into behind the scenes. (Interviewee C)

It was interesting to note differences in the ways in which patients and family members reacted to comics, drawing attention to the fact that comics are read in different ways by individuals depending on their own background and experiences. For instance, interviewees with a family member with a condition reflected on how, through reading the comics, they had become more aware of how they had been responding to their relative. On occasions, the act of reading the comic prompted family members to question their own reactions: The narrative about people nagging her and being a bit overprotective and … almost thinking they knew best made me think, ‘Maybe I shouldn’t … Maybe I should be slightly more …’ I don’t think I’m not understanding, but just … appreciate how hard it must be a bit more and … (Interviewee E)

Moving beyond the patient and their immediate family, a few interviewees commented on the potential role of health-education comics in raising awareness of particular conditions in wider society, especially those which were less widely known about, or which may be subject to stigma (McNicol and Weaver, 2013 discuss the relationship between comics and stigma in greater depth). Comics have the potential to challenge conventional stereotypes around illness and disability and can demonstrate how the reactions of others can (unintentionally) be stigmatizing:

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 40

40

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

possibly things where there’s more stigma … like mental health conditions and things like that, maybe there’s more of a role for comics … Something where you could start with the preconceptions and then tease them out … (Interviewee E)

She [interviewee’s mother] said that when she’s read other things about it [lupus], all they say is it’s older people, but actually it’s not; she was about 25 [when she was diagnosed]. So she said this one’s really good because it makes you think, ‘Oh, it can be a person with a young child that are diagnosed with it’. (Interviewee C)

Conclusion Although based on a small-scale study, the comments reported in this chapter illustrate some of the ways in which health-education comics can be read critically. In addition to having value as information sources and emotional support mechanisms, they can, potentially, offer a means to explore some of the inequalities underlying healthcare experiences. Considering the history of the comics movement, this is perhaps unsurprising. Being on the margins of culture, rather than in the mainstream, comics have long been viewed as a means to disrupt established cultural and social norms, as exemplified in the underground comix movement of the 1960s, for example. Danziger-Russell (2012, 92) argues that comics ‘create the perfect space for the expression of voices that have been previously marginalized’, offering a means for the expression of interior, or silent, voices, especially of those who cannot speak for themselves or are ignored. Furthermore, as Chinn (2011) suggests, critical health literacy frameworks have often taken quite abstract approaches. In contrast, comics may allow for a more tangible and wide-ranging consideration of the application of critical-literacy theory for information professionals and others working with health information. When reading a narrative about a condition they suffer from, it is very easy for patients, or those close to them, to find resonances between the characters in a comic and their own lives. From here, it is almost inevitable that the reading of a text will have practical implications, leading the reader to question not only their own feelings and reactions, but also the implications of these for the ways in which they act, and react to others. Within healthcare consultations, comics might be used to initiate a discussion about a topic that is difficult to address verbally; they can allow patients’ voices to be heard in alternative and potentially powerful ways; and they might empower patients to take greater control over their interactions with healthcare professionals. However, the traditional power relationships between patients and clinicians are not easily overcome and the portrayal of healthcare workers in many

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 41

MCNICOL READING HEALTH-EDUCATION COMICS CRITICALLY

41

comics only reinforces such entrenched attitudes. By showing different viewpoints in an accessible narrative, health-education comics can encourage the reader to reassess their own attitudes and assumptions; this can be empowering for patients and illuminating for family members and wider society. In this way, comics have the potential to challenge the stigma associated with many types of illness. As Sykes et al. (2013) write, critical health literacy can be seen as ‘a process in which citizens become aware of issues, participate in critical dialogue, and become involved in decision making for health’. This study has demonstrated that, through a critical reading of a number of health-education comics, readers can become more aware of the complex social issues around health conditions as they reflect on the views presented by the various characters in a narrative and question which of the characters has power and why. A critical dialogue about these issues can then develop as patients, family members, healthcare professionals, information professionals and society at large engage critically with the messages presented in health-education comics. This may lead to enhanced involvement in decision making for health, not only for individual patients, but for families and communities.

Acknowledgement This research was funded by the Wellcome Trust (grant number 106011/Z/14/Z).

References Abram, D. (2014) Worry Wart, Razarhawk. Beaty, B. (2011) In Focus Comics Studies. Fifty years after film studies. Introduction, Cinema Journal, 50 (3), 106–10. Broom, A. (2005) Virtually He@thly: the impact of internet use on disease experience and the doctor–patient relationship, Qualitative Health Research, 15, 325–45. Buckland, S. and Gann, B. (1997) Disseminating Treatment Outcomes Information to Consumers: evaluation of five pilot projects, King’s Fund Publishing. Chinn, D. (2011) Critical Health Literacy: a review and critical analysis, Social Science and Medicine, 73 (1), 60–7. Danziger-Russell, J. (2012) Girls and their Comics: finding a female voice in comic book narrative, Scarecrow Press. Demetris, A. (2012) Dad’s Not All There Anymore, Alex Demetris. Freebody, P. and Luke, A. (1990) ‘Literacies’ Programs: debates and demands in cultural context, Prospect, 5, 7–16. Green, M. J. and Myers, K. R. (2010) Graphic Medicine: use of comics in medical education and patient care, BMJ, 340, c863.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 42

42

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Greenberg, D. (2001) A Critical Look at Health Literacy, Adult Basic Education, 11 (2), 67–79. Groensteen, T. (2007) The System of Comics, University Press of Mississippi. Iser, W. (1989) Prospecting: from reader response to literary anthropology, John Hopkins University Press. Ishikawa, H., Nomura, K., Sato, M. and Yano, E. (2008) Developing a Measure of Communicative and Critical Health Literacy: a pilot study of Japanese office workers, Health Promotion International, 23 (3), 269–74. Kiecolt-Glaser, J. and Glaser, R. (1995) Psychoneuroimmunology and Health Consequences: data and shared mechanisms, Psychosomatic Medicine, 57, 269–74. Maury, P. and Morgan, N. (n.d.) ‘Ask Me 3’: Ms Jenkins visits the lupus clinic, The Lupus Initiative, http://thelupusinitiative.org/downloads/Askme3_V2_Full_10_06.pdf. McAllister, M. P. (1992) Comic Books and AIDS, Journal of Popular Culture, 26 (2), 1–24. McCloud, S. (1994) Understanding Comics: the invisible art, Harper Collins. McNicol, S. (2015) The Impact of Educational Comics on Feelings and Attitudes towards Health Conditions: interviews with patients and family members, http://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.1512330. McNicol, S. and Weaver, S. (2013) ‘Dude! You mean you’ve never eaten a peanut butter and jelly sandwich?!?’ Nut allergy as stigma in comic books, Health Communication, 28 (3), 217–25. Nutbeam, D. (2000) Health Literacy as a Public Health Goal: a challenge for contemporary health education and communication strategies into the 21st century, Health Promotion International, 15 (3), 259–67. Nutbeam, D. (2008) The Evolving Concept of Health Literacy, Social Science and Medicine, 67 (12), 2072–8. Rosenblatt, L. M. (1994) The Reader, the Text, the Poem: the transactional theory of the literary work, Southern Illinois University Press. Steckelberg, A., Hülfenhaus, C., Kasper, J. and Mühlhauser, I. (2009) Ebm@school – a Curriculum of Critical Health Literacy for Secondary School Students: results of a pilot study, International Journal of Public Health, 54 (3), 158–65. Stoeckle, J. D. (ed.) (1987) Encounters between Patients and Doctors: an anthology, The MIT Press. Sykes, S., Willis, J., Rowlands, G. and Popple, K. (2013) Understanding Critical Health Literacy: a concept analysis, Biomed Central Public Health, 13, 150. Wang, R. (2000) Critical Health Literacy: a case study from China in schistosomiasis control, Health Promotion International, 15 (3), 269–74.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 43

CHAPTER 4

Reframing librarians’ approaches to international students’ information literacy through the lens of New Literacy Studies Alison Hicks

Introduction International students play a vibrant role within today’s globally focused systems of higher education. Enriching both the academic and the cultural climate, international student numbers are growing, with over 850,000 studying in the United States alone in 2013/14 (Institute of International Education, n.d.). These figures have led to a sharp increase in librarian engagement in the field, with tours, workshops and instruction sessions positioned as some of the most important ways to support the growing presence of international students on campus (Bordonaro, 2013; Witt et al., 2015). Yet, while these developments have created renewed interest in the field, a failure to engage with research that positions information literacy as a complex social practice has led to the widespread belief that international student difference represents a learning difficulty that needs to be corrected. In turn, this problem-deficit stance has created what have been termed essentialist stereotypes of international students and fossilized models of instruction (Conteh-Morgan, 2003) that fail to account for the diversity of today’s multicultural societies. This chapter aims to address the shortcomings of these instructional approaches and models by exploring information literacy through the lens of New Literacy Studies. Characterized as a group of theories that emphasizes the ‘social and cultural contexts in which literacy is practised’ (Perry, 2012, 51), New Literacy Studies has not been widely explored within information literacy, despite the important role that it has played in the development of more culturally inclusive approaches to literacy studies more generally. Accordingly, this chapter will start by providing an overview of New Literacy Studies. It will then explore common observations related to international students’ information literacy through the lens of New Literacy Studies before

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 44

44

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

offering a number of recommendations for future research and practice. In doing so, this research challenges librarians to reconsider the way that they conceptualize and teach international student information literacy.

New Literacy Studies Traditionally, literacy has been understood as the acquisition of functional reading and writing skills. Measured through the assessment of tasks and characterized as a series of technical competencies that students have to master in the right order (Barton, 2007, 11), these ideas draw from cognitive and psychological perspectives of learning to position literacy as an individual skill that can be applied in any situation (Perry, 2012, 53). Starting in the 1980s, however, literacy researchers used a series of anthropological studies to question these ideas, demonstrating that literacy was situated within social contexts (Brice Heath, 1983); was used for a number of purposes (Street, 1984); and that different literacies were practised in different domains (Scribner and Cole, 1981). Together, these early studies forced researchers to refine their understandings of literacy, moving from a ‘dominant cognitive model with its emphasis on reading, to a broader understanding of literacy practices in their social and cultural contexts’ (Street, 2005, 417). Hailed as representing a new paradigm in literacy studies (Lankshear and Knobel, 2003, 2), these ideas led researchers to reconceptualize literacy as ‘almost always fully integrated with, interwoven into, constituted part of, the very texture of wider practices that invoke talk, interaction, values, and beliefs’ (Gee, 2014, 60). In other words, rather than being conceived as an individual or a decontextualized, cognitive skill, literacy should be seen as situated, emerging within a specific context through the ‘delicate interplay of social, cultural, economic, political, and even geographic forces’ (Brandt and Clinton, 2002, 340) and social, or shaped by the ‘values, attitudes, feelings, and social relationships’ of a particular community (Perry, 2012, 54). This also meant that literacy could not be seen as a neutral activity. If literacy is formed by ‘different social groups with social rules about who can produce and use particular literacies for particular social purposes’ (Larson, 2005, 19), then, researchers argue, it must also be patterned by the power relationships and structures of society (Barton and Hamilton, 2000, 8). From this perspective, literacy becomes inseparably linked with, and reflective of, inequalities in society (Barton, 2007, 213) in terms of whose literacies are being marginalized as well as in terms of the structural issues and conditions that originally led to an individual’s exclusion (Street, 2003, 77). These ideas form the nucleus of what has come to be known as New Literacy Studies, as well as serving to underpin other sociocultural theories of literacy (Perry, 2012, 53). Now forming an established approach in many

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 45

HICKS APPROACHES TO INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ INFORMATION LITERACY 45

classrooms, as well as a guiding framework for scholarly studies, these ideas have only recently started to be explored within the field of information literacy. Often conflated with multiliteracies, which examines literacy practices within changing technological environments (Coiro et al., 2008), New Literacy Studies has most commonly been invoked in passing to argue for a more critical understanding of information literacy (Detmering, 2010; Elmborg, 2006; 2012; Hall, 2010; Kapitzke, 2003; Patterson, 2009), with Nicholson (2014) and Buschman (2009) providing considerably more detail than most. Yet, while there has been little direct engagement with New Literacy Studies research, the focus on socially and contextually situated practices forms an intriguing way to reframe our understandings of information literacy. Most importantly, these ideas force us to consider both our traditional conceptions of information literacy and the implications of these understandings on the way that we think about the literacy practices of specific groups and communities. The idea that information literacy is a situated activity that derives meaning and legitimacy from its broader social context, rather than a set of neutral, cognitive skills that transfer unproblematically to other contexts and settings, for example, raises the possibility of multiple information literacies. It also forces us to explore a number of ideological questions; for example, ideas about what counts as literacy, or whose literacies are dominant or privileged in our society. A New Literacy Studies lens can thereby help us to reflect more concretely on our approach to international student information literacy.

International student information literacy Research into international student information literacy has grown substantially over the last twenty years (Bordonaro, 2013). Centred, for the most part, on the experiences of international students studying in Englishspeaking countries, these observations (and their implications) will now be examined through the lens of New Literacy Studies.

Common observations about international students’ information literacy Most literature that explores international students’ information literacy is structured through the use of information literacy standards, for example, the ACRL’s (2000) Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education. Focusing on an examination of both the content and the structure of international students’ educational initiatives, information literacy is positioned as a goal for educational activity (Pilerot and Lindberg, 2011, 341). Studies use a series of assessment techniques to measure changes in

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 46

46

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

international students’ information literacy, as compared to bibliographic or professional markers of expertise (Addison and Meyers, 2013), and to provide practical advice for other librarians. The structure of these studies, as well as the results of research, tends to centre on several key observations. One common theme relates to the idea that international students demonstrate low levels of information literacy, a problem that tends to be linked to difference, or to these students’ ethnic, national, racial or cultural traits. Thus, international students are seen to show ‘special difficulties’ (Lewis, 1969, 271) or an ‘obvious lack of self-sufficiency’ (Bilal, 1989, 129). They may possess inappropriate skill sets (Chen and van Ullen, 2011, 210), undeveloped critical thinking skills (DiMartino and Zoe, 2000), or their abilities may ‘lag behind those of US students’ (Martin et al., 2009, 1). Their nationality or ethnicity may further be seen as an impediment to learning, with cultural difference likely to ‘adversely affect international students’ ability to develop information literacy skills’ (Morrissey and Given, 2006, 223). These ideas can be seen to parallel a number of studies from the field of education, which argue that the prior educational experiences of international students often leave them unprepared to study in Western contexts (Chalmers and Volet, 1997). Another common theme relates to learning difficulties, or the idea that international students face a number of additional barriers to learning, as compared to domestic students. Low levels of information literacy are thereby linked to the perceived common problems that international students face in the classroom, including language and communication difficulties (e.g. Bilal, 1989), general cultural adjustment problems (e.g. Baron and Strout Dapaz, 2001) and differences in learning styles (e.g. DiMartino and Zoe, 2000) or educational traditions (e.g. Lewis, 1969). The widespread acceptance of these ideas has led Conteh-Morgan (2003, para. 5) to characterize international students’ experience as marked by struggles as they ‘continually labor […] under the weight of linguistic, cultural and technological disadvantages’. Conclusions such as these are fairly common within information literacy literature. Yet, while recognizing that librarians may be forced to teach to professionally approved standards, these ideas present a number of problematic assumptions. A New Literacy Studies lens will help us to explore these ideas in more depth.

Decoupling the people from the problems The focus on measurement or assessment that is inherent within standardsbased education means that many librarians often look to explain why international students demonstrate such low levels of information literacy or why they are so unprepared for the challenges of academic study. An easy

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 47

HICKS APPROACHES TO INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ INFORMATION LITERACY 47

solution is to link these problems to international students’ difference, or the idea that students from a certain country lack critical thinking skills or are rote learners who adopt a superficial approach to learning. However, in drawing our attention to the power differentials that are inherent within information literacy education, New Literacy Studies helps us to explore these suppositions in more depth. The first issue that New Literacy Studies helps to problematize is whether low levels of information literacy can be linked to individual ethnocentric characteristics, a question that is linked to our framing of information literacy through performance standards. Most simply, when we position information literacy standards as universal, or as ‘common to all disciplines, to all learning environments, and to all levels of education’ (ACRL, 2000), we create the assumption that truths should be immediately apparent if only individuals would ‘draw on their ability to evaluate information around them critically’ (O’Connor, 2006, 205). In other words, if information literacy is a universal skill, then individuals have only themselves (or, by implication, their cultural, racial or ethnic characteristics) to blame for a low score on their information literacy test. However, in demonstrating that literacy is both socially and ideologically situated, the lens of New Literacy Studies shows us that information literacy standards cannot be characterized as neutral. Instead, the standards to which we hold students accountable have emerged through culturally and ideologically specific conceptions of information competence; the ACRL Standards, for example, can be characterized as a ‘eurocentric, socially and culturally constructed set of skills’ (Morrison, 2009, 19) that have arisen from Western positivist and economic-rationalist ideas of literacy or ways of knowing (Lloyd, 2005, 83). This means that when we assess international students against information literacy standards, not only are we judging them against a culturally specific model of information literacy, but we are also marginalizing other forms of literate knowledge (Street, 1984) as well as the cultural and social practices that students bring to a classroom. These ideas demonstrate that low levels of information literacy may be linked to the mechanisms we use to measure information literacy, rather than to international students’ abilities. The second issue to which a New Literacy Studies lens helps to draw our attention is the assumption that information literacy skill performance is linked to national or cultural trait. In opening up our thinking to the concept of multiple literacies, it is easy to imagine that literacy can be lined up with culture, or that ‘there is a single literacy associated with a single culture’ (Street, 2000, 18). However, a New Literacy Lens demonstrates that this supposition is problematic because it risks perpetuating the idea that information literacy exists autonomously rather than as emerging from contested and situated sociocultural practices. At the same time, these ideas

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 48

48

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

also draw attention to the belief that an individual’s information actions are due to a cultural ‘style’ that is derived from their membership in a cultural group. While recognizing that a focus on the behaviours of cultural groups is often used to increase representation and to decentre the assumption that the dominant group’s cultural practices form a norm, these ideas are problematic because they position individuals as ‘carriers’ of cultural traits and their behaviour as derived ‘from the essence of an individual or a group’ (Gutiérrez and Rogoff, 2003, 20). Cultural difference is not located within an individual as an ‘inventory of characteristics’ (Street, 2000, 19). Rather, it should be understood as a proclivity of ‘people with certain histories of engagement with specific cultural activities’ (Gutiérrez and Rogoff, 2003, 19); just like in literacy, cultural variation is constituted and reproduced through an individual’s participation in the dynamic social practices of a community. Cultural labels can be problematic for other reasons, too. International students may be grouped with people who do not share the same language, history or cultural identity (Ramirez, 2009), with a Latin American label, for instance, covering Portuguese-speaking Brazilians, Spanish-speaking Peruvians, and the Anglophone, Francophone or Dutch-speaking Caribbeans. Similarly, membership in a cultural community should be seen as neither homogenous nor exclusive. Most worryingly, these ideas categorize international students on the basis that they must share the exact same set of experiences, beliefs and values as other members of a national or ethnic group. This obscures a broader consideration of the international student as an individual, even though a student’s motivations and goals for studying abroad or the fact that they are also a first-generation college student may have a profound effect on their learning. In effect, these ideas demonstrate that student performance cannot be categorically attributed to membership within a specific cultural group. Coupled with the understanding that our conception of information literacy obscures a number of unacknowledged power differentials, it is clear that international students’ information literacy may be more complex than has been previously imagined.

Difference is an asset The idea that international students face a number of linguistic and cultural barriers to learning may seem uncontentious, with anxiety about communication, for example, being seen to form one of the primary reasons why international students may avoid using the library (Jiao and Onwuegbuzie, 2001). However, as Conteh-Morgan (2003, para. 5) points out, it is surprising that ‘in the past three decades or so, there has been hardly any noticeable change in the profile of students who come to study in the United States’. New Literacy Studies enables us to explore these ideas in more detail,

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 49

HICKS APPROACHES TO INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ INFORMATION LITERACY 49

including whether these barriers exist, or if they are as problematic as they appear. One of the first questions that New Literacy Studies helps us to ask is whether these barriers are, in fact, barriers at all, a question that relates to how we understand the nature of information literacy. In effect, when we see information literacy as a generic set of skills that students are lacking, it is clear that linguistic issues may prevent students from internalizing these competencies quickly and efficiently. However, when we see information literacy as a deep engagement in the social practices of a community, it is clear that every time we engage in the literacy practices of the different communities of which we form part, we are developing our identity as well as the discursive resources that we have at our disposal. In other words, when international students study within a new intercultural context, their multilingualism is not a problem. Instead, it should be seen as an asset because it expands the range of interpretive resources that these learners have at their disposal, thereby helping to expose the values and beliefs that drive literacy practices and to drive the development of dynamic ‘dispositions towards inquiry, analysis, design and action’ (Comber, 2012, xi). Most simply, and as Orellana and Gutiérrez (2006, 119) point out, ‘Who, from a linguistic and social perspective, is more limited: those who are monolingual English speakers, or speakers of other languages who are also English learners?’ In this light, linguistic and cultural variables are seen to bring complexity and depth rather than as forming a barrier to international students’ information literacy experiences (Hughes, 2004, 2). These ideas will only become more important as societies become increasingly international. The idea that international students face a number of insurmountable barriers may further reflect a lack of engagement with the current state of international education. Most pragmatically, when we treat international students as a homogenous group, we ignore the considerable variation that exists between individuals. Many international students will face minimal linguistic barriers: Canada, for example, provided the fifth-largest contingent of international students to the USA in 2013/14 (Institute of International Education, n.d.), while many countries in Africa, as well as in South and South-East Asia also speak English as an official language. In addition, the growth of English as a global lingua franca, the wide availability of Englishlanguage media, or the significant emphasis that many countries place on language learning from an early age (Pew Research Center, 2015) signifies that students are likely to be far more prepared for studying in an English context than ever before. Advances in communication technologies means that the technological readiness of international students is seen to be less problematic than was previously assumed (Conteh-Morgan, 2003, para. 24), while the growth in numbers of students worldwide who are engaged in

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 50

50

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

international educational programmes – for example, the International Baccalaureate (International Baccalaureate, n.d.) – means that a significant proportion of students may already be familiar with Western norms and practices. These ideas demonstrate the importance of examining supposed barriers in detail, and within the changing higher education landscape. Another idea that New Literacy Studies helps us to interrogate is whether these barriers are unique to international students. In fact, this is a far harder question to answer than it may seem because most studies to date have centred uniquely on international students, rather than comparing them with their domestic counterparts. In addition, few studies take a longitudinal approach, focusing, instead, on one-time measures of student behaviours. These issues mean that studies run the risk of exacerbating perceived problems by failing to see international students’ adaptation to new settings within the context of all new students’ adjustment to higher education, as well as part of longer-term change processes (Volet and Jones, 2012, 252). These methodological limitations become even more problematic when studies that do compare international and domestic students’ information literacy rarely find evidence of difference (Martin et al., 2009; Varga-Atkins and Ashcroft, 2004). What is certain, though, is that in moving the focus of international students’ information literacy research from measurement to description, a New Literacy Studies lens decentres and destabilizes the very idea of barriers. In other words, when we associate information literacy with the idea of what people do with information within a specific context, rather than with a checklist of competencies, research is re-focused on student actions and strategies within new settings. This allows for a far deeper exploration of the concept of a ‘barrier’ and its effect on student activities. While she does not explicitly take a New Literacy Studies focus, these ideas can be seen the most clearly within Hilary Hughes’ work (2009) on international students in Australia. In exploring how these students use online information resources to learn, Hughes (2009) demonstrates that, firstly, barriers to international students’ information literacy are far more nuanced than was previously believed, and secondly, that students are rarely passive in the face of problems and challenges. Linguistic differences, for example, were perceived as strengths rather than barriers, because they helped students to develop creative strategies to work around challenges, for example using a search engine to find synonyms (Hughes, 2009) or to establish an author’s gender (Han, 2012). Alongside the finding that common information literacy issues, such as being able to deal with lengthy lists of results, are not unique to international students, Hughes and Bruce (2006, 38) thereby argue that international students’ difference should be positioned as being related to ‘the degree of difficulty [rather than to] the nature of the difficulty itself’. These ideas provide considerable evidence that barriers to information literacy

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 51

HICKS APPROACHES TO INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ INFORMATION LITERACY 51

should neither be considered unique to international students, nor as paralysing as they are often presented.

Recommendations In moving the focus from the individual to the social, New Literacy Studies invites us to explore the nature of international students’ information literacy in a number of new ways, and future research should build upon these beginnings to examine the potential of this approach more fully. In the meantime, a series of practical recommendations will be helpful for librarians who are working to take a more holistic approach towards international students’ information literacy. Firstly, it is important for us to examine and to be aware of our own biases. It is easy to accept stereotypes blindly, or because they match with our personal experiences, but research demonstrates that many of our assumptions related to cultural difference are not corroborated through research (e.g. Daniel et al., 2011). Unfamiliar methods of learning, for example, are not inferior to more familiar Western models, and asking international students to abandon the prior educational experiences and learning habits that have served them well in the past is, at best, counterproductive (ContehMorgan, 2003). Similarly, international students do not just enrol in Western universities in order to get a better education. Individuals are motivated to study abroad for a number of reasons, including for professional advancement or to learn a language (Conteh-Morgan, 2003). Our swiftness to categorize students as ‘international’ may also prevent us from seeing the individual through the label. Just like domestic students, international students may be undergoing various transitions at once, such as living away from home, moving from childhood to adulthood and adjusting to a new academic culture. These changes, as well as the sociocultural dynamics of a situation, may affect their learning and goals. Secondly, consider your choice of research methods carefully. Avoid relying on personal anecdotes and one-off survey data to make judgements about international students. Measurement over time acknowledges that international students are in a state of transition, and studies that look at domestic and international students together will enable more meaningful comparisons. Alternatively, consider using qualitative methods (such as interviews or ethnographic observation) to explore the dynamic processes and contexts of student adaptation. Ask students about their experiences, too! The student voice is invariably missing from most research into information literacy, and an understanding of their issues will help us to make judgements based on their experiences rather than on the perceptions of others. Lastly, think carefully about how you present your research results. Write

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 52

52

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

about your research in the past tense and use a definite article in order to avoid making over-generalized statements about international students. Using the phrase ‘the international students did this’ instead of ‘international students do this’ recognizes the contextual nature of research, while also moving away from seeing students as homogenous (Gutiérrez and Rogoff, 2003). The way you refer to international students is important too. Use labels as narrative descriptions rather than as categories (e.g. working-class, firstgeneration college student, trilingual). This moves beyond the tendency to essentialize students or to see causal relationships between information literacy and cultural group membership (Gutiérrez and Rogoff, 2003).

Conclusion This chapter has set out to challenge librarians to reconsider popular conceptualizations of international students’ information literacy. International students form a growing and vibrant population on campus, yet within information literacy literature these students are invariably positioned as both deficient and unprepared. However, by using a New Literacy Studies lens, we move the focus of information literacy from skill measurement to social practices, or broader considerations about how information literacy emerges and is perpetuated within a specific community. In the case of international students, this centres our understanding of information literacy on what people do, rather than ‘what they do not do when compared to a dominant group’ (Larson, 2005, 101). It also positions questions of language and culture, as well as the power relations between linguistic groups, at the heart of literacy, rather than seeing them as problematic add-ons. The strength of New Literacy Studies, however, may be linked to what it exposes as missing, or what we obscure or fail to see when we focus on understanding information literacy as an individual, generic practice. In the case of international students, it is clear that the emphasis on deficit keeps us from identifying the structural inequities, or the institutional practices and social processes that create and maintain vulnerability (Orellana and Gutiérrez, 2006, 118). This demonstrates that we can start to address the real issues within international student information literacy only when we understand students in relation to the practices of which they are a part rather than as a unit of analysis (Orellana and Gutiérrez, 2006, 119). More problematically, the focus on student problems can also be seen as ensuring that we, as educators and as librarians, can avoid examining our own attitudes and practices (Chalmers and Volet, 1997, 96). Our first step in this process, then, may be to start to question our own perceptions, actions and values as we work to rethink our approach to international students’ information literacy.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 53

HICKS APPROACHES TO INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ INFORMATION LITERACY 53

References ACRL (Association of College and Research Libraries) (2000) Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education, www.ala.org/ala/acrl/sites/ala.org.acrl/files/content/standards/standards.pdf. Addison, C. and Meyers, E. (2013) Perspectives on Information Literacy: a framework for conceptual understanding, Information Research, 18 (3), 1–13. Baron, S. and Strout-Dapaz, A. (2001) Communicating with and Empowering International Students with a Library Skills Set, Reference Services Review, 29 (4), 314–26. Barton, D. (2007) Literacy: an introduction to the ecology of written language, Malden, MA, Blackwell. Barton, D. and Hamilton, M. (2000) Literacy practices. In Barton, D., Hamilton, M. and Ivanic, R. (eds), Situated Literacies: reading and writing in context, Routledge. Bilal, D. (1989) International Students’ Acquisition of Library Research Skills: relationship with their English language proficiency, Reference Librarian, 10 (24), 129–45. Bordonaro, K. (2013) Internationalization and the North American University Library, The Scarecrow Press. Brandt, D. and Clinton, K. (2002) Limits of the Local: expanding perspectives on literacy as a social practice, Journal of Literacy Research, 34 (3), 337–56. Brice Heath, S. (1983) Ways with Words: language, life, and work in communities and classrooms, Cambridge University Press. Buschman, J. (2009) Information Literacy, ‘New’ Literacies, and Literacy, The Library Quarterly, 79 (1), 95–118. Chalmers, D. and Volet, S. (1997) Common Misconceptions about Students from South-East Asia Studying in Australia, Higher Education Research and Development, 16 (1), 87–99. Chen, Y.-H. and Van Ullen, M. K. (2011) Helping International Students Succeed Academically through Research Process and Plagiarism Workshops, College and Research Libraries, 72 (3), 209–35. Coiro, J., Knobel, M., Lankshear, C. and Leu, D. (2008) Handbook of Research on New Literacies, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates/Taylor and Francis Group. Comber, B. (2012) Foreword. In Pahl, K. and Rowsell, J. (eds), Literacy and Education: understanding the new literacy studies in the classroom (pp. vii–xi), Paul Chapman. Conteh-Morgan, M. (2003) Journey with New Maps: adjusting mental models and rethinking instruction to language minority students. In Thompson, H. A. (ed.), Learning to Make a Difference: Proceedings of the Eleventh National Conference of the Association of College and Research Libraries, April 10–13, 2003, Charlotte, North Carolina, Association of College and Research Libraries. Daniel, E., Lloyd, R., Martin, D., Rao, A. and Sloan, L. (2011) Ethnicity, Acculturation, and Plagiarism: a criterion study of unethical academic conduct, Human Organization, 70 (1), 88–96.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 54

54

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Detmering, R. (2010) Exploring the Political Dimensions of Information Literacy through Popular Film, Portal: Libraries and the Academy, 10 (3), 265–82. DiMartino, D. and Zoe, L. (2000) International Students and the Library: new tools, new users and new instruction. In Jacobson, T. and Williams, H. C. (eds), Teaching the New Library to Today’s Users, Neal-Schuman Publishers. Elmborg, J. (2006) Critical Information Literacy: implications for instructional practice, The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 32 (2), 192–9. Elmborg, J. (2012) Critical Information Literacy: definitions and challenges. In Wilkinson, C. W. and Bruch, C. (eds), Transforming Information Literacy Programs: Intersecting Frontiers of Self, Library Culture, and Campus Community, Association of College and Research Libraries. Gee, J. P. (2014) Literacy and Education, New York, Routledge. Gutiérrez, K. and Rogoff, B. (2003) Cultural Ways of Learning: individual traits or repertoires of practice, Educational Researcher, 32 (5), 19–25. Hall, R. (2010) Public Praxis: a vision for critical information literacy in public libraries, Public Library Quarterly, 29 (2), 162–75. Han, J. (2012) Information Literacy Challenges for Chinese PhD students in Australia: a biographical study, Journal of Information Literacy, 6 (1), 3–17. Hughes, H. (2004) Researching the Experience of International Students. In Danaher, P. A., Macpherson, C., Nouwens F. and Orr, D. (eds), 3rd International Lifelong Learning Conference: whose responsibility and what is your contribution? Yeppoon, Queensland. Hughes, H. (2009) International Students Using Online Information Resources to Learn (unpublished doctoral dissertation), Queensland University of Technology, Australia. Hughes, H. and Bruce, C. (2006) Cultural Diversity and Educational Inclusivity: international students’ use of online information, International Journal of Learning, 12 (9), 33–40. Institute of International Education (IIE) (n.d.) International Students in the United States, Project Atlas, www.iie.org/Services/Project-Atlas/United-States/ International-Students-In-US. International Baccalaureate (n.d.) Facts and Figures, www.ibo.org/about-the-ib/facts-and-figures/. Jiao, Q. G. and Onwuegbuzie, A. J. (2001) Library Anxiety and Characteristic Strengths and Weaknesses of Graduate Students’ Study Habits, Library Review, 50 (2), 73–80. Kapitzke, C. (2003) Information Literacy: a positivist epistemology and a politics of outformation, Educational Theory, 53 (1), 37–53. Lankshear, C. and Knobel, M. (2003) New Literacies: changing knowledge and classroom learning, Open University Press. Larson, J. (2005) Making Literacy Real: theories and practices for learning and teaching, Sage Publications.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 55

HICKS APPROACHES TO INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ INFORMATION LITERACY 55

Lewis, M. (1969) Library Orientation for Asian College Students, College and Research Libraries, 30 (3), 267–72. Lloyd, A. (2005) Information Literacy: different contexts, different concepts, different truths? Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 37 (2), 82–8. Martin, C. K., Maxey-Harris, C., Graybill, J. O. and Rodacker-Borgens, E. K. (2009) Closing the Gap: investigating the search skills of international and US students: an exploratory study, Library Philosophy and Practice, http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/47776522/closing-gap-investigatingsearch-skills-international-us-students-exploratory-study. Morrison, R. (2009) Culturally-Relevant Information Literacy: a case study (unpublished doctoral dissertation), National-Louis University, USA. Morrissey, R. and Given, L. (2006) International Students and the Academic Library: a case study, Canadian Journal of Information and Library Science, 30 (3–4), 221–39. Nicholson, K. (2014) Information Literacy as a Situated Practice in the Neoliberal University. In Proceedings of the Annual Conference of CAIS/Actes du congrès annuel de l’ACSI. O’Connor, L. G. (2006) Librarians’ Professional Struggles in the Information Age: a critical analysis of information literacy (unpublished doctoral dissertation), Kent State University, USA. Orellana, M. F. and Gutiérrez, K. D. (2006) What’s the Problem? Constructing different genres for the study of English learners, Research in the Teaching of English, 41 (6), 118–23. Patterson, D. (2009) Information Literacy and Community College Students: using new approaches to literacy theory to produce equity, The Library Quarterly, 79 (3), 343–61. Perry, K. (2012) What Is Literacy? A critical overview of sociocultural perspectives, Journal of Language and Literacy Education, 8 (1), 50–71. Pew Research Center (2015) Learning a Foreign Language a ‘Must’ in Europe, not so in America, www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/07/13/learning-a-foreignlanguage-a-must-in-europe-not-so-in-america/. Pilerot, O. and Lindberg, J. (2011) The Concept of Information Literacy in PolicyMaking Texts: an imperialistic project? Library Trends, 60 (2), 338–60. Ramirez, M. (2009) The Task of the Latino/a Activist: on archiving identity and community, InterActions: UCLA Journal of Education and Information Studies, 5 (1), http://escholarship.org/uc/gseis_interactions?volume=5;issue=1.. Scribner, S. and Cole, M. (1981) The Psychology of Literacy, Harvard University Press. Street, B. (1984) Literacy in Theory and Practice, Cambridge University Press. Street, B. (2000) Literacy Events and Literacy Practices: theory and practice in the New Literacy Studies. In Martin-Jones, M. and Jones, K. (eds), Multilingual Literacies: reading and writing different worlds, J. Benjamins. Street, B. (2003) What’s ‘New’ in New Literacy Studies? Critical approaches to literacy in theory and practice, Current Issues in Comparative Education, 5 (2), 77–91.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 56

56

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Street, B. (2005) At Last: recent applications of new literacy studies in educational contexts, Research in the Teaching of English, 39 (4), 417–23. Varga-Atkins, T. and Ashcroft, L. (2004) Information Skills of Undergraduate Business Students – a Comparison of UK and International Students, Library Management, 25 (1/2), 39–55. Volet, S. and Jones, C. (2012) Cultural Transitions in Higher Education: individual adaptation, transformation and engagement. In Karabenick, S. and Urdan, T. (eds), Transitions across Schools and Cultures, Emerald. Witt, S., Kutner, L. and Cooper, L. (2015) Mapping Academic Library Contributions to Campus Internationalization, College and Research Libraries, 76 (5), 587–608.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 57

CHAPTER 5

Using new literacies to discuss disability in the library

J. J. Pionke

Introduction While most libraries in the United States are compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), they are not necessarily accessible enough, or accessible at all, to those with disabilities, even when the buildings conform to the law. The ADA is a national law in the US that seeks to create more equal opportunities and treatment of people with disabilities. Codified within the law are requirements such as that all public buildings should have accessible entrances and bathrooms. While it is easy to say that libraries should make more efforts to provide services for people with disabilities and different access needs, in this time of economic uncertainty, all departments in the library have multiple competing priorities and a dearth of funding. Even if funding were not a major issue, competing priorities certainly are. The prevailing unspoken attitude tends to be that as long as the library is accessible for most people and is at least ADA compliant, than accessibility for all is not a tier-one priority. This chapter explores how new literacies can play a role in challenging such complacency and improving library access for people with disabilities. Librarians tend to be a forward-thinking group of people when it comes to technology; they are often early adopters and are used to considering ways in which technology can improve access to information. From here, this chapter argues, it is a relatively small step to using new literacies to change the very way that we think about accessibility. The chapter starts with an overview of disability issues in relation to library provision. It then examines how the new literacies required to interact with digital media and, in particular, Lankshear and Knobel’s (2006) notion of ‘mindsets’, might be a means to challenge prevailing attitudes. Building on this theory, a number of practical approaches are described. These include

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 58

58

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

both general suggestions that might apply to a range of disabilities and examples of methods suited to particular conditions.

Disability and the library Disability takes many different forms, from highly visible physical disabilities, for example, resulting in wheelchair use, to more hidden disabilities like Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) or autism. While we, as a society, do not typically think of the elderly in the category of disabled, there are a multitude of reasons why they should be taken into consideration, from having mobility issues such as being unsteady on their feet as balance degenerates with age, to using walking aids, to needing assistance with remembering where materials and places are located (Gawande, 2014, 37–8). The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) Amendments Act of 2008 (ADAAA) expanded the coverage of what is a disability so that more people, like the elderly who have infirmities that make daily life activities difficult, could have more protections under the law. The ADAAA also extended coverage to people with mental disabilities like PTSD as well as learning disabilities like developmental delay. The ADA and the ADAAA are designed to help create a more even life experience within society for people with disabilities, no matter what those disabilities are. There is similar legislation and guidance in other parts of the world such as the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities which was ratified by the United Nations in 2008 and has been adopted by many countries, including the European Union, and the Equality Act of 2010 in the UK, which combined multiple non-discrimination Acts into one streamlined Act that includes disability. Part of the accommodation process in most legislation is making public buildings, like libraries, accessible. Most US libraries have some level of ADA-compliance or have developed work-arounds when they are not strictly compliant. However, even the ADA requirements may not be adequate to meet the needs of all people with disabilities. For instance, book stacks should be spaced at a minimum of 36 inches, and 42 inches is preferred (ALA, n.d.). If the patron is in a motorized wheelchair with life-support equipment attached to it, however, there is a very real possibility that they would not be able to progress easily through the book stacks at 36 inches, or even 42 inches. Libraries have often worked around this issue with signage indicating that patrons needing extra assistance should come to the reference desk and their items will be retrieved. While at first sight this appears to be a practical solution, it is precisely this language of ‘needing extra assistance’ that many people with disabilities find frustrating. Most people with disabilities want to be as independent as possible. In fact, the independentliving movement argues ‘that people with disabilities were the experts on their experience and could best decide for themselves what services they needed and

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 59

PIONKE USING NEW LITERACIES TO DISCUSS DISABILITY IN THE LIBRARY 59

how to use them’ (Pelka, 2012, 198). When environments created in libraries do not accommodate their needs, the independence of people with disabilities is automatically limited. This makes them dependent on library workers for assistance – something that goes against the rehabilitative training which people with disabilities have had and leads to a great deal of frustration, not only because of having to ask for assistance but also because of having to wait for the items that are needed.

New literacies and disability The term ‘new literacies’ incorporates a broad range of concepts but, at its heart, it takes ideas and uses a medium (often digital) in order to understand those ideas in different and interesting ways. From the ontological view, new literacies, sometimes referred to as ‘new media literacies’, are no longer simply about the word printed on a page but, rather, about the word that is printed in bits on the internet, whether that is a tweet, a blog entry or a downloadable version of this chapter in an institutional repository. New literacies can also apply to other digital artefacts like podcasts, vodcasts or any remixing of media into a new form. Paradigmatically, the approach of using these new tools is designed to alter the way we think about the issues around us. New literacies has similarities with critical literacy, but there are also differences, in particular, the way in which critical literacy takes a more overt political stance and focuses much more on the different levels of meaning in each resource (podcast, book, slideshow etc.). New literacies, on the other hand, focuses on the narrative itself and examines how it is constructed through various (usually digital) objects. There are also links between new literacies and New Literacy Studies (discussed in Chapter 4), which emphasizes the social and cultural context of literacy, and which might be seen as a precursor to new literacies. The use of new literacies can be a powerful tool to generate understanding of the complex issues regarding how people with disabilities see and move through the world because new literacies engages people in a multitude of ways, including outside of formal learning environments. There are many theorists working in the area of new literacies studies; for example, James Paul Gee, who focuses on the multimodal nature of language and how this affects learning (Gee and Hayes, 2011). This chapter, however, will focus on the work of Lankshear and Knobel (2003; 2006) and, in particular, their notion of ‘mindsets’. Lankshear and Knobel (2006) suggest that there are two mindsets in regard to learning. They state that ‘Mindsets can be thought of as sets of assumptions, beliefs, values, and ways of doing things that orient us towards what we experience and incline us to understand and respond in some ways more than others’ (Lankshear and Knobel, 2006, 31). They

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 60

60

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

emphasize how the two mindsets are at play in terms of technology – those who have inside knowledge and those who are newcomers (2006, 34–5). It is often argued, perhaps simplistically, that millennials are insiders with all levels of technology, having grown up with digital technologies and the internet, while those of earlier generations are newcomers who learned to live in a world without a high prevalence of digital technologies. While Lankshear and Knobel are talking about technological mindsets, their model of thinking can also be applied to attitudes towards disability and accessibility. In terms of disability, society’s views might be roughly divided into two categories, or mindsets. There are the ‘includers’, or people who believe that, no matter what the disability, our environment should be inclusive for all. Includers would generally fall under the social model of disability which views disability as something produced by the way in which society is organized, rather than as being the result of an individual’s impairment or difference. Includers would want to ensure that the built environment and the people in it take into account the vast range of abilities that people have. This mindset would embrace concepts of universal design and usability that stress the importance of designing products and spaces so that they can be used by the widest possible range of people. Alternatively, there are the ‘ablers’, who believe that accessibility should be something that is added on and performed secondarily to the primary construction of the building, website or other space. Ablers would tend to follow the medical model of disability, whereby the focus is on medically managing and healing the disability in order to reach some version of ‘normal’. Abler language would include things like ‘ADA compliant’. An example of this would be where only one bathroom in an entire building is handicapped-accessible and its construction was done as a retrofit. In libraries, beyond building in accessibility such as ramps and bathrooms, an abler approach would result in design solutions such as adding a service-call device near photocopiers and computers to enable patrons who have difficulty operating the machinery to signal a librarian to come and render assistance. For the most part, American society is an abler society, and one that is slow to change. However, changing libraries from an abler mindset to an includer mindset is a necessary step in order to develop a more inclusive environment within society for all.

Exploring some practical applications of ‘includer’ mindsets Precisely understanding the obstacles that people with disabilities face as they try to navigate the library, physically and virtually, is vitally important. Determining what their needs and obstacles are is often about doing user research. Asking to see how people with disabilities navigate through the library is just one way in which libraries can check their accessibility by

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 61

PIONKE USING NEW LITERACIES TO DISCUSS DISABILITY IN THE LIBRARY 61

utilizing user-experience techniques. For example, a registered blind graduate student sat down with a librarian who watched the student navigate trying to access journal articles. The librarian used a multimodal approach for note taking, using a pad of paper and marked-up screenshots showing where the student was on the website and what they were experiencing. The screenshots acted as a visual reminder of the conversation and the student’s experience, which in turn was useful when the librarian emailed the website development team with observations and requests for changes. Importantly, it was the student who determined what was discussed and who actively encouraged the librarian to take notes and share the experience with others. There are a wide variety of ways in which the library can become a more accessible place for people with disabilities. In terms of physical space, doing a focused walkthrough of the building using the ILFA (International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions) Access to Libraries for Persons with Disabilities – Checklist (Irvall and Nielsen, 2005) to observe the space from multiple perspectives, such as not having sight, not being able to hear or not being able to walk easily, can offer the insight needed to appropriately adapt the physical environment to the needs of users with physical disabilities. The same technique could be applied to other types of disabilities such as PTSD or autism. For example, some people with autism are non-verbal and may communicate only through pictures or the written word. Having a communication board, using a specially modified tablet computer at the reference desk would assist librarians in working with a person with autism who is non-verbal. These types of modifications can be accomplished in other ways, including creating digital objects that allow people with disabilities to see the library from their perspective, rather than a standard able-bodied one, before arriving at the actual building. New literacies is in many ways about adapting technologies in new ways to the needs of the moment and empowering people to use those technologies in unconventional ways to express their narratives. Of course, particular disabilities result in unique issues that librarians need to find ways to address. Though highly individualized, PTSD does have several hallmarks that are more typical across people with PTSD than not. For instance, combat veterans, especially those with PTSD, dislike closed-in spaces where they do not have a clear line of sight of the space around them. This concept is called hypervigilance and, while it is very useful for survival, during normal day-to-day activities being constantly hypervigilant is exhausting and stressful. Rearranging furniture and having designated safehaven rooms within the library can greatly ease how much someone who is hypervigilant has to work in order to stay focused on their studies. This is but one example of a population with a specific need and how that need might be addressed. Engagement with a complex issue, such as PTSD,

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 62

62

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

provides a space for new literacies to be incorporated into discussions not only about how to understand the condition, but also about how to adapt to the condition – rather than expecting people with the condition to adapt to the library – in unique and interesting ways. In the scenario with PTSD, having online maps, similar to Google maps, would help those with PTSD to experience the library before they arrive and, potentially, allow them to mark up the map to provide feedback on furniture arrangements that might need to be changed because of impediments to line of sight and egress. Another example of the ways in which new literacies concepts can support people with disabilities comes from a dementia support group that meets once a month. Members share not just their personal stories, but also requests for ideas and information. A designated secretary uses the social bookmarking tool Pearltrees1 to build a site of resources as they are mentioned, making them accessible to the entire group. As Pearltrees is open to the public, others can add to it at any time, including during the support group meetings. Taking the discussion outside of the commonly accepted cultural norms can sometimes be of great help in developing new approaches. For instance, a wiki or blog might be used to create a cohesive narrative about how each employee in the library views disability (accessibility) and what disability (accessibility) means to them, in order to better understand prevailing attitudes and develop training that addresses concerns. Such methods enable library employees not only to share their ideas but also to annotate and debate them as well. There are many technologies that can be used for reflection; these include expressing ideas through pictures using Instagram, blogging (privately or publicly), podcasting, vodcasting or tweeting. Using a microblogging tool like Facebook or Twitter can help people to develop ideas over time, using the input of the people around them. This is due, in part, to the multimodality of these digital forms of reflection, and is evident in how words, images and links come together to form a new-literacies understanding of the topic. The shared experience of discussing how the library interacts with patrons with disabilities aids library employees in using new literacies through the use of digital objects as a reflection tool. Scenario planning – a form of experiential learning – within the lens of new literacies ‘is very much about challenging the kinds of mindsets that underwrite certainty and assuredness’ (Lankshear and Knobel, 2003, 25). In the preservation and disaster management world, scenario planning involves a made-up scenario where often the worst can, and does, happen. The idea is to run the scenario over a designated time period, with a gamemaster making adaptive changes as time goes on. For example, the library might start with a flood in the basement and then move on in quick succession to a fire on the third floor and an injured child in the second-floor stacks to see how library

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 63

PIONKE USING NEW LITERACIES TO DISCUSS DISABILITY IN THE LIBRARY 63

staff would respond to crisis and what training or deficits need to be implemented or addressed. To demonstrate the applications of accessibility, scenarios could take on a unique and imaginative direction; for example, if all the adults were suddenly struck by a disease that made it impossible for them to read, how would the library adapt to children being the primary information finders? While this scenario may seem silly or far fetched, playing it out would make library staff think about signage, directions and ease of understanding. These are just a few ideas and examples of how new literacies can be applied to developing a fundamental cultural shift in how the library works with, and provides services for, people with disabilities.

Conclusion Worldview shifts do not happen in a vacuum. Understanding mindsets and engaging in conversation in the technological spaces that people inhabit through the use of new literacies techniques can help to bridge the gap between theory and practical application. It also offers ways to move forward in assisting people with disabilities and allowing them to benefit in terms of not only a better user experience and reduced frustration, but also greater understanding and respect. This chapter has suggested how new literacies might help librarians to think about disability and access issues from an ‘includer’ mindset that takes account of the wide range of abilities of library users.

Notes 1

www.pearltrees.com/.

References ALA (American Library Association) (n.d.) ADA and Libraries, www.ala.org/tools/ada-and-libraries. Gawande, A. (2014) Being Mortal, Metropolitan Books. Gee, J. P. and Hayes, E. R. (2011) Language and Learning in the Digital Age, Routledge. Irvall, B. and Nielsen, G. S. (2005) Access to Libraries for Persons with Disabilities – Checklist, IFLA. Lankshear, C. and Knobel, M. (2003) New Literacies: changing knowledge and classroom learning, Open University Press. Lankshear, C. and Knobel, M. (2006) New Literacies: everyday practices and classroom learning, Open University Press. Pelka, F. (2012) What We Have Done: an oral history of the disability rights movement, University of Massachusetts Press.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 64

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 65

CHAPTER 6

‘Anyone can cook’: critical literacy in the workplace

Andrew Whitworth

Introduction Carr and Kemmis (1986) bemoan the existence of a pervasive ‘theory–practice gap’ in the education profession. Principles, standards and other generalized insights which emerge from the research literature are valuable only in so far as they must be interpreted and then applied in the practice of teachers on the ground, whether in schools, universities, workplaces or the informal learning networks which permeate society. Carr and Kemmis observe, however, that this view of the profession – with practice continually transformed through reflection on that practice – is increasingly subservient to one where practitioners have practice dictated to them by interests (management, consultants, academic researchers) who are essentially external to the profession. In this chapter, I argue that this view of education needs to be extended beyond just formal education as practised in schools and colleges, and into workplace education, the sector in which many information professionals reside. Exploring the meaning of critical literacy in the workplace setting is the narrative device through which this argument is supported. As with all critical theory, in order to have force, critical literacy cannot be a set of theoretical principles which somehow stand above the social settings in which they are practised. Furthermore, it cannot be defined as a set of preexisting judgements about practice. To be truly critical, critical literacy must, instead, be developed in practice, emerging from the collective judgements that are made in real learning settings and the dialogues that are constantly emerging from these settings (Linell, 2009). This chapter is concerned with critical literacy in a specific setting – the workplace. In line with the above-mentioned principles, I do not intend to define or conceptualize critical literacy in advance. Rather, in this chapter I will explore how it emerges from the work of two key authors who have

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 66

66

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

studied workplaces as dynamic and social settings for learning: Annemaree Lloyd and Etienne Wenger. For both, ‘literacy’ – though Wenger tends more often to use the term ‘competence’ – is negotiated by practitioners. It is therefore an intrinsically collective, intersubjective phenomenon, and one that is specific to particular contexts. The critical dimension emerges when one considers the role of authority in these social settings, and how authority can direct learning, and possibly retard or nullify it. This can be done through the creation of ‘practice architectures’ (Kemmis and Grootenboer, 2008) which either do not permit the results of learning to transform practice, and/or restrict this transformation to certain defined professional groups or roles. This, for Carr and Kemmis, is what creates the theory–practice gap. The title of this chapter, ‘Anyone Can Cook’, is drawn from the animated film Ratatouille (2007). In that film it is the title of a book created by Chef Gusteau, the inspiration for the (rodent) protagonist, Remy. But the book – or, rather, the idea that ‘anyone’ could cook like a professional chef – is at first disparaged by another character in the film, food critic Anton Ego. Ego’s annoyance stems from his belief that to state ‘anyone can cook’ dismisses the value of the chef’s professional training, innate talents and experience; combined, these are what give him/her expertise, and thus credibility (or authority), in this particular professional setting. However, because of events in the film, by its conclusion Ego has revised his position. He says that although not everyone can cook, a great chef (or professional expertise, if one likes) can come from anywhere; this expertise is not nurtured and manifested only in specific places (such as top training schools and restaurants). If information literacy, or other literacies such as digital literacies, are to be developed in critical ways, this distribution of authority over information practice is key. The qualified information professional can certainly help with its development, but such assistance must itself be developed through a dialogue between the professional and their workplace client. Only in this way can the theory–practice gap possibly begin to be closed. This chapter starts by reviewing theories developed by Annemaree Lloyd and Etienne Wenger. It then builds on some of the ideas they describe, such as information landscape, practice architectures and stewarding, to develop the notion of radical information literacy. This approach offers the potential to challenge traditional workplace power structures, as scrutiny of authority becomes a collective responsibility, rather than a site of individual power.

Annemaree Lloyd: information literacy as the basis of practice Lloyd’s distinctive view of information literacy was developed through her study of a specific workplace, that of firefighters. Like any group of workers, firefighters have clear information needs, sources and criteria by which they

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 67

WHITWORTH ‘ANYONE CAN COOK’: CRITICAL LITERACY IN THE WORKPLACE 67

make judgements about the relevance, credibility and cognitive authority (Wilson, 1983) of information. But Lloyd’s significant insight was that the typical view of information literacy, one which defined it as competencies displayed at particular moments in time (searches) and on particular kinds of information (textual), could not capture the full richness of these processes. Lloyd noted that at least equal importance had to be given to social sources of information, that is, the information validated between firefighters and ‘stored’ in agreed-upon practices that were shared between the group of workers. Equally important were physical and sensory sources of information embodied in, say, the movements of more experienced colleagues as firefighters negotiated their way through the dangerous environments in which they had to work (see Lloyd, 2005, 85). For firefighters and other professional groups, ‘literacy’ therefore becomes not just something which comes into play at set moments – for example, in clearly defined information searches. Instead, it is ‘a complex social practice: one that involves people co-participating in practices specific to their settings, and in the process, developing collective and common understandings, as they engage with knowledge that is preserved through social, cultural, political and economic features that are laid down over time and through which practices are organised within a setting’ (Lloyd, 2010, xvi). This practice is ‘embedded and interwoven through the practices that constitute a social field (i.e. a context) and as such is subject to collaborative arrangements and activities. It is constituted by a set of interwoven understandings that guide interaction and is linked to the activities around information and knowledge sanctioned by any given setting’ (Lloyd, 2010, 1). Thus, judgements about the validity, relevance and authority of information are not made by an independent agent acting alone and by referring to generic criteria. These kinds of judgements – and ultimately, professionals’ ability to learn in a given social setting – are made possible when information users are connected to ‘various modalities of information that are situated within a social site’ (Lloyd, 2010, 15) – modalities that ‘direct what information is considered valid’ (Lloyd, 2010, 17). An important aspect of this view of information literacy is that it is firmly context specific. Lloyd (2010, 9–10) introduces the metaphor of the ‘information landscape’ to refer to these social settings. Information landscapes are ‘intersubjectively created spaces … characterised by the signs, symbols, artefacts, sayings and doings that define these spaces to … members and identify the boundaries of the environment to outsiders’. Like geographical landscapes, information landscapes are all formed from the same basic ingredients, and may be describable as representative of general types. However, each configuration is unique, only fully knowable by an exploration of the landscape that must take place over a long period.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 68

68

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Lloyd also uses Kemmis and Grootenboer’s (2008, 57) term ‘practice architectures’ in a similar way. Some architectures are more amenable to particular practices than others, being set up in ways which permit certain judgements to be made, while preventing others. For example, one organization may be highly hierarchical, with strict controls asserted over practice and the judgements that individual employees are permitted to make, whereas another may be more inclusive and/or promote innovations and exploration of new practices by employees themselves. Experience gained in a particular landscape may have elements that are then valued in other, similar landscapes – one law firm, for example, is recognizably similar to another – but there will still be aspects of experience and practice that cannot be simply transferred between settings. In Goldstein and Whitworth’s (2015) investigation of how three case-study organizations perceived the value of information literacy, both small and large organizations recognized the value of tacit knowledge regarding the social aspects of information – that is, experience gained by individuals over many years regarding things like who is the best person to ask about particular subjects or queries. Despite, in one case at least, the widespread use of various information systems that were aimed at capturing and making this kind of tacit knowledge explicit, Goldstein and Whitworth still observed that the departure of a particular employee could leave a ‘hole’ in any organization’s information landscape; anyone replacing them would not immediately acquire this same knowledge of the information landscape simply by moving into the same post. Such knowledge (information literacy) would have to be constructed over a longer period of time through observations of practice and dialogue with existing practitioners (social components of the information landscape). In this view of literacy, the ability to make judgements that are in accordance with the practice architectures that permeate given landscapes is still something that is learned. Novices in a social setting must ‘learn “how to see”’ (Gherardi et al., 1998, 282) by discerning the practices which are valued in their landscape. But although there is clearly ‘training’ taking place in most workplace environments, as often as not this kind of learning is informal; Waring and Bishop (2010) describe this as ‘water cooler learning’. Indeed, formal training may become divorced from judgements made on ‘shop floors’ and novices (inadvertently or not) ‘protected’ from the reality of information practices (Lloyd, 2010, 91–2). To summarize, this is a view of literacy which is firmly dialogic. The basis for making judgements about the relevance, credibility and authority of information is one that is maintained through discussions, practices and interactions that take place in specific social settings. For Lloyd, information literacy is thereby the basis of practice. We learn to become literate in particular contexts as we assimilate ourselves to them (and they to us) in

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 69

WHITWORTH ‘ANYONE CAN COOK’: CRITICAL LITERACY IN THE WORKPLACE 69

various ways, learning about how judgements are made within each information landscape we encounter.

Etienne Wenger: communities of practice and digital habitats Etienne Wenger’s description of the community of practice is the second key pillar on which this chapter rests its view of critical literacy. Communities of practice are brought together by shared learning needs; they are ‘communities where the learning component is central’ (Wenger et al., 2009, 3). They may be found in a workplace setting, but also among groups such as environmental campaigners, sports clubs, or sufferers from a disease. There is a shared domain of enquiry which is, broadly, defined and agreed (although sometimes contested) by the community and which provides a sense of collective identity (Wenger et al., 2009, 5). The crux of the theory is that these communities are where competence is negotiated and subsequently learned by newcomers to the community. This is done by community members drawing on a wide range of resources – informational, technological and social. Wenger’s view of competence is therefore highly compatible with Lloyd’s definition of literacy as collective practices which are intertwined within an information landscape and thus learned (and re-learned) by practitioners in each unique landscape. In the opening pages of his 1998 book Communities of Practice: learning, meaning and identity, Wenger offers a case study of a group of insurance claims processors. The study provides a detailed instance of how the formal and informal teaching of literacy in a given setting can become divorced from each other. When new processors join the firm they are taken through a few weeks of formalized training in which the ‘official’ practices of the company are inculcated into them. These are practices based on the mental models and maps of practice constructed by managers and business analysts. But as soon as they are on the shop floor, some of these practices then are unlearned as the processors are exposed to the reality of this information landscape. New entrants discover that judgements about the relevance, quality and authority of information are not always made in ways that accord with the models they were exposed to in training, even when (in fact, especially when) they are being made by more experienced colleagues. Certain ‘short cuts’, for all that they are not sanctioned by management and do not appear in the novices’ initial training, are nevertheless introduced to employees through the informal, intersubjective dialogues which flow around the shop floor. Thus ‘Communities of practice facilitate access to tacit information that cannot be articulated through text’. This means that ‘developing a shared understanding about what constitutes information is as important as the information itself’ (Lloyd, 2010, 21). This information:

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 70

70

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

represents the real and ongoing values and beliefs of participants in practice. Consequently, in this modality information is fluid and the ways of knowing are constantly changing. Social information is difficult to articulate through text but is highly valued by the collective because it shapes the initial subjectivities and then enables the enacting of intersubjectivity once members engage with the actual practice of the setting. This allows them to move from the reified identity produced through engagement with epistemic information (learning to act) towards the construction of a collective identity (becoming). (Lloyd, 2010, 163)

This move is the one that takes place when a practitioner transitions from the initial, management-based phase of training, with its more objective modality, to the community of practice, in which training still takes place, but less formally, and with reference to different sources of authority. As these new bases for judgements are learned, the process ‘enables the transformation from peripheral participation towards full participation (Lave and Wenger, 1991). This participation enables the newcomer or novice to begin engaging with an intersubjective space that is controlled by others’ (Lloyd, 2010, 164). Wenger et al. (2009), later published advice for communities of practice on how they could manage the virtual spaces (such as email lists, social media and so on) that, increasingly, are conduits for the dialogues and information exchanges that take place within and between communities of practice, and form their information landscapes. Wenger et al. call these the communities’ ‘digital habitats’. These habitats are not just fixed configurations of technologies, but dynamic creations – information landscapes, in other words – constantly emerging from the learning that takes place in the community, and interplaying with the community’s definition of its domain and its practices (Wenger et al., 2009, 10–11). Each digital habitat is a ‘creative vortex’ in which technology and community shape each other (Wenger et al., 2009, 20). These spaces ‘create moments of togetherness’ (Wenger et al., 2009, 8) within which it is hard to separate the social and the pedagogical. The digital habitat does not just provide an architecture through which judgements can be made about information. The habitat itself is a centre of critical judgements. Being context specific, habitats are practice architectures and ‘different habitats work for different communities’ (Wenger et al., 2009, 69). Therefore, decisions need to be taken about what resources are relevant for a particular habitat. The process of making these judgements is called stewarding. Stewards ‘take responsibility for a community’s technological resources for a time’ (Wenger et al., 2009, 24), helping communities to choose, configure and use these resources. Stewarding is ‘a creative practice that evolves along with the community and reflects the … process by which a community ‘designs’ itself as a vehicle for learning’ (Wenger et al., 2009, 25). It has a key role in helping

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 71

WHITWORTH ‘ANYONE CAN COOK’: CRITICAL LITERACY IN THE WORKPLACE 71

any community to realize its full potential (Wenger et al., 2009, 198), and specifically bridges the theory–practice gap. Stewards act as conduits for information, maintaining an awareness of a wide range of potential resources and making (or, rather, helping the community to make) critical judgements about the relevance of these resources to the practice of the community. Thus, stewards play a key role in how a community negotiates what it means to be ‘literate’ in that particular social setting. Despite the usefulness of the stewarding concept, there are some limits to how Wenger et al. (2009) describe it. Firstly, they limit it to the technologies which comprise the digital habitat. Instead, it should be seen as something which extends over all the practices which comprise the information landscape. As Lloyd notes (2010, 168), ‘the community must provide a range of information affordances that will enable a new member to become engaged with a range of information activities and to develop information skills’. These ‘affordances’ may be technology based but they may also be procedural, textual or social. Secondly, while the formal aspects of stewarding are described in detail by Wenger et al. (2009), the informal processes of stewarding are not really addressed. Yet stewarding is only occasionally conscious and deliberate. More often, it is unconscious, manifested in the everyday micro-level decisions and judgements (or the omission of such) as people undertake their working lives. Introducing the stewarding idea, Wenger et al. (2009, 24) point out that ‘the interplay between technology and community in this ongoing pattern of use, adaptation and dissemination of evolving practice can happen by itself, untended’, even if ‘often … a person or a group of people are paying attention to this process and influencing it’. But nothing ‘happens by itself’ – if it appears to be, what is emerging is an unconscious process, structured by earlier processes and critical judgements. It is this aspect of stewarding, particularly, which needs to be ‘scrutinized’, a subject important to understanding critical literacy, to which this chapter now turns.

Scrutiny over authority: the critical element The process of stewardship is explicitly related to ‘literacy’ by Wenger et al. (2009). But what aspects of this view of practice – or Lloyd’s – allow for the emergence of a truly critical literacy? The notion of communities continuously negotiating, reflecting on and transforming practice in social (workplace) settings is a productive one, but it is also, in certain respects, an ideal. Communities of practice are often (in practice) less-than-optimal sites for learning. In addition, the insights developed within may not be able to manifest themselves in actual transformation of practice, due to political limits placed on them, whether

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 72

72

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

directly or indirectly (such as denial of the necessary resources). It was noted earlier that certain practice architectures may be more dictatorial than others, depending on the ways in which they allocate authority within social settings. A critical political question about information practice is, therefore, whether this authority is narrowly concentrated, or more widely distributed. This may be overtly defined, perhaps by the creation of procedural rules for the handling of certain types of information. However, even if these rules exist in the mental models of organizational management, Wenger’s insurance processors prove that in reality they may be less-thanrigorously followed by employees. However, most rules are not overt; instead, they are embedded in habits and routines, with practitioners subtly directed away from considering alternatives (‘that’s not the way we do things here’). Lloyd (2010) says, ‘Power is enacted through discursive practices of the collective who mediate the information environment by guiding novices towards the sites of knowledge that reflect the realities of their workplace practice and performance’ (p. 160) and ‘the provision or opportunities to engage with information are not evenly distributed or made available to everyone within a setting and not everyone who participates will be given the same or similar opportunities to engage and experience the information environment’ (p. 170). Differing levels of authority make it more or less likely that certain information practices will disperse throughout a community. Those who possess authority in a community, which could be for various reasons including seniority, occupation of a certain formalized role or simply that they ‘know the right people’, legitimize (their) practices and innovations, making it ‘acceptable for others to try [these practices] and exerting an influence that may lead others to try’ (Wilson, 1983, 63). This matters for literacy, as judgements can be made about practices and resources for reasons that are not to do with their efficacy or relevance. For instance, Huvila (2010) looked at corporate finance firms and saw practitioners making judgements based on how they perceived that the information would be relevant to their success at work. Certain judgements may be avoided because there is a desire to not offend someone in a position of authority. This is important for information professionals in workplace settings in critical ways. Stewards are not always drawn from the communities on whose behalf they work. As Wenger et al. (2009, 25) point out, ‘Actual community membership is not a precondition for the [steward] role, but it does confer it additional legitimacy.’ This ‘legitimacy’ comes about through recognizing the (informational) value of participation in community life. This helps stewards to develop the necessary awareness of how knowledge is stored and flows through a community, in order to act more effectively as a steward. There is a continuous risk, however, that a community of practice could become

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 73

WHITWORTH ‘ANYONE CAN COOK’: CRITICAL LITERACY IN THE WORKPLACE 73

parochial, closing off its boundaries and retarding inputs from outside the community. ‘Alterity’ (Linell, 2009, 82–5) is important because it allows one conceptual system (a practice architecture, an information landscape, a digital habitat) to come into contact with other such systems and the ‘memories’ they contain (see Crang, 2000, 150), and to refresh itself from this contact. Therefore, while it is quite legitimate for ‘external’ information professionals to work with communities and assist them with stewarding their information landscapes, a critical, political view of this interaction must ask: whose interests are being reflected in this process? It was noted earlier that information landscapes serve, in part, to define boundaries. Though these boundaries are highly diffuse and negotiable, nevertheless they are always at least potentially present, and in some places or times are strictly drawn. Authority becomes manifested in who is permitted to act as a steward. Access to the digital habitat, or indeed the community itself, can be restricted. Stewarding, while a constant process, becomes most visible when decisions are made and resources are allocated, and at these substantive decision-making moments a key question becomes one of access: who sits at the ‘planning table’ (Cervero and Wilson, 1998). A practice architecture may be structured in ways that specifically restrict the agency of (most) employees when it comes to transforming practices, even when there is an awareness that transformation of practice is necessary. In a case study of a large-scale technological installation in a university, Whitworth (2012) noted that even though all involved with the project agreed to include certain cutting-edge technologies in the design, the university’s procurement systems (its extant information practices, in other words) could not permit this, as they forced the institution to turn to existing suppliers first, even though they were not yet working in this innovative space. While critical literacy is developed in practice, I would argue that it must retain an essential normative core. ‘Anyone can cook’, yes, but that does not mean that all cooking is the same. Somewhere there need to be measures of quality that turn the simple preparation of food into an enjoyable experience for all the senses, even if such measures can be only provisionally defined in advance. If, as argued in this section, critical literacy is inescapably political, then its normative core must be found in the deliberation and dialogue which a given practice architecture permits, or what Habermas (1987) calls communicative rationality. Communities of practice must therefore be able to scrutinize the information practices that permeate their landscapes, a process that, ideally, should involve the maximum number of community members. This is stewarding, but one now distributed across the community, and not invested in specific roles or offices. However, such a view of stewarding – as a collective authority over information practices – is still subject to the same

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 74

74

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

limitations on democratic ideals as other deliberative fora. These limitations contribute to the pervasiveness of ‘hierarchism’ (Blaug, 2010), which promotes the view that only hierarchical and instrumental means of decision making are effective. Certainly, these forms of information processing and decision making may deliver efficiency gains. But these tend to come at the price of a loss of scrutiny of the decisions taken. Agency is a necessary element of organizational life, as, without it, no progress would take place; communities would just discuss things, and never actually do anything. But trade-offs exist between scrutiny and action. Hierarchical practice architectures, and the judgements about information that these architectures permit, may deliver efficiency gains, but what are their cognitive costs? How can a community remain vigilant over the trade-offs it faces?

Radical information literacy Whitworth (2014) defines a ‘radical information literacy’ as explicitly dialogic, encompassing methods and processes which redistribute authority over information practices and, thus, maximize the capacity for stewarding within all members of a community. Authority does not reside in individuals within the community, but is made collective, polyphonic (Bakhtin, 1981) and democratic. Teaching approaches for critical literacy in the workplace can draw on critical pedagogies, which, as Shor (1996) explores, innately permit the scrutiny of authority and its redistribution among the community of learners. The critical information professional is not engaged on a mission to bring their view of effective information practice to communities, but to work in dialogue with them, developing a dynamic and creative understanding of their context(s), and then identifying key ‘teachable moments’ through which ‘more complex evaluation skills’ can be promoted (Lloyd, 2010, 119). More specific pedagogical advice can be drawn from the informationliteracy models of Christine Bruce (Bruce, 2008; Bruce et al., 2006). Her relational view of information literacy is based around the raising of learners’ awareness regarding the possible variation in the information landscape, and helping to ensure that a broader experience of variation shapes the information landscape of that community. Relational approaches expose community members to a wide range of potential resources, whether these already exist within the information landscape, or which are introduced to them by the information professional (acting as a broker). But these resources are not imposed on communities. It should remain up to the members of the community to judge the relevance and credibility – thus, scrutinize the authority – of these resources. Generally, then:

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 75

WHITWORTH ‘ANYONE CAN COOK’: CRITICAL LITERACY IN THE WORKPLACE 75

where the learning about the landscape is actively engaged in by the participants, where learning is socially situated, where it takes place in (relational) ways that encourage a wide exploration of the variation in practice, then the full experience of variation of these participants will be more likely to become embedded in … the texts, systems and genre repertoires of the landscape. The resources produced through this active learning will be more relevant to members of that community and … possibly relevant to other communities as well. This permits the distribution of stewarding capacity … providing useful resources to those seeking to nurture the information landscape through developing a broader genre repertoire … (Whitworth, 2014, 164)

A good practical example of this approach is offered by Eubanks (2011) and her case study of work done with the YWCA in Troy, New York. Eubanks worked in an ‘activist lab’, a technological space for the use of women in this community. Originally, computers were installed, but there was no human element within the space, so the lab’s use was limited. But once ‘lab hostesses’ arrived – women who lived in the YWCA and who spent time in the lab as its ‘human face’ – then use greatly increased. This was not because the lab then contained ‘experts’ but, rather, because users reacted positively to women who were identifiably members of the same community. There was no imposition of practice. Rather, users were encouraged to reflect on their own activities and, once a focus for the use of the lab was found, the hostess (reacting to this ‘teachable moment’) would help the user find out how technology, or the information it gave access to, could help that user. In this way, the YWCA took a critical approach to both digital and information literacy education. Reflective practice and action research are also integral to developing critical literacy in the workplace. Carr and Kemmis (1986, 2) are concerned to ensure that education professionals do not develop a ‘limited view of [their] professionalism’, something which perpetuates the theory–practice gap. This must also apply to information professionals. Action research is the scrutiny of one’s own practice (Reason and Bradbury, 2001) and, in Carr and Kemmis’s view, is what allows educators, in any realm, to support their claims to cognitive authority. It is not oriented to the development of theory, nor to practice alone. Instead, theory and practice come together in praxis, a dialogue between theory and practice which is intended to ‘remake the conditions of informed action and the knowledge which informs it’ (Carr and Kemmis, 1986, 33). This can be seen as remaking the information landscape, through an approach that ‘closes the separation between researchers/ policymakers on the one hand, and practitioners on the other’ (Carr and Kemmis, 1986, 216). All, at least potentially, can produce texts, or other types

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 76

76

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

of communicable insights, that then become available resources for other members of the community, or other communities. Reflective practice does not ‘just happen’. Ultimately, it is a challenge to existing authorities, and many practice architectures are designed, subtly or overtly, to impede it. For example, the resources needed to engage in it may be denied, or surveillance techniques may be used to discourage it. Organizations may also encourage reflection only in so far as it seeks to confirm existing goals, rather than question them – what Argyris and Schön (1999) call ‘single-loop learning’. Reflection also takes a level of individual commitment. It is a conscious ‘stepping aside for a moment in order to articulate knowledge of the social context of our activities, even if it is only to oneself’ (Hultgren, 2009, 85). However, this view of literacy ‘fully embraces the possibility of transformation in any social setting’ (Whitworth, 2014, 168, emphasis in original). Ultimately, critical literacy must result in practices that do not try to annul authority, but ‘diminish the negative effects and cognitive costs of authority (such as coercion, alienation, surveillance) in workplaces and communities … radical IL [information literacy] is a guide to remaining vigilant over direct democracy and small-scale decision-making, and assists the creation of decolonizing forms of organization and community-building’ (Whitworth, 2014, 169). It is an approach to literacy which rests firmly on the potential that every community of practice has to scrutinize and transform its practices, and its own models of literacy, through a process of enquiry that, while it may not always be conscious, is irrevocably collective, dialogic and intersubjective.

Conclusion In a review of Whitworth (2014), Pilerot (2015) criticized Radical IL for (among other things) its vagueness and lack of specificity. This is a criticism that has also been heard at conferences, and one I acknowledge. But to make it slightly misses the original intention of the work. Radical IL is not presented as a set of concrete outcomes, but as a process, a narrative aimed at helping information professionals ‘learn to see’, as Gherardi et al. (1998, 282) have it. The cognitive gap (Blaug, 2010) between those who overtly wield authority of various kinds to impose practices in the workplace and those who respond to that authority in various ways is pervasive and, in many workplaces, probably intractable. But this can also result in a blindness that becomes institutionalized; a belief that the information practices of staff on the shop floor, or in the classroom, or expressed on social media, cannot possibly have ‘authority’, and/or be accorded the status of ‘knowledge’ in the same way as objective, ‘scientific’ principles. The result will almost certainly be the

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 77

WHITWORTH ‘ANYONE CAN COOK’: CRITICAL LITERACY IN THE WORKPLACE 77

introduction, or perpetuation, of information practices that are, simply, less effective on the ground. The work of the various authors mentioned in this chapter, particularly Carr and Kemmis, and Lloyd and Wenger, show firmly that not only is this not the case, but it is exactly through the processes of scrutiny and the transformation of practice by practitioners themselves that the validity of theoretical, generic knowledge is proven. This is, emphatically, not antiscientific; instead it is ‘strong objectivity’ (Harding, 1995), a distribution of the capacity to make informed judgements that strengthens the knowledgegeneration capacity of given social settings and, ultimately, society. An essential part of critical literacy, whether in workplaces or otherwise, resides in how it sustains in individuals and communities the ability to make critical judgements. Learning to see the processes which support such judgements, through working with clients in ways that are dialogic, polyphonic and democratic, is central to this task. Anyone can cook, perhaps – but it still takes time, care and attention to draw out their potential talent and see it judged by those who must consume the products of their learning.

References Argyris, C. and Schön, D. (1999) On Organizational Learning, Blackwell. Bakhtin, M. (1981) The Dialogic Imagination: four essays by M. M. Bakhtin, University of Texas Press. Blaug, R. (2010) How Power Corrupts, Palgrave Macmillan. Bruce, C. S. (2008) Informed Learning, ACRL. Bruce, C. S., Edwards, S. L. and Lupton, M. (2006) Six Frames for Information Literacy Education, Italics, 5 (1), http://www98.griffith.edu.au/dspace/bitstream/handle/10072/ 14028/36236.pdf?sequence=1. Carr, W. and Kemmis, S. (1986) Becoming Critical: knowing through action research, Deakin University Press. Cervero, R. and Wilson, A. (1998) Working the Planning Table: the political practice of adult education, Jossey-Bass. Crang, M. (2000) Relics, Places and Unwritten Geographies in the Work of Michel de Certeau. In Crang, M. and Thrift, N. (eds), Thinking Space, Routledge. Eubanks, V. (2011) Digital Dead End: fighting for social justice in the information age, MIT Press. Gherardi, S., Nicolini, D. and Odella, F. (1998) Toward a Social Understanding of How People Learn in Organizations: the notion of situated curriculum. Management Learning, 29 (3), 273–97. Goldstein, S. and Whitworth, A. (2015) Determining the Value of Information Literacy for Employers. Paper presented at European Conference on Information

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 78

78

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Literacy, Tallinn, Estonia, 3 October 2015. Habermas, J. (1987) The Theory of Communicative Action vol 2: Lifeworld and system – a critique of functionalist reason, Polity Press. Harding, S. (1995) ‘Strong Objectivity’: a response to the new objectivity question, Synthese, 104 (3), 331–49. Hultgren, F. (2009) Approaching the Future: a study of Swedish school leavers’ information-related activities, Valfrid. Huvila, I. (2010) Information Sources and Perceived Success in Corporate Finance, Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61 (11), 2219. Kemmis, S. and Grootenboer, P. (2008) Situation Praxis in Practice. In Kemmis, S. and Smith, T. J. (eds), Enabling Praxis, Sense Publishers. Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991) Situated Learning: legitimate peripheral participation, Cambridge University Press. Linell, P. (2009) Rethinking Language, Mind, and World Dialogically: interactional and contextual theories of human sense-making, IAP. Lloyd, A. (2005) Information Literacy: different contexts, different concepts, different truths? Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 37 (2), 82–8. Lloyd, A. (2010) Information Literacy Landscapes: information literacy in education, workplace and everyday contexts, Chandos. Pilerot, O. (2015) Review of: Whitworth, Andrew. Radical Information Literacy: reclaiming the political heart of the IL movement. London: Chandos Publishing, 2014, Information Research, 20 (1), review no. R526. Reason, P. and Bradbury, H. (eds) (2001) Handbook of Action Research, Sage. Shor, I. (1996) When Students Have Power: negotiating authority in a critical pedagogy, Chicago University Press. Waring, J. J. and Bishop, S. J. (2010) ‘Water Cooler’ Learning: knowledge sharing at the clinical ‘backstage’ and its contribution to patient safety, Journal of Health Organization and Management, 24, 325–42. Wenger, E. (1998) Communities of Practice: learning, meaning and identity, Cambridge University Press. Wenger, E., White, N. and Smith, J. D. (2009) Digital Habitats: stewarding technology for communities, CPSquare. Whitworth, A. (2012) Invisible Success: problems with the grand technological innovation in higher education, Computers and Education, 59 (1), 145–55. Whitworth, A. (2014) Radical Information Literacy: reclaiming the political heart of the IL movement, Chandos. Wilson, P. (1983) Secondhand Knowledge: an inquiry into cognitive authority, Greenwood Press.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 79

CHAPTER 7

Social justice, adult learning and critical literacy

Jennifer Lau-Bond

Introduction Adult learners, also called mature learners, are a nebulous group. The United States National Center for Education Statistics (NCES, n.d.) defines ‘adult education’ as any formal learning activities done by people over 16 years old. In the UK, the National Research and Development Centre for Adult Literacy and Numeracy (2010, 6) expands the definition of adult learning to ‘the entire range of formal, non-formal and informal learning activities which are undertaken by adults after a break since leaving initial education and training, and which results in the acquisition of new knowledge and skills’. Other definitions are based solely on age; many institutions of higher education, including Roosevelt University (2014a) in Chicago, Illinois, consider their adult degree programme to be for students over 24 years old. In 2013, roughly 31% of students enrolled in degree-granting post-secondary institutions in the United States were 25 or older and therefore fell into the group commonly thought of as ‘adult students’ (NCES, 2015). Because this article is grounded in the context in which I work, it primarily focuses on students enrolled in higher education in the United States who are 24 or more years old. However, it is important to remember that not all 24-year-olds have the same challenges and opportunities, and students younger than this may exhibit similar behaviours, motivations or circumstances. There are no rigid lines when defining adult learners, and inflexible definitions are in fact not terribly meaningful because adult education and learning theorists can be informative for information professionals about helping learners of all ages. I approach the examination of adult learning and critical literacy from the perspective of an academic librarian and instructor. I was a librarian at the Roosevelt University Library from 2007 to 2010 and, since 2008, I have also been teaching online courses in Roosevelt’s adult accelerated degree programme (now called the Flex-Track Program). This chapter starts with an overview of Roosevelt University and its philosophy of and approach to social

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 80

80

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

justice, in particular as part of its Flex-Track Program. It then explores how, within this framework, three adult learning theories have been influential, both within formal, taught academic-skills courses and in more ad hoc library support. The final section reflects on some of the potential challenges facing tutors and library professionals wishing to incorporate such approaches into their work.

Roosevelt University and social justice Roosevelt University is a private not-for-profit college with a social justice mission. From its founding in 1945, Roosevelt was, in the words of former college President Theodore L. Gross (2005, 41), ‘built on social justice’. In fact, its founders set out to create a university that was open to all, explicitly opposing the racial and ethnic quotas (or outright prohibitions) that many other American colleges imposed at the time. Roosevelt University (2014b) is proud of its unique history and mission, and it sees itself as ‘offering a transformative education that empowers qualified students to consider their greater place within a global society’. Social justice is not compulsory at Roosevelt, and you will not necessarily find it discussed, or even implied, in every classroom. Social justice is pervasive at the University, however. It can be seen in things like school events; in an emphasis on service learning that combines academic study with community service and engagement with the city of Chicago; and in many of the courses and programmes offered. Perhaps one of the strongest examples of the social justice mission, however, is the Flex-Track Program. Part of the Evelyn T. Stone College of Professional Studies, the Flex-Track Program offers an accelerated bachelor’s degree programme geared towards the needs of adult students. The accelerated programme has been around in a variety of forms for quite some time, but the 2014 to 2015 academic year brought changes that made it even more explicitly oriented toward the needs of adult students. Courses are now offered in 8-week terms instead of the university’s regular 15-week terms, and courses are taught only at night or online, thereby allowing working students to earn degrees more quickly and with less disruption to their lives. As of Fall 2014 there were 400 students pursuing a degree with the programme. More than 99% of the students were 24 or older and 67% of the students were part time, which the school defines as taking 11 credit hours or fewer per term. (Most classes are three credits.) Furthermore, 57% of those students identified themselves as a race/ethnicity other than white, compared to around 46% for the entire university, excluding international students (Roosevelt University, 2014c). This is a transfer programme, meaning that the students have already earned some credits elsewhere, either in another department at Roosevelt or at another university.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 81

LAU-BOND SOCIAL JUSTICE, ADULT LEARNING AND CRITICAL LITERACY

81

Therefore, Flex-Track students are, essentially, a diverse subset of adults who come to the programme to complete a bachelor’s degree on a part-time basis. Roosevelt’s accelerated adult programme has always been heavily influenced by the university’s social justice goals, and by critical pedagogy. I teach the introductory course sequence and another core course, all with a critical agenda: PLS 201: Critical Reasoning and Academic Skills; PLS 202: Information Literacy and Research Writing; and PLS 220: Technological Literacy. While these courses were new in Fall 2014, I taught earlier versions of PLS 201 and 202 in the past. Through these and other courses, the programme aims to produce students capable of critical reflection and discourse, and the university’s wider mission ensures that social justice action is always present, whether explicitly or implicitly, in the Flex-Track Program. It is this unique combination of circumstances and orientation that has provided me with a lens for exploration of critical theory, adult learning theory and how they both intersect with librarianship.

Social justice and adult learning theory In my experience, adult learning theory can offer many insights to all educators, including librarians. In this chapter, I have chosen to highlight three specific theories that have personally informed my work as both an instructor and librarian, namely, Knowles and andragogy, McClusky and the theory of margin, and Mezirow and transformative learning.

Knowles and andragogy Andragogy has been defined as ‘the art and science of helping adults learn’ (Knowles, 1980, 43). While not the first to use the term, Malcolm Knowles certainly popularized it, and he developed his own set of six assumptions to help explain and characterize adult learners: 1 2 3 4 5 6

Adults need to know the reasons why they are learning something. Adults have a psychological need to be self-directed. Adults have experiences that can contribute to (or hinder) their learning. Adults are ready to learn when the topic satisfies a need of their developmental stage or role in life. Adults learn in order to apply knowledge right away (i.e. problemcentred rather than subject-centred learning). Adults are best motivated by internal, rather than external, factors (Knowles, 1990).

Andragogy is not overtly a critical theory, but it is complementary to critical

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 82

82

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

theory. Andragogy suggests that adults learn best when they can take responsibility for their learning and have their own experiences respected as valuable in the learning process, rather than depending on a teacher to impose a purpose, direction and legitimacy. In other words, Knowles rejects the ‘banking model’ of education (see Chapter 2) disparaged by Freire (2000, 79), who argues that educators should focus instead on ‘posing of the problems of human beings in their relations with the world’. Of course, Knowles (1990, 46) acknowledges that many adults have been conditioned to the banking model and believe the ‘role of learner to be that of a dependent, more or less passive recipient of transmitted content’. Facilitating an environment where adults can overcome this sense of dependency and deeply examine their own learning is the goal of adult educators, and, in fact, of critical educators as well. Using Knowles’s assumptions, I try to establish my courses as adult spaces. I do have assignment deadlines, but I try to define all expectations in advance so students can plan their time in any way that makes sense to them, and I offer flexibility when students need it. I emphasize the collegiality of the course and that I am not there to teach in the traditional sense, but to help students in their learning. My courses, like many in the Flex-Track Program, are discussion based, meaning that the biggest portion of the course time is spent on asynchronous discussion forums. This communicates to my students that their input is just as valuable as mine, and it creates a culture of shared enquiry and reflection that advances everyone’s understanding of the issues. Discussions generally centre on the assigned text, which may be a work of literature, an argumentative essay, a video or other type of resource. My goal at the beginning of the course is to start with relatable popular media, both because it feels more approachable for some students and also because I want to demonstrate that during the course they will be expected to reflect critically on all types of ideas, not just those from academic sources. One of the most effective ways I try to engage students is by giving them plenty of time to reflect on their own experiences. For instance, I start PLS 201, which for many students is their very first class at Roosevelt, with a narrative essay where they have to tell a personal story that relays a meaning or message. The assignment communicates to students that their experiences and perceptions are important and it also helps them to start to learn to interpret those experiences and translate them for others. One reading I have used in PLS 201 discusses installing spyware on computers to protect children, and I start the discussion by asking students to evaluate this issue. At first, students tend to divide into older students and parents on one side and younger students and non-parents on the other, with the first group generally arguing that spyware is acceptable and the second group arguing that it is not. Over the course of the week, each side starts to share personal experiences, with younger students explaining their feelings about parents

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 83

LAU-BOND SOCIAL JUSTICE, ADULT LEARNING AND CRITICAL LITERACY

83

who regulated their online activities and parents sharing stories about ways their own children got into trouble online. The sharing of personal experiences both helps students to feel that their own background is relevant and makes it easier for other students to acknowledge alternative perspectives. While I try not to direct the conversation, I do jump in frequently and push students to engage in more reflection. For example, sometimes parents who themselves are not confident with technology argue that they need spyware to help them monitor what their children are doing online. If I question them more about this belief, they may start to consider issues such as the source of their own anxieties, which helps other students to consider how parenting can be influenced by outside factors. This creates rich and complex discussions, and it helps students to think about the world around them in new ways. Of course, it is difficult to truly implement all of Knowles’s ideas in practice. All my courses are situated within an institution that still ranks and counts students. I must still create course rules, enforce policies, assign grades and attend to the other myriad administrative duties expected of faculty. Because PLS 201 and 202 are introductory courses, they are particularly important for students, and it is expected that students will exit the courses with a certain level of competency in college-level reading, writing and research. As Knowles argues, adults must be internally motivated to learn, but formal education institutions still generally assume that achievements like grades, credits or even fear of punishment are the most important motivations. As a faculty member teaching adults, I feel the constant tension between helping students to learn on their own and giving them the practical skills that the university says they need. This challenge exists in libraries as well. Often library instruction sessions are squeezed into impossibly short time slots and must address a long list of tools and skills that students need for their assignment. These demands do not allow much opportunity for librarians to help students find their own motivation or direct their own learning. However, even something as simple as mentioning why you are demonstrating a specific tool can be an effective opportunity to tap into the adult’s need for explanation, as well as sparking critical discussions about why some tools are valued over others, and who determines that value. Similarly, librarians can demonstrate tools that students can access after graduation rather than only focusing on subscription sources. This helps students to see the practical applications of what they are learning, and they gain a deeper understanding of why some tools are accessible only through the university and what the impact of this inaccessibility might be.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 84

84

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

McClusky and the theory of margin While not a model for adult learning exclusively, McClusky’s theory of margin (1970; 1971) does help to explain some of the factors adults face that impact on their learning. The theory is based on the premise that an adult’s ‘margin’ is a function of their ‘load’ (demands) relative to their available ‘power’ (resources). Both load and power can be internal or external factors that influence an adult’s life. For instance, external loads could be work responsibilities, civic duties or family obligations. Internal loads could be personal goals, expectations or aspirations. Similarly, external sources of power could be family and friends, financial resources or available time, while internal power could be something like self-confidence or coping skills. A person’s margin, therefore, can be impacted on by changes in either their load or their power. Learning can take place only when there is a surplus margin. In other words, if a student’s load is greater than their available power, there are no reserves left for the person to attend to learning. However, by decreasing load, increasing power, or both, the margin is improved and learning can take place. McClusky (1971) suggests that, as they move through life, adults continually strive to adjust the ratio in order to adapt to the changes in power and load that inevitably occur as one ages. He sees education as playing a central role in helping adults to make those adjustments. In many ways, the theory of margin simply formalizes something most people already understand instinctively. For example, an adult student trying to juggle caring for children with taking courses (load) will have an easier time if they also have resources such as a supportive co-parent or money available for childcare (power). The beauty of this theory is its simplicity and the way it can lead both adult educators and adult students themselves to concrete action to improve learning conditions. By exploring both the elements of load and power, it becomes easier to see where changes must be made so as to facilitate learning. This theory is also an inherently critical analysis (although McClusky may not have promoted it as such), as a full exploration of an individual’s margin necessitates acknowledgement of systemic sources of load and power. Using the example of childcare, there are many societal/systemic influences at work as well, such as gendered expectations about who is responsible for childcare; assumptions about what a student looks like and needs (i.e., college students are young and childless and therefore need no childcare); and even income inequalities that lead to some people being able to afford childcare and others not. Such analyses reveal the elements of power and load, large and small, internal and external, that impact on student learning, and this can lead students to advocate for personal, institutional and even societal changes. In my own courses, I have found the concept of margins to be useful for

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 85

LAU-BOND SOCIAL JUSTICE, ADULT LEARNING AND CRITICAL LITERACY

85

creating conditions that encourage learning. For instance, one type of load that I often see with my online students is anxiety about technology. Many of my students have been out of education for a long time and therefore are new to tools such as course management systems, online registration and so forth. Even if they have been in education more recently, they may simply struggle with technology in general and worry that they will not be able to keep up, will seem ‘old’ or will make a ‘terrible’ error in communication or procedure. In response to the technology anxiety so many express, I attempt to give students the opportunity to both increase their power and decrease their load. On the power side, I offer lots of links to ‘help’ resources in the course materials and I regularly create text or video directions or set up phone calls to walk struggling students through specific processes. I spend time helping students who lack internet access at home to identify access points and plan their workload so as to accommodate these limitations. In short, I work to give the anxious student power in the form of confidence in their technology skills and the assistance they need to succeed in an online course. To impact on load, I try to make the course as simple to navigate as possible. I make sure that links are clearly identified and directions are provided at the outset so that students do not waste time trying to interpret what they need to do. I encourage feedback from students and work with them to identify factors that may inhibit their learning. I do not believe any of these actions are particularly unique. Framing my course design and practice with the theory of margin in mind, though, has helped me to think through the many factors that may influence my students and to take charge of the role I can play in facilitating their learning. Certainly many elements of load and power are beyond my influence, but not all of them. By creating an environment where students feel comfortable and encouraged to communicate their needs and challenges to me, and carefully listening to what they say, I continually search for ways to impact on student success. I believe the theory of margin is directly applicable to library practice as well. For instance, in instruction sessions I always tell students that the most important information I want them to take away is how, and why, to get help from the library. I emphasize that this is not because I think librarians are so powerful or should be gatekeepers of knowledge, but because identifying when one is stuck and knowing what sources of help are available are important forms of power. As librarians, we also help students to gain the power of language through learning the terminology of research, or of their discipline. We can help to decrease a student’s load by making our tools easier to use; by making our physical spaces easier to navigate; or by offering online services for students who cannot come to campus. Even more radically, libraries should consider whether they have any role to play in other loads to which students may be subject, including the types

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 86

86

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

of systemic loads mentioned above. If the library is concerned with social justice and access to education, how can it, or should it, act when something is preventing students from learning? For example, if adult students have problems finding childcare, can the library help in some way? Perhaps the library could research local childcare options and create a guide that could be distributed to students; offer extended hours to accommodate students who cannot visit until other family members are home to care for children; or provide children’s materials for parents who need to bring their children with them to the library. I am not suggesting that such initiatives would benefit every community. Rather, I am suggesting that libraries should consider the ways that they can use their strengths to play a part in facilitating learning in their communities, even if this does not fall into what might be considered traditional academic support. We need to engage critically with the issues, and work with other campus and community partners to identify the sources of load and power that our students have (or lack), and contribute our unique perspective and skills to improving student margins when possible. This is equally true for public libraries, many of which already do this with programming, collections and services.

Mezirow and transformative learning The learning theory I personally find most inspiring and energizing is transformative learning. One major proponent of this idea, Jack Mezirow (2000, 7–8), defines transformative learning as ‘the process by which we transform our taken-for-granted frames of reference (meaning perspectives, habits of mind, mind-sets) to make them more inclusive, discriminating, open, emotionally capable of change, and reflective so that they may generate beliefs and opinions that will prove more true or justified to guide action’. Transformative learning therefore involves change in the way we see ourselves and our world. The basis for Mezirow’s (2000, 16) conception of learning is the idea that we all have frames of reference, or the ‘structure of assumptions and expectations through which we filter sense impressions’. Frames of reference can be conscious or unconscious, and they are made up of both habits of mind and points of view, which Mezirow (2000, 18) describes respectively as general assumptions and ‘sets of immediate specific expectations, beliefs, feelings, attitudes, and judgments’. An example of all this in action would be a student who says they are ‘bad at technology’. This frame of reference has probably built up through a variety of individual and shared experiences. They may have assumptions that technology is easier for others to learn or that technology is a societal ill and therefore not worth learning anyway. They may expect they will get a bad grade in Technological Literacy or that they

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 87

LAU-BOND SOCIAL JUSTICE, ADULT LEARNING AND CRITICAL LITERACY

87

are not capable of learning a specific tool. Mezirow (1990, 6) argues the learning part of transformative learning happens through critical reflection, or ‘reflection on presuppositions’. This reflection can be internal or done through critical discourse with others, but it ultimately leads to some type of reflective action, such as reordering one’s problematic frame of reference to accommodate new experiences (Mezirow, 2000, 23–4). While Mezirow’s theory often focuses on internal actions, such as altering attitudes or worldviews, it can certainly be extended out to encompass Freire’s (2000, 126) notion of critical praxis as well, which he defines as ‘reflection and action directed at the structures to be transformed’. Through critical reflection and action, individuals can transform themselves, or even the world around them. In my own courses, my goal is to indeed encourage transformative learning. The reason I place so much emphasis on the discussion forums is because I want to create the kind of environment where students can examine their own frames of reference. I cannot change anyone’s frame of reference, nor would I want to, because that would not be true learning, but I can provide a safe place that welcomes and encourages the critical discourse and reflection that Mezirow says leads to transformative learning. One unit I created for PLS 220 that provided a compelling illustration of Mezirow’s theories was on digital gaming. Initially many students were vocally opposed to digital gaming, arguing that it was nothing but a harmful, destructive waste of time for children and adults alike. On the other hand, a smaller but equally vocal group of self-described ‘gamers’ were very positive about games and argued that criticism of gaming was just media hype. We read and discussed research highlighting both problematic and beneficial aspects of popular and educational digital gaming. We also did a group project exploring various types of ‘social impact’ games, which are games that try to influence behaviour or attitudes. The group project in particular gave the students further opportunity to share their own gaming experiences and reactions to course texts, and it challenged them to look at the context and agendas of some games. At the end of the unit they did a personal reflection assignment where they displayed more nuanced views of digital games than they had initially. This demonstrated how students had assimilated what they learned from our texts, discussions and the experiences of colleagues into their own frames of reference. There is a great deal of potential for transformative learning in libraries as well. For instance, one topic I frequently cover in instruction that occasionally causes anxiety among students (and even some faculty) is a discussion of authority. I use examples from the group’s topics to search Google. We explore the type of results and compare them to what we found in library databases to see the strengths and weaknesses of each tool. Occasionally students express genuine discomfort because they have always been told that

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 88

88

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

the best sources come from the library rather than commercial search engines and they worry that they no longer have a concrete rule to follow. My questions and examples challenge students because they do not fit into their existing frames of reference. I cannot know whether this simple discussion has encouraged any real transformative learning, but I can say that in my own courses I see more varied and nuanced internet sources in assignments than I did before I incorporated this discussion.

Challenges and next steps In this chapter, I have attempted to use my own practice as an example, but this means I also need to discuss where my own practice falls short or where I would like it to go in the future. Much of adult learning theory suggests that teachers should be facilitators and allow students to direct their own learning, but as any anyone involved in teaching will attest, it takes courage to give up control. Most teachers are evaluated in some way, and to let go of your authority can feel like you are letting go of your control over your performance. While I have had great success when I do give up control, I am not immune from the anxiety this can create. I find it easier to do in my own courses, where I have more time to develop relationships and address topics. Library instruction and reference, though, are brief, and students have different expectations about what they will gain from those interactions. In these encounters, I continue to push myself to encourage critical discourse and reflection from students and to incorporate exercises that allow them to come to their own conclusions and to ensure that I am listening to their own needs and experiences rather than just pushing my information to them. I also have plans to incorporate more activities into my courses that are explicitly social-justice oriented. Roosevelt actively encourages such activities, and while we do have discussions in my courses about larger social influences and how we might impact on them, I have not previously charged the students to go out and take some kind of action. One project I am particularly excited to try in PLS 220 will go in our unit on identify theft. I plan to have students use some social media tools to collect quality resources and share information with their social networks about identity theft and how to protect oneself. This will give me the chance not only to address research and source evaluation but also to get my students thinking about issues such as the complexities of information on social media, and how their voice can impact on a conversation. I hope tweaks like these will help my courses better fit in with the University and programme missions as well as encourage transformative learning and critical enquiry in my students.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 89

LAU-BOND SOCIAL JUSTICE, ADULT LEARNING AND CRITICAL LITERACY

89

Conclusion So, should all university librarians interested in critical literacy be familiar with adult learning theory? I would enthusiastically argue ‘yes’. Even if your entire population is traditional-age students, they may still be facing adult challenges such as the demands of children, full-time jobs or other circumstances that impact on their learning. If not, they will be in a transition period between childhood and adulthood, and you certainly want them to develop the type of learning that will serve them well in the next stages of their lives. Moreover, adult learning theory is largely concerned with helping students to become lifelong learners capable of critical reflection and discourse. Ideas such as Knowles’s alternative to the ‘banking’ model (Freire, 2000) of education; McClusky’s conceptualization of power and load; and Mezirow’s emphasis on critical reflection are all complementary to critical literacy theories and offer insights that librarians can use to develop students’ critical skills and further their understanding of social justice issues.

Acknowledgements I must acknowledge Dr Amanda Putnam at Roosevelt University for the pivotal role she played in my ideas about adult learning. The initial design for my PLS 201 and 202 was based on her courses. She generously shared assignments and structure with me when I started teaching, and she inspired my initial interest in adult learning theory. I also want to thank Dr D. Bradford Hunt, the former Dean of the Evelyn T. Stone College of Professional Studies at Roosevelt University, for providing me with information about the demographics of the Flex-Track Program.

References Freire, P. (2000) Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Continuum. Gross, T. L. (2005) The Rise of Roosevelt University: presidential reflections, Southern Illinois University Press. Knowles, M. S. (1980) The Modern Practice of Adult Education: from pedagogy to andragogy, Association Press. Knowles, M. S. (1990) The Adult Learner: a neglected species, Gulf Publishing Co. McClusky, H. (1970) An Approach to a Differential Psychology of the Adult Potential. In Grabowski, S. (ed.), Adult Learning and Instruction, Adult Education Association of the USA. McClusky, H. (1971) Education: background issues, http://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED057335. Mezirow, J. (1990) Fostering Critical Reflection in Adulthood: a guide to transformative and emancipatory learning, Jossey-Bass Publishers.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 90

90

PART 1 THEORIES OF CRITICAL LITERACY

Mezirow, J. (2000) Learning as Transformation: critical perspectives on a theory in progress, Jossey-Bass Publishers. NCES (National Center for Education Statistics) (n.d.) Fast Facts: adult learning, https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=89. NCES (National Center for Education Statistics) (2015) Digest of Education Statistics, 2014, http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d14/tables/dt14_303.50.asp. National Research and Development Centre for Adult Literacy and Numeracy (2010) Study on European Terminology in Adult Learning for a Common Language and Common Understanding and Monitoring of the Sector, www.anc.edu.ro/uploads/images/Legislatie/adultreport_en.pdf. Roosevelt University (2014a) Adult Learners, www.roosevelt.edu/Admission/Adult.aspx. Roosevelt University (2014b) Why Social Justice? www.roosevelt.edu/About/SocialJustice.aspx. Roosevelt University (2014c) Roosevelt Enrollment at a Glance, www.roosevelt.edu/IR/QuickFacts.aspx.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 91

PAR T 2

Critical literacy in practice

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 92

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 93

CHAPTER 8

A picture is worth a thousand words: teaching media literacy

Michael Cherry

Introduction Morrell (2008, 6) argues that ‘no population requires critical literacy more than today’s urban youth’ and, in particular, those young people who find themselves disadvantaged and with limited educational opportunities. Similarly, when considering the role of critical literacy in the school-to-prison pipeline among young Latino males, Garcia (2013, 8) claims that ‘The attainment of positive schooling experiences and empowering critical literacy skills for young Latino males can be one way to stop incarceration, decrease recidivism, and keep these youth on track to a successful future.’ She therefore considers that ‘it is imperative that the most disenfranchised youth, such as those who become a part of the school-to-prison pipeline or juvenile justice system, have access to quality, critical literacy educational experiences’. A number of researchers have examined the role of critical literacy within the criminal justice system. In New York City, Vasudevan (2009) explored how adults and adolescents at the Alternative to Incarceration Program engaged in expressive multimodal literacy practices involving texting, social networking and photo/video sharing. In the UK, Sheridan (2006) proposed a Freirean approach to critical literacy for women prisoners within the Scottish Prison Service. In addition to achieving basic skills and meeting key performance targets in relation to prisoner literacy levels, she argues, such an approach could lead to the empowerment of women prisoners, beginning with personal empowerment and ending in collective empowerment. For those who find themselves alienated, or even excluded, from the traditional school system, public libraries present a vital opportunity to develop ‘literacy for life’, not simply ‘literacy in the service of school’ (Lunsford, 2009, 396). In the UK for example, The Reading Agency (2008) produced a booklet of Ideas to Inspire People in Prisons and Young Offender

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 94

94

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Institutions. However, although both public libraries and, of course, prison libraries have often played an important role in supporting the development of basic literacy skills amongst offenders and those at risk of offending, this has usually been focused on what Morrell (2008, 3) describes as ‘a narrowly defined and conceived dominant literacy agenda’. The case study presented in this article attempts to address this imbalance by describing a public library-based programme focused on fostering critical literacy skills amongst at-risk teenagers.

Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library and the Youth Care Center The Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library (EVPL), a ‘star’ ranked library, provides a variety of resources and services to its community through its eight facilities. Its mission is to create experiences, opportunities and an atmosphere for lifelong learning. The EVPL serves over 180,000 residents of Vanderburgh County, a south-western Indiana county in the United States covering 233 square miles. It is the largest metropolitan area within a 100-mile radius. Adjacent to the EVPL’s Central Library is a juvenile detention centre for boys and girls between the ages of 12 and 17. The Youth Care Center (YCC) provides assistance to incarcerated youth in Vanderburgh County and the surrounding counties. In addition to serving as a correctional facility, the YCC administers programmes and services committed to educating at-risk teenagers. This chapter describes a partnership between the EVPL and the YCC. It highlights a programme called Media Sensationalism and Youth, which is designed to teach incarcerated teenagers literacy skills beyond traditional reading and writing. The programme encourages teenagers to understand and create media, in addition to framing literacy within a broader context that includes images, advertisements and different types of visual culture. The Media Sensationalism and Youth programme described below incorporates various resources that can be used to implement a media literacy programme. These resources include activities such as analysing covers from the satirical Mad Magazine; deconstructing gossip tabloids; and learning how the satirical television show The Daily Show with Jon Stewart uses video montage as a tool for media literacy education. The programme aims to provide a more comprehensive understanding of information literacy, while redefining the roles of information specialists. In doing so, it empowers library staff by providing them with the tools to teach literacy within a broader framework that includes digital, media and critical literacies.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 95

CHERRY A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS: TEACHING MEDIA LITERACY

95

Understanding media literacy The Center for Media Literacy (CML) is an organization devoted to advancing 21st-century literacy skills. It is one of the leading advocates for media literacy in the United States today and helps to develop critical thinking skills that are necessary to understanding 21st-century media. CML argues that the ability to communicate competently today requires an understanding of the images, words and sounds that make up contemporary media culture. This pedagogical framework includes accessing, analysing, evaluating and creating media, in addition to making informed decisions about media content. The CML website supplies educators with literacy kits that provide a basic framework for teaching media literacy in the classroom. This includes a collection of resources and curricula that can be used to explore the core concepts of media literacy mentioned above. CML (n.d.) also provides a useful guide to the ‘Five Core Concepts’ that might emerge from media literacy education. These are remarkably similar to what many would regard as key concepts of critical literacy (McNicol, 2015). CML suggests that students who are media literate will be able to recognize that: • all media messages are ‘constructed’ • media messages are constructed using a creative language with its own rules • different people experience the same media message differently • media have embedded values and points of view • most media messages are organized to gain profit and/or power. CML is not the only body supporting educators in this area. Organizations such as the National Association for Media Literacy Education;1 the Critical Media Project2 and the Learning About Multimedia Project (LAMP)3 provide similar resources for implementing media literacy programmes. In addition, books like Renee Hobbs’s (2011) Digital and Media Literacy: connecting culture and classroom and Heidi Hayes Jacobs’ (2014) Mastering Media Literacy are excellent starting points for librarians interested in this type of literacy. Many of these books contain activities that can be implemented in a library programme or classroom. Recently, the Young Adult Library Services Association (2014), a division of the American Library Association, drew attention to media literacy and critical literacy in its white paper The Future of Library Services for and with Teens: a call to action. A large portion of this paper documented the increasing use of technology by today’s teenagers and what the Association describes as a paradigm shift for libraries and teen services. This shift ultimately changes the way librarians need to teach and understand literacy. The authors write: ‘This more fluid understanding of literacy has meant that librarians’ work with

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 96

96

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

teens now falls under a larger umbrella of multiple literacies, which encompasses information literacies, critical literacies, digital literacies, media literacies, and much more’ (Young Adult Library Services Association, 2014, 6).

The Media Sensationalism and Youth programme Youth librarians at the EVPL chose to partner with the YCC with the understanding that at-risk teenagers can be even more susceptible to media messages than many of their peers. The majority of teenagers housed at the Center are there for crime-related incidents such as assault or theft, while others have a high rate of truancy or come from hostile and dysfunctional families. In most cases, the teenagers are not performing well within public school classrooms. These environments tend to reinforce traditional reading and writing skills, alongside standardized testing and a time-honoured curriculum. Although these traditional literacy skills are necessary, it is also necessary that we teach teenagers life skills in the form of media literacy and critical literacy education. These are skills that can influence how students think about technology and media culture. Students were selected to participate in the programme based on their behaviour at the Center. At-risk teenagers who maintain good behaviour are rewarded with opportunities such as participation in community programmes. This selection process had the added advantage of keeping the class sizes small and more focused, since only teenagers in good standing could participate. The average class size for girls consisted of six students, whereas the boys’ unit averaged eight teenagers.

Introduction to ‘yellow journalism’ Librarians began the programme with an analysis of media sensationalism throughout history. While we may attribute sensationalism to the editorial bias of today’s mass media, it has its roots in the so-called ‘yellow journalism’ of the 19th century. According to author Daniel Cohen (2000), one of the first and gaudiest examples of sensational news was published by the New York Sun in 1835. Known as ‘The Great Moon Hoax’, this was a series of articles published by the Sun which claimed to have discovered life on the moon. The articles described all kinds of beings, including unicorns, bat people and other oddities. They were accompanied by lithographs that portrayed creatures swimming in rivers and flying among mountains (Goodman, 2008). The librarians used the lithographs and the story of ‘The Great Moon Hoax’ as a starting point to discuss sensationalism in the media. Teenagers at the YCC were asked questions such as: ‘Why do you think the Sun published these stories even though the articles were fabricated?’; ‘Do you think that all news

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 97

CHERRY A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS: TEACHING MEDIA LITERACY

97

information is true?’; ‘How do you decide what news is true and what news is false?’. These questions generated discussion about the accuracy of the news media. Students were quick to identify the economics behind news journalism, understanding that what shocks is what sells, or makes a profit. Others commented on the alien hysteria common in today’s supermarket tabloids. After some initial discussion about the Sun, students were presented with fake tabloids that documented a short history of the modern tabloid. The tabloids were created by programme staff and consisted of images and text on large sheets of poster board. They were presented to the teenagers as a timeline composed of historical events that have shaped our understanding of modern journalism. For example, teenagers learned how the Penny Press made tabloid journalism cheap, while focusing on scandalous stories. In addition, we discussed the rise of yellow journalism and the rivalry between Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst (see Biressi and Nunn, 2008; Campbell, 2003; Cohen, 2000; Sloan, 2001). Students discovered how yellow journalism relied on bold headlines; hype and hyperbole; and aggressive newsgathering tactics. Discussing terms such as sensationalism, hyperbole and yellow journalism helped to strengthen students’ vocabulary skills as well as their understanding of journalism history. Each example illustrated how visual elements such as bold layouts, colour and illustrations contributed to the overall evolution of the modern tabloid. The modern examples, such as the National Enquirer and Weekly World News, included more carefully arranged symbols and images relating to the overall text. Headlines involving paranormal creatures such as the Loch Ness monster, vampires, and Bat Boy were chosen as a way to connect ‘The Great Moon Hoax’ to today’s tabloids. Connecting to popular culture in this way helped to support the interests of teenagers and create meaningful dialogue in the classroom.

‘Ripped from the headlines’ Following this brief history lesson, teenagers were asked to identify headlines from various magazines and tabloids. They were reminded of their earlier responses concerning the truth and validity of news sources. The headlines were cut out from their original covers and enlarged in black and white format. They included news journals such as Time and Newsweek, next to tabloids like the National Enquirer and Weekly World News. The various headlines read as follows: • The Decline and Fall of Europe (And Maybe the West) • Apocalypse Now

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 98

98

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

• • • • • • • • • • •

This Baby Could Live to be 142 Years Old The Decade from Hell Giant Bats Attack Planes Is This the End? Moon Drifting Toward Earth Attack of the Droids Beach Party Terror 118 Days in Hell Men in Black Suits are Hiding in Plain Sight Desperately Seeking Cures Global Warming is a Hoax.

As teenagers gathered around the table, they were asked to identify and separate the tabloid headlines from the news journals. One pile would represent titles regarded as legitimate news sources, while the other pile would represent tabloid sensationalism and hype. The teenagers quickly realized that it was nearly impossible to identify the Time and Newsweek covers from their tabloid counterparts. Headlines such as ‘Desperately Seeking Cures’, ‘118 Days in Hell’ and ‘This Baby Could Live to be 142 Years Old’ are actually taken from the covers of news journals.4 Time magazine’s 3 April 2006 special issue on global warming states: ‘Be Worried. Be Very Worried’. It includes an image of a lone polar bear adrift on a sheet of ice. The caption below the headline reads: ‘Earth at the Tipping Point. How it Threatens Your Health. How China and India Can Help Save the World – Or Destroy It’. In other examples, the use of sensationalism is even more evident. The 22 August 2011 issue of Time reads, ‘The Decline and Fall of Europe (And Maybe the West)’, as if to suggest that the economic crisis in parts of Europe will result in the entire continent’s devastation, in addition to that of the United States. The 8 March and 4 April 2011 double issue of Newsweek provokes the same collective fear through its use of hyperbole. The cover reads ‘Apocalypse Now: Tsunamis. Earthquakes. Nuclear Meltdowns. Revolutions. Economies on the Brink. What the #@%! Is Next?’. Based on these examples, it is clear that tabloid journalism and American weekly news magazines both rely on the same type of media hype. When the magazine covers were finally revealed, students were able to identify the sources of the headlines. They could see how the placement of bold, sensational headlines relied on similar techniques in both the tabloids and news journals. In response to the headline ‘Global Warming is a Hoax’5 one student identified how news media have competing opinions about the issue of climate change. Other students compared the use of bold headlines to billboard advertisements, pointing out how companies use similar tactics to sell commercial products. This analysis of news journals and tabloids became the basis for our next activity.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 99

CHERRY A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS: TEACHING MEDIA LITERACY

99

Representing power and gender in the media In the book Mastering Media Literacy (Hayes Jacobs, 2014, 5), Frank W. Baker states, ‘As a media literacy educator, I maintain that while our students may be media savvy, most are not media literate’. The contemporary view of young adults is that they are tech-savvy learners, capable of mastering media skills on their own and sharing this knowledge with their peers. Ethnographic studies such as Mizuko Ito’s (2010) Hanging Out, Messing Around, and Geeking Out: kids living and learning with new media do much to support this view of today’s youth. However, in order to think critically about media, students need to be able to understand it within a broader cultural context. Understanding the behaviours and learning habits of teenagers helps to document their use of media, but it does not provide a framework for teaching critical media literacy. To strengthen at-risk teenagers’ media and critical literacy skills, youth librarians at the EVPL implemented an activity described in Baker’s (2012) book, Media Literacy in the K-12 Classroom. In the chapter entitled ‘Visual Literacy’ Baker describes the use of magazine covers as symbolic representations. Using several magazine covers of President Barack Obama, the author suggests asking students to deconstruct the covers and explain their symbolism. Baker also uses the example of basketball player LeBron James, pointing out that the James cover for Sports Illustrated has a different intended audience than the one for GQ magazine. Elsewhere, he has described this activity using actress Jennifer Lawrence of The Hunger Games fame (Hayes Jacobs, 2014). This is a fun activity that can be implemented using a wide variety of politicians, sports figures and celebrities. In our programme at the YCC, students were given magazine covers depicting President Obama, based on the activity in Baker’s book. The magazines included Time, Mad Magazine, Rolling Stone and others. The students were asked to compare and contrast the covers based on their intended message. We discussed the idea of political spin as it relates to the various images of President Obama. For example, students were first shown the October 2013 Mad Magazine cover depicting Obama as an espionage spy. This was the magazine’s special ‘war on privacy’ issue that followed the release of surveillance data by former CIA contractor Edward Snowden. Artist Mark Fredrickson chose to represent the president in a trench coat and hat, classic symbols that represent the police detective or special agent. Additionally, Obama is flanked by black and white spies from the Mad comic strip ‘Spy vs. Spy’. The use of caricature makes the president appear villainous and evil. This depiction contrasts sharply with the now famous 20 March 2008 Rolling Stone cover depicting Obama as ‘A New Hope’. Here the president stands confident, as opposed to cunning. The white aura surrounding his body makes him appear angelic, in contrast to the devilish

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 100

100

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

grin on the Mad cover. The same kind of white aura and confidence was used to represent him on the 10 December 2007 issue of Time magazine. The president elect stands with his arms crossed as he looks confidently towards the future. The cover reads in bold, red letters, ‘The Contender’. Our discussion centred on the use of camera angles to represent Obama as strong and confident. Altogether the students analysed about a dozen magazine covers representing the president. This included caricatures common to magazines like Mad and Mother Jones, as well as weekly news journals like Newsweek and Time. The many images of President Obama demonstrated to the students how political spin carries multiple meanings and forms of representation. In these examples, the meaning remains unclear as ambivalent forms of representation compete for the viewer’s attention. In response to the magazine covers, students were able to identify other types of media where President Obama is depicted. They discussed how the president’s image is used on Tshirts, posters and other types of visual culture. In addition, several teenagers argued that the president also controls his own image, for example, through televised events. This discussion demonstrated how students understood the concept of political spin across various media. In an another activity, teenagers in the girls’ unit were presented with gossip tabloids such as Us Weekly and People that often display gender codes associated with female identity. Youth librarians displayed Us Weekly magazine covers next to People magazine covers and asked the girls to identify common themes between the two. Teenagers were asked several questions, including: ‘What kinds of topics are the publishers marketing to females?’; ‘Do you think these topics influence readers’ lifestyle choices?’; and ‘Do you believe these are the only topics that can be marketed to females?’. From nearly forty magazine covers, students were able to identify several common themes, including weddings/relationships, body image and pregnancy. All the headlines were displayed in the yellow font common to these tabloids and every single headline was marked with an exclamation point. The discussion that followed centred on how gender codes influence the way society views female identity. For example, a student remarked on the pervasiveness of the tabloid headlines. She had not realized how magazines bombarded women with themes concerning relationships, pregnancy and body image until the magazine covers were viewed as a group. She now appreciated how these types of gender codes dominate gossip tabloids and target female readers, potentially influencing the way women construct and perceive their identities. This is a critical issue for teenagers, as studies show that many young women struggle with issues related to appearance, sexuality and pregnancy (Hoffman and Maynard, 2008; Signorielli, 1997; Solomon-Fears, 2015; Van Vonderen and Kinnally, 2012).

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 101

CHERRY A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS: TEACHING MEDIA LITERACY

101

Humour as media analysis In their book Practices of Looking: an introduction to visual culture, Marita Sturken and Lisa Cartwright argue that we make meaning of the world through our abilities to understand images and the underlying ideologies they represent. The authors write: ‘Language and systems of representation do not reflect an already existing reality so much as they organize, construct, and mediate our understanding of reality, emotion, and imagination’ (Sturken and Cartwright, 2001, 13). All the previous classroom activities had consisted of teenagers analysing and deconstructing print formats as they engaged in a critical understanding of gender construction, symbolic representations and the history of media sensationalism. However, the last exercise they were shown included a video montage from media critic and comedian Jon Stewart. The video, entitled ‘Jon Stewart’s Media Sensationalism Montage at the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear’, compiles short video clips from various media outlets such as CNN and Fox (Comedy Central, 2010). The video was first screened at the 2010 Washington, DC rally of the same name. The clips are edited into a sequence that demonstrates the tactics news organizations employ to manipulate public opinion. In addition to editorial bias, the video montage demonstrates how news organizations act to perpetuate fear through their use of media. After watching the video montage, students were asked to identify similarities between the video and the Newsweek and Time covers they had studied earlier. Teenagers identified natural disasters, apocalyptic events and the threat of outbreak as several themes common to both the print resources and video. Others pointed out how often the media stresses terrorism in addition to these themes. They commented on the regularity of these themes, much like the girls’ unit had noticed the consistency of gendered messages in gossip tabloids. One of the more interesting tactics we discussed is how written text, such as a headline, is expressed in auditory form. Political pundits like Keith Olbermann and Ed Schultz project their voices in order to control political debates. This is similar to the loud crosstalk common in satirical shows such as Real Time with Bill Maher. The continuous use of high-sounding rhetoric resembles the urgency and blare of a headline. This kind of rhetoric attempts to sway public opinion through loud, excessive statements, rather than through the accuracy of those statements.

Making media Media literacy educator Renee Hobbs identifies composing messages with multimedia tools as one of the key ways teenagers can gain media literacy skills (Young Adult Library Services Association, 2014). The Media

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 102

102

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Sensationalism and Youth programme at the YCC therefore culminated in a technology project using the software Comic Life. While the primary purpose of Comic Life is to create comic-book pages, the design tool has several other applications. The software allows users to drag and drop images into templates that resemble comic-book pages. It is designed with fonts, panels, captions and lettering art that enable users to create digital works of art. There is also a filtering option that can be applied to digital images or photos for various effects. Students at the YCC were tasked with the project of creating a digital tabloid. The main feature of the tabloid was a headline and cover parodying celebrity gossip, sports or other news topics. Students could add further pages to their tabloid if they wished. The creation of the tabloid enabled students to reflect on how media messages are constructed. Their previous analysis of magazine covers allowed them to understand how visual codes inform one’s understanding of the news. Students’ own work would need to address these codes when they considered the cover art, design and layout of their tabloid. Moreover, students were asked to think critically about how visual information would be conveyed in their work, from the use of fonts to the placement of text. Furthermore, teenagers were encouraged to parody and ‘remix’ titles of magazines. This idea was partially inspired by the activist organization Adbusters Media Foundation and the artist group TrustOCorp. These (often anti-capitalist) groups are known for their rebranding of corporate culture in the form of street signs, products and other consumer labels. In one series of works, TrustOCorp parodied gossip tabloids like People, Us Weekly, and OK!, transforming the titles into Shallow People, God Help Us, and We’re Not O.K. The magazine covers took aim at celebrity pop culture, playfully imitating the same textual strategies as used in the tabloids. The students’ examples mirrored the techniques used by these groups. For example, one student remixed the title of The Daily Sun to read The Daily Slant. The students were encouraged to create dramatic headlines and make use of images. The digital images included celebrities, paranormal creatures, sports icons and other examples of popular culture. Students dragged and dropped the digital files into their tabloid templates and then filtered them for special effects.

Conclusions Multiple forms of literacy are required to meet the challenges brought about by today’s media. If information professionals are to remain relevant and have an impact on their communities, they will need to expand how they teach and understand literacy so as to take account of media and critical literacies. Media literacy education provides a solid pedagogical framework for teaching students about information. But, whereas past efforts have focused

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 103

CHERRY A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS: TEACHING MEDIA LITERACY

103

largely on accessing and retrieving information, future efforts should include teaching skills that encourage a critical understanding of it. The media literacy activities at the YCC were designed to teach literacy skills beyond traditional reading and writing to incarcerated youth. These critical life skills have the potential to make young people better decision makers and, ultimately, more literate citizens. They empower teenagers with the ability to reflect on information and make important decisions about what influences them. In conclusion, today’s librarians are faced with the task of teaching and understanding literacy in a way that promotes 21st-century learning. This means that they will have to define literacy as a critical textual practice that encompasses not only words but also other types of visual culture. This will open a new chapter on literacy, empowering young people to make choices about media and the stories that impact on their lives.

Notes 1 2 3 4

5

http://namle.net/ www.criticalmediaproject.org/ http://thelamp.org/ ‘Desperately Seeking Cures’– Newsweek, 24 and 31 May 2010 (double issue); ‘118 Days in Hell’– Newsweek, 30 November 2009; and ‘This Baby Could Live to be 142 Years Old’– Time, 23 February 2015. ‘Global Warming is a Hoax.*’– Newsweek, 13 August 2007.

References Baker, F. W. (2012) Media Literacy in the K-12 Classroom, International Society for Technology in Education. Biressi, A. and Nunn, H. (2008) The Tabloid Culture Reader, Open University Press. Campbell, W. J. (2003) Yellow Journalism: puncturing the myths, defining the legacies, Praeger. CML (Center for Media Literacy) (n.d.) Five Key Questions Form Foundation for Media Inquiry, www.medialit.org/reading-room/five-key-questions-form-foundationmedia-inquiry. Cohen, D. (2000) Yellow Journalism: scandal, sensationalism, and gossip in the media, Twenty-First Century Books. Comedy Central (2010) Jon Stewart’s Video Montage at the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KgrYWn7ALM. Garcia, V. (2013) The Role of Critical Literacy and the School-to-prison Pipeline: what was learned from the life histories and literacy experiences of formerly incarcerated young Latino males, http://digitallibrary.usc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/p15799coll3/id/288638.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 104

104

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Goodman, M. (2008) The Sun and The Moon: the remarkable true account of hoaxers, showmen, dueling journalists, and lunar man-bats in nineteenth-century New York, Basic Books. Hayes Jacobs, H. (2014) Mastering Media Literacy, Contemporary Perspectives on Literacy, Solution Tree Press. Hobbs, R. (2011) Digital and Media Literacy: connecting culture and classroom, Corwin: A Sage Company. Hoffman, S. and Maynard, R. (2008) Kids Having Kids: economic costs and social consequences of teen pregnancy, Urban Institute Press. Ito, M. (2010) Hanging Out, Messing Around, and Geeking Out: kids living and learning with new media, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Series on Digital Media and Learning, MIT Press. Lunsford, A. (2009) Literacy for Life, English Education, 41 (4), 396–7. McNicol, S. (2015) The Role of Critical Literacy in Libraries, ALISS Quarterly, 10 (2), 12–15. Morrell, E. (2008) Critical Literacy and Urban Youth: pedagogies of access, dissent, and liberation, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc. Sheridan, L. (2006) Not Just Doing Time, Adults Learning, 17 (9), 18–19. Signorielli, N. (1997) Reflections of Girls in the Media: a content analysis. A study of television shows and commercials, movies, music videos, and teen magazine articles and ads, The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED444213.pdf. Sloan, B. (2001) I Watched a Wild Hog Eat My Baby!: a colorful history of tabloids and their cultural impact, Prometheus Books. Solomon-Fears, C. (2015) Teenage Pregnancy Prevention: statistics and programs, Congressional Research Service, https://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RS20301.pdf. Sturken, M. and Cartwright, L. (2001) Practices of Looking: an introduction to visual culture, Oxford University Press. The Reading Agency (2008) Ideas to Inspire People in Prisons and Young Offender Institutions, http://readingagency.org.uk/adults/Final%20Ideas%20to%20inspire%20people% 20in%20prisons%20and%20YOIs.pdf. Van Vonderen, K. E. and Kinnally, W. (2012) Media Effects on Body Image: examining media exposure in the broader context of internal and other social factors, American Communication Journal, 14 (2), 41–57. Vasudevan, L. (2009) Performing New Geographies of Literacy Teaching and Learning, English Education, 41 (4), 356–74. Young Adult Library Services Association (2014) The Future of Library Services for and with Teens: a call to action, www.ala.org/yaforum/sites/ala.org.yaforum/files/ content/YALSA_nationalforum_final.pdf.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 105

CHAPTER 9

Curricular and extra-curricular opportunities to engage school students in critical literacy in England Rebecca Jones

Introduction Ensuring that pupils are provided with opportunities to engage in authentic tasks that require them to develop their information literacy skills is a key issue for the school librarian. However, many information-literacy models currently available (e.g. Big61 and PLUS2) tend to emphasize the process skills of searching, locating and retrieving relevant information rather than requiring users to challenge or question the underlying ideology of the information itself by ‘reading texts in an active, reflective manner in order to better understand power, inequality, and injustice in human relationships’(Coffey, 2015). This chapter identifies opportunities to engage school students in critical literacy that take place either within the curriculum or as extra-curricular activities. In schools in England the school librarian’s input into teaching and learning can be variable and depends on the ethos of the institution and the strength of staff working relationships. Those librarians who are able to collaborate with teaching staff to design lessons and projects can have direct input into the range of skills that are included in the learning process. In other cases, however, pupils’ use of the information that they find during a research lesson or for homework can predominantly lie in the domain of the teacher, which means that it can be challenging for the librarian to work with pupils outside of locating and recording information. In England, the majority of state-funded schools follow a national curriculum which, in its current version, is widely viewed as placing greater emphasis on the acquisition and application of knowledge and concepts than on the skills of critiquing the underpinning values and power structures and socially constructed concepts. While within the national curriculum pupils interact with a range of texts including course textbooks, selected additional

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 106

106

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

reading from both traditional and online sources and material that they locate themselves, the emphasis on knowledge building within subjects means that the use of textbooks and worksheets is often seen as the most effective way of delivering the curriculum in a reliable and consistent manner (Oates, 2015, 6). In relation to using sources, the emphasis in the classroom is usually on the first step in the critical-literacy process, that of identifying bias, but seldom extends to questioning the assumptions made by the texts themselves. An example of this approach is evident in the English syllabus, where pupils need to critically evaluate texts and undertake persuasive writing in order to support a point of view (Department for Education, 2014a, KS4 reading). The history curriculum is another subject that requires teachers to ‘equip pupils to ask perceptive questions, think critically, weigh evidence, sift arguments, and develop perspective and judgement’ (Department for Education, 2014b, 34). One area where lessons can also offer opportunities for pupils to encounter and engage with bias in relation to social justice issues is PSHE (personal, social, health and economic education) and citizenship (Department for Education, 2013). For example, the full citizenship syllabus encourages critical thinking and the planning of citizen action into specific, pupil-defined areas of concern. As part of the course pupils must ‘plan practical citizenship actions aimed at delivering a benefit or change for others in society’ (Department for Education, 2015). However, while the purpose of this coursework is for pupils to plan how to instigate change, this could result in actions that are designed to work within the current system rather than challenging the structures that have created the inequality.

Background to the case studies The examples in this chapter include activities within the curriculum, namely a communications and culture course and a project qualification course, and extra-curricular activities such as mock elections and academic suppers. They are activities that take place at Malvern St James School, Worcestershire, England, a leading girls’ boarding and day school for pupils aged from 4 years in Reception to 18 years in Year 13. Aspiration, achievement and rigour lie at the heart of the school, which encourages girls to explore and discover their individual academic and extra-curricular talents. The library is a wellresourced facility that aims to encourage curiosity and a passion for independent thought and discovery. The librarian has head-of-subject status and can support and suggest initiatives to expand pupils’ skills and experiences. Liaison with all subjects is central to this approach, which allows for collaboration within lessons, alongside the recreational services that are also provided.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 107

JONES CURRICULAR AND EXTRA-CURRICULAR OPPORTUNITIES TO ENGAGE STUDENTS

107

Integrating critical literacy within the curriculum The following section provides two examples to demonstrate how critical literacy is an integral part within specified areas of the curriculum at Malvern St James, supported by the school librarian.

A level communications and culture AQA Communications and Culture (AQA, 2015a) is an example of an A level course3 that provides pupils with a structure within which to understand, and then critique, the underlying power constructions that underpin popular culture in modern Western society. The A2 course is concerned primarily with the application of critical perspectives that reveal the inequalities and power structures that support the Western liberal market economy. This course forms the second part of an A level qualification and provides a shift of emphasis from examining how personal identity is constructed to identifying and evaluating power structures and cultural practices. Students are provided with a set of key terms that enable them to describe and conceptualise how dominant ideology is communicated. Although direct action is not part of the syllabus, the experience of studying this course can result in greater engagement with issues surrounding the critical perspectives. This interest can then be expanded in the written case studies and media piece that each student creates. At Malvern St James, the written case studies have provided the girls with an opportunity to explore and understand the range of feminist positions such as radical feminism, third-wave feminism and post-feminist ideologies, and their responses to them. For some girls, this has led to a reassessment and also a new understanding of the messages that underpin the marketing of commodities that are directed towards them. One example is a class study of the ‘pinkification’ of products and the possible effects on girls of this positioning, including studying the choice of the language used to describe the items to the market and critiques of this approach as published in the popular press (e.g. Valenti, 2014). The case-study approach of the course encourages continuous research and the librarian’s role is very much to raise pupils’ awareness of current issues in the media and on social media as pupils work with real examples. In one lesson an article on builders who had been reported for harassing a young woman was presented. This led to discussions of fourth-wave feminism, viable actions for women, inherent sexism and freedom of choice. Discussions like these led to discovery of campaigns such as the online everyday sexism project (Bates, 2015) which pupils may then decide to engage with. The librarian’s role is, therefore, to facilitate evidence-based discussions to help individuals uncover the ideologies present within texts that encourage

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 108

108

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

wider research. To enable pupils to look outside their own experiences, they are presented with examples from Western culture, such as adverts, products, film clips or news stories that they are then invited to explore using different critical perspectives. The librarian works with the teacher and collates texts from a range of perspectives that link into different discourses that then need to be deconstructed. This process of analysis from diverse viewpoints encourages students to identify their own default position and then to consider alternative responses. It is an organic process that enables pupils to follow up the specific cultural aspects that they can relate to. The librarian also works with the students outside of the lesson through discussion on a more informal level of the ideas that they have encountered. For her choice of coursework topics in 2015, one student conducted an analysis of the American lingerie retailer Victoria’s Secret. She investigated how the brand promoted particular body shapes; implied ideals of Western female perfection; and controlled the sexuality of the female form through the use of celebrity endorsement. The creative coursework invites the student to take a critical standpoint and this student chose to challenge the validity of the assumptions that lie behind this particular dominant and idealized cultural message. Her piece invited the viewer to adopt a more critical perspective by looking beyond the mythological status that the catwalk shows have created and to engage with the messages that are being sent out about the status and perceptions of women. In terms of the student’s own critical standpoint, she had an opportunity to explore whether buying the underwear meant that she had succumbed to the image being sold by the show and that the construction of her identity was therefore simply a reflection of calculated advertising. Another pupil chose to unpick the negative responses that Emma Watson received after her high-profile speech to the UN for the He for She campaign (HeForShe, 2015). She used evidence gathered from media reports to understand why Emma’s message had provoked such negative, and even violent, responses. Her analysis resulted in the pupil challenging the link that was being made between a woman’s reputation and her credibility. A final example comes from a pupil who engaged with the online attacks that women face when using dating websites and apps. She used her information literacy skills to identify relevant information sources and then her critical literacy skills to uncover the underlying messages conveyed in the language, narratives and mode of address being used in the medium of the internet. Her conclusion was: Women need to take the responsibility of claiming technology as their own … They need to ... harness technology as a tool to broadcast the message of the true meaning of feminism. In the postmodern understanding, interpretation is everything.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 109

JONES CURRICULAR AND EXTRA-CURRICULAR OPPORTUNITIES TO ENGAGE STUDENTS

109

Her subsequent video piece was an appeal for women to claim the space created on the internet and use it to develop a strong voice. The message was her call for action. In this respect, the course does not simply identify bias but examines the binary oppositions created by texts and how they position the reader. Power structures are identified through the study of advertising, narrative and other spaces. In this way the subject provides pupils with real opportunities to question the constructs of their cultural backgrounds and society. The resulting actions of pupils demonstrate the impact of understanding the constructs of dominant ideology that is represented through the marketing of commodities and media representations.

Project qualifications Project qualifications (AQA, 2015b; Edexcel, 2015) also provide students with the opportunity to explore ideas that are outside of the standard curriculum. These qualifications promote the gathering of a range of texts and critical analysis of sources, in addition to placing a strong emphasis on the processes, actions and conclusions reached by the student. The artefact route also offers the student the opportunity to put their ideas into action, a key concept of critical literacy exemplified by Freire’s (1970) notion of praxis (see Chapter 1). For example, a student at Malvern St James organized a fund-raising and awareness-raising event for Ebola suffers as a direct result of her investigations. Her analysis of the political and economic situation in affected African countries inspired her to organize an exhibition displaying African cultural artefacts and a sale of African-produced items, with all proceedings being donated to an Ebola charity. Her mission was twofold: to provoke others into action by presenting them with information about the African continent; and to provide them with the opportunity to donate money that would make a difference to people’s lives. The project had provided her with both the information-literacy skills to plan, undertake and evaluate her research and the critical skills to analyse and act on her findings to encourage action by others. In another example, a pupil used the project qualification to investigate the issue of immigration into the UK and to create a podcast. To gain a range of critical perspectives, she gathered her own primary evidence, including interviews from economic migrants, families who had settled in the UK three generations ago and a UKIP (UK Independence Party4) representative to discuss their policies. In the resulting documentary podcast she demonstrated an understanding of how to communicate using this medium whilst balancing the contrasting perspectives. Her creative piece provided her with an editorial voice that she used to convey her findings and to advocate for the social inclusion of immigrants. Her final action was, once again, personal, and resulted in her joining a political party.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 110

110

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

At Malvern St James, the librarian forms part of the teaching and supervision team and has overall responsibility for the management of the subject. In practice, this means direct involvement in the delivery of skills and support for individual projects. With a background in information literacy and research, the librarian is in an excellent position as the expert to teach these vital skills within the project qualification process. Working in a team means that a co-ordinated approach can be put in place and student-led actions for change, which are devised in response to their research, can be discussed, supported and guided.

Critical literacy in extra-curricular activities As well as working to support curriculum delivery, school librarians can create opportunities for pupils to engage with issues that are outside of the curriculum, during break-times and before or after school. The librarian may also collaborate with staff on events that take pupils off timetable during the school week and promote critical literacy. The examples below are from activities run by the librarian at Malvern St James School.

Independent Learning Challenge During the Independent Learning Challenge, all Year 9 pupils (13- to 14-yearolds) are taken off timetable for two days to create their own political party. Engaging young people in politics provides several benefits, including an understanding of the issues that form the basis of government and engagement with the ideologies that underpin different political parties. This process takes place within an environment that encourages the critique of policies based on real issues. According to Smith (2013), the political arena is a perfect opportunity for the development of such critical information-literacy skills and citizenship. In order to complete the task, each group has to engage with the politics of existing parties as a basis for understanding key social issues such as family, crime, education and health. The groups also have to respond to important international issues such as immigration. The task contains a competitive element that encourages participation and it is creative, as pupils are being asked to understand, evaluate and then challenge existing party policies. In order to decide on their standpoint, the teams have to better understand their own positions. In practice this has led to some heated discussions about key UK issues, including benefits eligibility, immigration and the extent of UK involvement within Europe. When considering the cost of child benefit, one team carried out research to discover the reality of life for young mothers. This led them to consider the responsibility the state has

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 111

JONES CURRICULAR AND EXTRA-CURRICULAR OPPORTUNITIES TO ENGAGE STUDENTS

111

to families and the cultural attitudes that might act as a barrier for young mothers to reach their potential. As a result, the team reconsidered their party’s decision to remove financial support with the aim of discouraging girls from having children at a young age, and to change their policies to emphasise the important role of education in creating the conditions that can motivate all young people to achieve. The exploration of social issues that are outside of their own experiences helps all the teams to understand the ideology behind actual political positions and policies. In addition, teaching staff are involved in monitoring the groups during the task. This provides an opportunity for discussion to take place on an informal level. Groups can discuss ideas with their teachers, and staff can suggest alternative perspectives for the teams to consider, such as the implications that policies might have for social cohesion, equality of opportunity and humanitarian issues. This results in pupils gaining a fuller understanding of the principles behind policies. The task also involves the teams in creating their own party-political broadcasts. This provides the opportunity to critique existing main party broadcasts. The teams reflect on the issues that have been chosen by the parties as a focus; the language used to create the narrative; and the mode of address. Pupils gain an awareness of persuasive messages and also how to analyse the ways in which they are being positioned as the audience.

Mock elections The 2015 general election in the UK was used as a basis to run mock elections. The format echoed the national election and provided an opportunity for pupils from both junior and senior schools to represent their chosen political party. Each party had to present its policies during hustings and by making its own party-political broadcast. The librarian worked with the pupil organizers and hosted the voting in the library on election day. Pupils’ reflections of their experience showed the level of involvement that they had in the process. The leader of the environmentally focused Green Party commented: Privatization has perhaps gone too far and we should be considering renationalizing important utilities e.g. railway, electricity, and gas so that there is a greater social motive in the interests of the people, rather than a profit-oriented motive.

The leader of the Monster Raving Loony Party, a party that effectively satirises British politics through its bizarre policies, summed up the impact of her experience:

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 112

112

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

It made me think really hard and question the system and, although there are areas which are unfair, I think that no system is perfect. I was talking about it for weeks after with my parents!

Comments from other students underlined the difference that taking part had made to them, for example: Taking part in the mock election has definitely given me a keener awareness of the way society is structured and the way it operates. I feel things are not necessarily fair in our political system.

One interesting result was that the candidate representing the Conservative Party subsequently decided to use her Personal Development Week to learn more about politics by volunteering at the local party office. For that pupil, her interest in social justice was translated in to action by experiencing how her local politicians represent their constituency at home and in Parliament.

Academic suppers Another initiative that has encouraged critical literacy is half-termly suppers where more able pupils are invited to take part in academic discussions based on a topic selected by the librarian. The dinners do not include the same pupils each time; different groupings are arranged according to interests or events. A special guest, for example a school governor, academic or industry leader, is invited and every pupil brings a source on the topic to share at the table. Topics are carefully selected to promote debate and to encourage pupils to explore the status quo and have included, ‘Who we are and who we want to be’ and ‘Can we trust science?’. The adults at the dinner work with pupils to explore ideas and concepts and often become involved in the discussions themselves. The librarian leads and guides the discussion by actively challenging pupils’ beliefs and standpoints. The range of ideas brought to the table, in combination with the variety of guests, means that a range of critical standpoints are aired. The conversations build up pupils’ critical thought processes and allow them to challenge dominant ideologies around faith, politics, science and cultural norms. Informal feedback indicates that most pupils find the experience stimulating and valuable. Some pupils extend their thinking during the evening, whilst others reflect on the ideas that have been raised after the dinner.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 113

JONES CURRICULAR AND EXTRA-CURRICULAR OPPORTUNITIES TO ENGAGE STUDENTS

113

Conclusion The examples provided in this chapter show a small snapshot of the types of opportunities and activities that can take place to enable secondary school pupils to develop critical literacy skills. They illustrate how school librarians can engage pupils by working with subject teachers to support the formal curriculum and also in the extended curriculum. The examples presented demonstrate that, in addition to encouraging personal reflection on their existing attitudes and assumptions, there is evidence to suggest that, by stimulation of the students’ thought processes, the students will be more willing and able to engage in positive action and social justice issues.

Notes 1 2 3 4

http://big6.com/pages/about/big6-skills-overview.php. http://farrer.csu.edu.au/PLUS/. A ‘Level 3’ course typically studied by 16- to 18-year-olds. A right-wing political party, highly critical of the UK’s current immigration policy.

References AQA (2015a) Communication and Culture, www.aqa.org.uk/subjects/communicationand-culture/a-level/communication-and-culture-2625. AQA (2015b) Projects, www.aqa.org.uk/subjects/projects. Bates, L. (2015) The Everyday Sexism Project, www.everydaysexism.com/index.php/about. Coffey, H. (2015) Critical Literacy, www.learnnc.org/lp/pages/4437. Department for Education (2013) Personal, Social, Health and Economic (PSHE) Education, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/personal-social-healthand-economic-education-pshe/personal-social-health-and-economic-psheeducation. Department for Education (2014a) National Curriculum in England: framework for key stages 1 to 4, https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/ 381754/SECONDARY_national_curriculum.pdf. Department for Education (2014b) The National Curriculum in England Key Stages 3 and 4 Framework Document, https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/ 381754/SECONDARY_national_curriculum.pdf. Department for Education (2015) Citizenship Studies GCSE Subject Content, https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/ 358272/Draft_Citizenship_Content.pdf. Edexcel (2015) Project Qualification,

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 114

114

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

https://www.edexcel.com/quals1/project/Pages/default.aspx. Freire, P. (1970) Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Herder and Herder. HeForShe (2015) Home – HeForShe, www.heforshe.org. Oates, T. (2015) Why Textbooks Count: a policy paper, Cambridge Assessment, www.cambridgeassessment.org.uk/images/181744-why-textbooks-count-timoates.pdf. Smith, L. (2013) Towards a Model of Critical Information Literacy Instruction for the Development of Political Agency, Journal of Information Literacy, 7 (2), 15–32. Valenti, J. (2014) Let’s End Pink-ification: must the ‘girls’ aisle be full of sexist toys and clothes?, Guardian, www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/aug/05/ girls-aisle-sexist-toys-clothes.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 115

CHAPTER 10

New media and critical literacy in secondary schools

Joel Crowley

Introduction New media, including Wikipedia and YouTube, has revolutionized how 11to 18-year-old students research and learn. This chapter will examine the relationship between students and the information they find on these sites and look at how they use this information. It begins with an exploration of the features of new media and their use among secondary school students. It then looks at how the principles of critical literacy can help students to use these new media resources more effectively and highlights the role that school librarians can play in helping students to develop as critical users of new media.

New media The term new media can be difficult to define. It is not sufficient to define it as media that has emerged more recently than other types. Such a focus would mean that what constitutes new media will continually change and that today’s new media is just tomorrow’s old media. Neither is it sufficient to focus on the form the information is in: whether it is text, video, sound or multimedia. One type is not defined as new media at the expense of another. Instead, it is necessary to look at how the information is created and what can happen to the information after creation. In this sense, old media is any medium, such as a book, journal article or static HTML web page, which has a private author(s). The information is created, published and then consumed. In comparison, new media has a different, and more dynamic, lifespan. A source can be created and published online by anyone and it can then be commented on, or edited, by any user in an open online community. In this way, the information can continue to evolve. This has been described as ‘the

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 116

116

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

back and forth nature of online communities’ (Jackson and Wallin, 2009, 375) and it is this interactivity that can be seen as a provocative challenge to the academic essay and other old media. It is this feature that sets new media apart from the old. New media is therefore characterized by dialogue, interactive user feedback and creative participation made possible by the growth of so-called Web 2.0 (O’Reilly, 2005). Both YouTube1 and Wikipedia2 have these characteristics. YouTube allows users to ‘collaborate and remix existing content using video responses, hyperlinks and written comments’ (Sampson, 2013, 279). It is easy for any user to upload a video, starting a possible dialogue with the rest of the online community. Similarly, Wikipedia allows users to edit and comment on existing content as well as to add new content. Both sites encourage users to not simply be consumers of information, as they would be with old media, but also to comment and create. There are other examples of new media such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Vine. However, this chapter will focus on Wikipedia and YouTube because of their widespread role in education and research. There are a number of examples of both sites being used in education. These include online-based organizations such as the Khan Academy,3 which utilizes YouTube’s ability to communicate information to a very large audience. There are also many examples of these sites being used in traditional educational settings such as schools and universities. These range from the use of YouTube in the teaching of Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus in an American high school (Thompson, 2010) to a Wikipedia-editing project in a graduate-level chemistry course at the University of Michigan (Moy et al., 2010).

New media, secondary school students and critical skills There have been many examples of research into student use of new media in universities. For example, Head and Eisenberg (2010) studied Wikipedia use amongst students in six US colleges and discovered widespread use of the site, with over half of respondents using it frequently for course-related research. Similarly, Fleck et al. (2014, 29–30) studied the use of YouTube amongst psychology students in an American university and found that 63.5% of respondents had prior experience of using YouTube for academic purposes and 80% agreed that multimedia on sites like YouTube was helpful for such purposes. Research into the use of new media by younger students is more limited. However, the research that has been carried out indicates that students below university age are similarly accustomed to using sites like Wikipedia and YouTube for information retrieval purposes in an educational context. A 2015 survey of the use of social networking sites (SNSs) amongst young people

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 117

CROWLEY NEW MEDIA AND CRITICAL LITERACY IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS

117

(15–18 years old) in France, England, Thailand and Denmark showed that 55% of students regularly use SNSs (including YouTube) to seek information. This use extended to education. More than one quarter of respondents had used an SNS at the direction of a teacher. In addition, around one fifth of those surveyed had used such sites to find information for a project independently and to search for information related to educational and vocational guidance (McNicol and Aillerie, 2015). If it can be assumed that students are using YouTube and Wikipedia, the next question to ask is, how are they using them? As Dunaway (2011, 154–5) describes, the very nature of these two sites means that students are not expected to be ‘passive consumers of content’ as they might be with a book or static ‘Web 1.0’ web page. They are encouraged to be ‘active participants in the construction of knowledge’, who critique what they read and then respond to it. Whether 11- to 18-year-olds take this opportunity is a point of contention. Users of these sites are not a homogeneous group who all use sites in the same way, and even an individual student might use these sites one way for one purpose and another for something else. However, when researching and learning about a topic of interest, many young people do take a very active part in the construction of knowledge. Viewing the hundreds of thousands of YouTube videos of video-game play and tips, as well as the associated video responses and comments, demonstrates this. Students regularly watch these videos and then critique the game and the person playing it (McCormick, 2014). However, it seems less likely that this type of deep interaction with information is extended to independent learning in the traditional education sphere. While observing students carry out a research project, Harouni (2009, 475) found that they did not ‘question the accuracy or the strength of the ideas they have gathered’ from websites like Wikipedia. This reflects wider concerns about a ‘copy and paste culture’ in education. Since 2002 educational institutions, supported by JISC in the UK, have introduced strategies to prevent students in secondary, further and higher education from using information from Wikipedia and similar sites and submitting it as their own without questioning, or even acknowledging, it (Paton, 2013). It would be an exaggeration, however, to say that all students are simply using the information on these sites uncritically in the way found by Harouni (2009). For example, Sormunen and Lehtio (2011) studied how 17- to 18-yearolds used articles from Wikipedia. They found that some students did use the articles completely uncritically, copying and pasting the text, but others interacted with the text in a deeper way and exhibited critical skills. Copying and pasting was used by 45% of students, but 91% synthesized the information they read. This meant that they read two or more articles and then wrote in their own words.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 118

118

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

The ways that students can use information, on both new media sites and from more traditional sources, fit a spectrum. At one end is the copy-andpaste approach, where students are taking the information at face value and not questioning what they read. At the other end of the spectrum is where students deeply analyse, question, comment and respond to this information in the way imagined by Dunaway (2011). Where a student falls on this spectrum when doing a task will depend on a wide range of factors including: the individual student; their teacher’s influence; the nature of the task they are doing; and the level of the student’s interest in the task. It is important that students develop analytical skills so that they can question the world around them. Sampson (2013, 281) argues that critical media literacy skills are ‘essential for individuals and communities to expose the taken-for-granted logics of neo-Liberalism and offer the possibility to imagine a society based on different values’. Both within and outside of such a political framework, the benefits of students being able, and willing, to question the world they live in are evident. The Prague Declaration, supported by UNESCO (2003), states that information literacy ‘plays a leading role in reducing the inequalities within and among countries and peoples’. In a new media age these issues have been magnified as people are exposed to a plethora of sources from thousands of authors and are encouraged to give their response to these messages on a global platform. Critical literacy skills can provide students with the skills to allow them to engage with sites like YouTube and Wikipedia more effectively. The following section suggests how school librarians can play a key role in supporting the development of such skills.

Critical literacy in the school library An understanding of the need to question sources and how to do this is an important part of information-literacy teaching, with practitioners emphasizing the need to analyse the reliability of sources. For example, one of the seven pillars in SCONUL’s (2011) information-literacy model is titled ‘evaluate’, and the need to be able to ‘compare and evaluate information and data’ is at its core. However, in the last 15 years the need to go beyond this form of information literacy has been emphasized by scholars in the field of library and information studies. Scholars such as Elmborg (2006) have taken the ideas from Freire’s (1970) notion of critical pedagogy and applied them to information literacy. Elmborg argues that instead of teaching students how to complete research using a set method, practitioners should teach students how to research in a way that involves questioning what they do and the information they find. Students need to develop a greater understanding of why people create and use information and how this information is shaped by the author’s position in society, in order to effectively find and evaluate a source.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 119

CROWLEY NEW MEDIA AND CRITICAL LITERACY IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS

119

The school librarian can play a key role in the teaching of these criticalliteracy skills and is often in a position that is well suited to doing so. Many school librarians are required to teach information literacy, and the ideas behind critical literacy can be incorporated into this teaching. They are also often the members of staff working closely with students while they are doing homework assignments and independent research. For example, a school librarian can help a student through the research process and emphasize the need to think about, and question, the information found. The librarian can ask important questions such as, ‘Why would a government report present the information in a different way to a newspaper article or on a forum?’ For many students, it is this initial ‘hand holding’ that helps them to understand the research process and the critical use of information. Traditionally, an algorithmic approach has been used when looking at analysing sources in information literacy. For example, students have been taught to ask the ‘five Ws’ (who, what, when, where, why – and how) in order to discover the reliability of a resource (e.g. Radom and Gammons, 2014). However, this approach is limited because it ‘oversimplifies a complex issue’ (Harouni, 2009, 481). For example, there is no such thing as a completely biased and unreliable source or a completely unbiased and reliable source. The issues are always more nuanced and complex than the ‘five Ws’ implies, and a wider understanding of the context of knowledge creation, as demonstrated by critical literacy, is required.

New media and critical literacy teaching A number of practitioners have chosen to incorporate new media into their teaching of critical literacy. For example, Oliver (2015) used a Wikipediaediting project to teach these skills to recent high school graduates. There are several advantages to using new media for this purpose. As shown above, Wikipedia and YouTube are sites that are familiar to students. This removes the anxiety and confusion that could come from using an unfamiliar resource. It teaches students skills in a comfortable environment and this ‘opens a door to asking probing questions about other information sources’ (Jacobs, 2010, 188). In addition, using a site with user-generated material can provide more immediate opportunities to observe the issues around the construction of knowledge than is possible with traditional scholarly resources (Oliver, 2015). For example, it is easier to highlight examples of users altering content for particular purposes, and students are even able to do so themselves. Students are often particularly interested in examples of purposeful vandalism on Wikipedia. A simple lesson starter is to give students a vandalised Wikipedia page and ask them what is wrong with it, how they knew and why someone

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 120

120

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

would want to do this. Harouni (2009) did this using Wikipedia pages that he had vandalised himself. Another option is to use one of the real-life examples of vandalism, such as those found on Wikipedia’s ‘Vandalism on Wikipedia’4 page, as the starting point for a debate with a class. These examples show students the need to develop the skills to critically evaluate what they read on new media sites and to think about the issues surrounding them. Hoax YouTube videos are another way of getting students interested in critical literacy. There are countless videos, ranging from simple home-made clips like those of the Pacific Northwest tree octopus5 to those used for advertising purposes, such as the Ikea wireless bungee jump,6 which can be used in lessons to open up discussions on the reasons why people create these videos and how you can see if they are real or fake. The librarian can lead the student through the processes of thinking critically about what they are watching and questioning the latest viral video rather than assuming that it is real. An additional advantage of using new media when teaching critical literacy is that it not only helps students to start to think about the information they consume, but it can also be used to show how their worldview and environment shapes their creation and consumption of information. The importance of this has been emphasized by Beilin and Leonard (2013). The critical-literacy course they designed was rooted in the life experiences of their particular students and attempted to validate and utilize students’ knowledge and perspectives. Having students create their own YouTube news reports on issues important to them and then examine their viewpoints as a class is one way of doing this. It is, perhaps, precisely this cyclical relationship and social element at the heart of new media that has alarmed many library professionals and led them to discourage the use of such resources amongst their students. In professional discussions, librarians often cite the lack of authoritativeness as a major limitation because the information on Wikipedia and YouTube is ‘constantly exposed to special interests, false or unreferenced statements and even vandalism’ (Harouni, 2009, 476). However, when used with an awareness of how new media works, along with critical literacy skills, new media can be a vital tool in the research process for students in secondary schools. It is often a source that students want to engage with, and that they are likely to use regardless of what the teacher or librarian instructs them to do. School librarians can play a key role in helping students to develop the skills they need in order to do so effectively. Not only will this improve the quality of their research, but it can also improve the quality of these sites when students are given the opportunity to become active, socially aware participants in the construction of information.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 121

CROWLEY NEW MEDIA AND CRITICAL LITERACY IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS

121

Conclusion New media has revolutionized how 11- to 18-year-olds learn, and will continue to do so. Young people have access to an unprecedented amount of information through sites like YouTube and Wikipedia. Rather than being threats to the development of good information-literacy skills, these platforms offer ideal opportunities for students to use information critically; they allow students to question and change the information they find. However, this requires students to possess critical literacy skills. This chapter has suggested some ways in which school librarians can help the students they work with to respond to new media both critically and creatively.

Notes 1 2 3 4 5 6

https://www.youtube.com/. https://www.wikipedia.org/. https://www.khanacademy.org/. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vandalism_on_Wikipedia. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80jjcri5oLs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M6M1ZDo8N8.

References Beilin, I. and Leonard, A. (2013) Teaching the Skills to Question: a credit-course approach to critical information literacy, Urban Library Journal, 19 (1), http://ojs.gc.cuny.edu/index.php/urbanlibrary/article/view/1397/pdf_8. Dunaway, M. (2011) Web 2.0 and Critical Information Literacy, Public Services Quarterly, 7 (3–4), 149–57. Elmborg, J. (2006) Critical Information Literacy: implications for instructional practice, The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 32 (2), 192–9. Fleck, B., Beckman, L., Sterns, J. and Hussey, H. (2014) YouTube in the Classroom: helpful tips and student perceptions, The Journal of Effective Teaching, 14 (3), 21–37. Freire, P. (1970) Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Herder and Herder. Harouni, H. (2009) High School Research and Critical Literacy: social studies with and despite Wikipedia, Harvard Educational Review, 79 (3), 473–93. Head, A. and Eisenberg, M. (2010) How Today’s College Students Use Wikipedia for Course-Related Research, First Monday, 15 (3), http://firstmonday.org/article/view/2830/2476. Jackson, B. and Wallin, J. (2009) Rediscovering the ‘Back-and-Forthness’ of Rhetoric in the Age of YouTube, College Composition and Communication, 61 (2), 374–96. Jacobs, H. (2010) Posing the Wikipedia ‘Problem’: information literacy and the praxis of problem-posing in library instruction. In Accardi, M., Drabinski, E. and

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 122

122

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Kumbiet, A. (eds), Critical Library Instruction: theories and methods, Library Juice Press. McCormick, R. (2014) This is Why People Want to Watch Other People Play Video Games, The Verge, www.theverge.com/2014/8/26/6068993/this-is-whypeople-want-to-watch-other-people-play-video-games. McNicol, S. and Aillerie, K. (2015) Information Searching in Social Networking Sites: survey results, unpublished. Moy, C. L., Locke, J. R., Coppola, B. P. and McNeil, A. J. (2010) Improving Science Education and Understanding through Editing Wikipedia, Journal of Chemical Education, 87 (11), 1159–62. Oliver, J. (2015) One-shot Wikipedia: an edit sprint towards information literacy, Reference Services Review, 43 (1), 81–97. O’Reilly, T. (2005) What is Web 2.0: design patterns and business models for the next generation of software, www.oreilly.com/pub/a/web2/archive/what-is-web20.html. Paton, G. (2013) Universities in Crackdown on ‘Cut and Paste Culture’, Telegraph (4 April), www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/9969091/Universitiesin-crackdown-on-cut-and-paste-culture.html. Radom, R. and Gammons, R. (2014) Teaching Information Evaluation with the Five Ws: an elementary method, an instructional scaffold, and the effect on student recall and application, Reference and User Services Quarterly, 53 (4), https://journals.ala.org/rusq/article/view/3854/4264. Sampson, P. (2013) Contested Frontier: examining YouTube from a critical perspective, E-Learning and Digital Media, 10 (3), 276–84. SCONUL Working Group on Information Literacy (2011) The SCONUL Seven Pillars of Information Literacy, Core Model For Higher Education, www.sconul.ac.uk/sites/default/files/documents/coremodel.pdf. Sormunen, E. and Lehtio, L. (2011) Authoring Wikipedia Articles as an Information Literacy Assignment: copy-pasting or expressing new understanding in one’s own words?, Information Research, 16 (4), www.informationr.net/ir/16-4/paper503.html. Thompson, A. (2010) Unmooring the Moor: researching and teaching on YouTube, Shakespeare Quarterly, 61 (3), 337–56. UNESCO (2003) The Prague Declaration: towards an information literate society, www.unesco.org/ci/en/files/19636/1122886353PragueDeclaration.pdf.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 123

CHAPTER 11

Critical literacy and academic honesty: a school librarian’s role and contribution

Anthony Tilke

Introduction Academic honesty and academic integrity are terms in common currency, especially in tertiary education. However, the specific term ‘academic honesty’ is used by the International Baccalaureate (IB), an independent, international organization that has developed curricula in the primary and secondary sectors of education. Academic honesty is considered to be a significant feature in IB philosophy. The terms academic honesty or academic integrity are often considered to be the antithesis of the term ‘plagiarism’; for example, the UK’s Higher Education Academy (HEA) and JISC (2010) produced a guide to Supporting Academic Integrity which is heavily focused on plagiarism. The IB, however, takes a more holistic and more positive view; it argues that ‘academic honesty must be seen as a set of values and skills that promote personal integrity and good practice in teaching, learning and assessment’ (International Baccalaureate, 2011, 2). Therefore, within the IB definition, there are expectations that students will develop skills in the techniques or mechanics of academic honesty, but also that they will realize and practise ethical standards with regard to academic honesty. In contrast to the IB approach, literature in library and information science tends to be strong on references to the techniques and skills development needed with regard to avoiding plagiarism, but there is less focus on the affective arena, whereby students develop principles and values with regard to their practice of academic honesty. This chapter describes a librarian’s contribution not merely to teaching the basic precautions necessary to avoid plagiarism but also to the higher-level critical thinking skills and aptitudes that students need in order to successfully meet the demands of academic-honesty principles and standards as part of the IB programme. The following section focuses on the role of

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 124

124

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

academic honesty within the IB Diploma Programme (IBDP) course for 16to 18-year-old students.

The IB Diploma Programme Although academic honesty is a central part of IB philosophy throughout IB curricula, there are specific requirements for students and schools that undertake the IBDP, a curriculum for students in their last two years of secondary education (16–18 years of age). This curriculum is generally considered to be helpful and an appropriate preparation and experience for studying at tertiary level, as it involves considerable externally assessed enquiry and research assignments. The IBDP is a distinctive curriculum, yet its features are not unique and other curricula can also incorporate salient aspects, such as: • identification of students’ skill development • statement of learning aspects from the curricula • explicitly identified expectations of students – their learning, commitment, ethical behaviour, etc. • legal/binding requirements related to original work, with identifiable consequences • opportunities for original coursework. IBDP students are required to study six subjects from a variety of disciplines. In addition, all diploma students complete core assignments, namely: follow a course in Theory of Knowledge; fulfil CAS (Creativity, Action and Service) requirements; and complete a research project using an original line of enquiry (the Extended Essay). In all these activities, students are required to develop and apply critical thinking. Students undertake an assessed project for each of their subjects and complete an examined essay for Theory of Knowledge. Nevertheless, it is the extended essay requirement that is generally perceived to be the most enquiry- and research-focused aspect of the programme for students. This is a 4000-word essay that involves research and is undertaken independently by each student, typically over a five- to six-month period. Each student needs to undertake original, individual work. To support them in this process, each student is assigned a supervisor who is a member of staff of the institution where the student is enrolled. One example of the developing articulation of IB philosophy is through its statements on approaches to teaching and learning (ATL) in each of its programmes. This document identifies key aspects for teaching and learning in schools that offer the IBDP: thinking, communication, social, selfmanagement and research skills. The stance taken is that there should be

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 125 .

TILKE CRITICAL LITERACY AND ACADEMIC HONESTY

125

understanding behind an ability to use skills, so that students are critically aware of their own practice and that their practice is raised above mechanical or automatic following of procedures. Over and beyond this, the IB has articulated a Learner Profile for all learners. These broad concepts are that learners should be thinkers, enquirers, knowledgeable, balanced, risk-takers, communicators, principled, open minded, caring and reflective. In students’ experience of IB programmes, they are encouraged to reflect on these skills and aptitudes and, because there are associated values underpinning these skills, all require a level of critical reflection by individuals. Therefore, there are firm expectations that thinking, and in particular critical thinking, will be a key part of the aptitude and skill set of IB students. Applying that to academic honesty is no less important.

IB diploma students and academic honesty IBDP students are required to understand that their work should be authentic. Their own enquiry is individual and needs to reflect originality. In a research piece of work, inevitably they will call on previous knowledge and information. In some areas, aspects of creativity (such as in art and design) might make it more difficult for students to make the distinction between previous creativity and their own, but they need to appreciate this distinction and acknowledge previous creativity where it is used, or indicate that they have been influenced by other artists. In other areas, such as psychology and scientific areas of research, they need to understand the ethics underpinning research. At a basic level, students need to acknowledge sources, using a recognized style or system of citing in text and referencing. Both in citing their sources and in paraphrasing, quoting or referring to sources of information, students need to be aware of plagiarism. They also need to understand that colluding with or duplicating the work of their fellow students is not ethical or acceptable. In addition, however, students also need to understand the concept of the public domain. This includes understanding that they cannot use any material they find (not least images) without attribution or, where relevant, obtaining permission to use material posted on the internet (International Baccalaureate, 2011). However, it also includes a critical awareness of the content of secondary sources in relation to their own enquiry. Students are encouraged not just to accept the findings, statements or conclusions of secondary sources but to critique them according to their own line of enquiry. The section that follows discusses some of the ways in which the school librarian can support students in these activities.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 126

126

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

The contribution of the school librarian Andreassen et al. (2015) identify a tension between teaching possibly mundane aspects of academic integrity or honesty (such as citation) and getting students to appreciate and see the benefits of developing such skills. They conclude that, in order to progress such ideals, critical thinking should be built into all stages of a research project, including documenting and recording sources. With these findings firmly in mind, emphasizing the ‘bigger picture’ and the benefits of considering process over content (or requirements) is helpful. For students, the research components of the IBDP are products they need to complete; however, for educators, it is as much about students understanding how to undertake the process of analysing, research, creativity, enquiry, writing and academic honesty so that they can develop aptitudes and skills for the future – in other words, lifelong learning skills. This being so, it is typically the case that the involvement of the librarian is planned for specific aspects of the processes, but they are also likely to troubleshoot and provide individual consultations on a more ad hoc basis. In terms of the enquiry elements of the IBDP, which include features of academic honesty, the librarian can become involved through strategies such as developing the librarian’s role within the teaching process. In order to gain a school profile as an educator, the librarian might take part in team teaching; schedule individual consultations with students; and develop relationships with members of teaching staff (Tilke, 2011). The aim of this strategy is for students and staff to see the librarian not just as a resource provider but as an educator who can help them in the various stages of enquiry, and especially where principles of academic honesty apply. As with many curricula, stated roles for the library, or librarian, in IB curricula are sparse. The situation is slowly changing, for example the inclusion of suggested roles for the librarian in the ATL documentation. However, to date, some of the most prominent roles for the librarian in IB curricula appear in the IB Academic Honesty document (International Baccalaureate, 2011). From this document and from other material (Tilke, 2011) it is possible to identify roles for the school librarian with regard to the development of academic honesty in an IB school. One suggestion is to develop teaching tools (e.g. library guides) about enquiry, research and academic honesty. An even better approach is where, with the support of the librarian, aspects of understanding academic honesty are interwoven through content, as relevant. In addition, it is important that the school librarian is involved in developing the school’s own academic honesty document (a requirement of the IB) and in promoting and using it within the school. Typically, a committee is set up with a brief either to generate a policy document or to review one. The librarian, who may be involved as a committee member, can help to promote an awareness that the policy should

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 127

TILKE CRITICAL LITERACY AND ACADEMIC HONESTY

127

educate, rather than just prescribe. In this way, they can help to ensure that critical understanding of academic honesty issues is the aim, rather than just developing a set of procedures to police plagiarism. The librarian can also promote a focus on the purpose of skills and tools to ethically enquire and research in an IB learning environment, rather than simply enforcing a set of procedures required to meet specific assignment requirements, important though the latter are. This can be as basic as reflecting on the purpose of citation and bibliography, which many students see as requirements imposed by teachers, rather than as tools to aid enquiry and research. Scaffolding library support for academic honesty is more than passively making librarian expertise available, perhaps independently, in an IB school. Rather, it involves the librarian being considered part of the teaching and learning process, so that they are named and included in appropriate strategies within a school. It involves communication and shared knowledge of curriculum and students. In this way, the library becomes part of the strategies that IB students use and subject teachers incorporate into their pedagogy. Where identified in a school culture and documentation, librarian support becomes more real and relevant for students.

Conclusions It is almost a truism that the IBDP is considered a helpful preparation for positive student experiences in higher education. In support of this, Gaynor (2011) identified the need and benefit of good levels of student understanding of academic integrity in their transition to tertiary education. However, as the Project Information Literacy (Head and Eisenberg, 2010) found, there are often aspects of concern in terms of the enquiry and research skills of new students in tertiary education. In this research, students were more adept at following procedures related to a product (i.e. a research paper), rather than at displaying a critical understanding, not least with regard to starting the research process. In this context, the contribution of the school librarian to the IBDP may provide a stronger foundation for the development of student understanding, skills and aptitudes within the secondary sector, thus helping students to progress successfully to tertiary education. As Weller (2012) points out, within higher education, ‘In reading for the purposes of writing an essay, students are always participating in a dialogue with the texts that they read in ways that emphasise a communicative function of reading that is frequently overlooked.’ This idea, which is integral to notions of critical literacy, opens a different perspective on our traditional conceptions of academic integrity, which are all too often focused on plagiarism. Academic honesty is not simply about citing sources correctly, it also implies an academic responsibility to examine sources critically and to

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 128

128

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

engage with them in more sophisticated ways. It emphasizes ideas such as the public domain, ethical enquiry and the collective construction of knowledge. The IBDP is one curriculum that has started to recognize the wider concepts of academic honesty and also to draw attention to the school librarian’s potential role in this process.

References Andreassen, H., Lag, T., Flytkjaer, V., Lokse, M., Stenersen, M. and Figenschou, L. (2015) From How to Why: critical thinking and academic integrity as key ingredients in information literacy teaching, UiT, the Arctic University of Norway, http://result. uit.no/infolit/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2014/04/Lilac-poster_ FINAL.pdf. Gaynor, F. A. (2011) Academic Integrity and the Transition to Higher Education: curriculum design for initiating a scholarly apprenticeship. In Educational Integrity: culture and values. Proceedings 5th Asia Pacific Conference on Educational Integrity. The University of Western Australia, 26–28 September, www.apcei.catl.uwa.edu.au/procs/gaynor.pdf. Head, A. and Eisenberg, M. (2010) Truth be Told: how college students evaluate and use information in the digital age, Project Information Literacy Progress Report, University of Washington Information School, http://projectinfolit.org/images/pdfs/pil_fall2010_survey_noappendices.pdf. International Baccalaureate (2011) Academic Honesty, International Baccalaureate Organization. The Higher Education Academy JISC Academic Integrity Service (2010) Supporting Academic Integrity: approaches and resources for higher education, https://www. heacademy.ac.uk/sites/default/files/supportingacademicintegrity_v2_0.pdf. Tilke, A. (2011) The International Baccalaureate Diploma Program and the School Library: inquiry-based education, ABC-CLIO. Weller, S. (2012) ‘The One who Writes is the Same as the One who Reads’: textual annotation, plagiarism and international students’ approaches to reading, 5th International Plagiarism Conference, 16–18 July, The Sage, Gateshead, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, www.plagiarismadvice.org/research-papers/ item/the-one-who-writes-is-the-same-as-the-one-who-reads

Note: Some documents published by the International Baccalaureate are available only on a password-protected part of its website. However, public documents may be accessed at: http://ibo.org/en/become-an-ib-school/usefulresources/resource-library/#dp.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 129

CHAPTER 12

Engaging undergraduate communications students in critical information literacy

Rachel Elizabeth Scott

Introduction It has been over a decade since Troy Swanson (2004) published his ‘radical’ idea that librarians should teach students about information itself, including how and why it is created, and not just how to search for it. Critical literacy provides the information professional with an opportunity to encourage critical consciousness in students (Elmborg, 2006; Kopp and Olson-Kopp, 2010) and to examine the social context and construction of information sources (Kapitzke, 2003). Beyond good or bad sources, critical information literacy encourages students to ascertain the social and cultural frameworks in which the information was created and understand the implications of that context. This chapter discusses the way in which a librarian and an instructor collaborated to engage undergraduate students in a required undergraduate communications course in critical information literacy. It starts, however, with a consideration of how a lack of published examples can present a challenge to librarians wishing to implement critical information literacy approaches.

Examples of critical information literacy in libraries Critical information literacy is rooted in the work of critical theorists and, more specifically, the critical pedagogy of Paulo Freire. In his Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Freire (2000, 72) explicitly relates several traditional library functions – receiving, filing, collecting, storing, cataloguing – to his ‘banking concept of education’ in which teachers view knowledge as capital to be deposited in students. Elmborg (2006, 193) asks how librarians should respond to Freire: ‘Is the library a passive information bank where students and faculty make knowledge deposits and withdrawals, or is it a place where students actively engage existing knowledge and shape it to their own current

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 130

130

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

and future uses?’ The literature suggests that many librarians have since endeavoured to make the library a place of engaged learning and knowledge construction (Bruce, 2004; Mackey and Jacobson, 2010; Maybee, 2006). Elmborg (2012, 90) notes that Freire’s critical pedagogy responded to a specific cultural and philosophical context and that, before appropriating it as a pedagogical model, librarians must ‘account for the translation of his work ... into modern (and postmodern) practices’. The influx of ideas and praxis from critical pedagogy has helped librarians to transition from resource-based bibliographic instruction to user-centred information literacy. However, librarians continue to struggle to ‘translate’ critical pedagogy into practice. Despite the proliferation of literature on critical information literacy since the mid-1990s, there are relatively few published curricula or examples. In her dissertation on critical information literacy in practice, Beth Allsopp McDonough (2014, abstract) writes that the literature on critical information literacy is ‘theoretical and largely-negative and so is not readably accessible to the practitioner’. Nonetheless, McDonough’s ‘interpretive synthesis’ of this literature does reveal 14 case studies, some of which are summarized here. Swanson (2004) outlines the content for four information literacy sessions with a community college first-year writing class. Broidy (2007, 497) discusses how she reconceptualized a credit-bearing course using a ‘critical feminist assessment of information’ to hone critical thinking. Reale (2012) explains how she revamped an intermediate-level undergraduate English course from an orientation to a participatory session in which students engage as a community of scholars, not as passive receptacles of information. Peterson (2010, 72) uses problem-based learning (PBL) to incorporate critical literacy into informationliteracy sessions, claiming that ‘PBL breaks down the traditional hierarchy of the classroom and shifts the focus from lecture to active learning’. While there are relatively few scholarly syntheses dealing with how to teach critical information literacy, curricula and case studies are available to practitioners in less formal venues. Increasingly, librarians post and discuss critical information lesson plans and ideas on blogs, social media and other less formal platforms. For example, #critlib is an affinity group of librarians interested in critical perspectives on library practice that hosts regular Twitter conversations and shares resources and ideas related to critical pedagogy and information literacy. Exchanging outcomes and experiences with other practitioners can inspire the teaching librarian to put critical literacy into practice. This chapter will explain how and why elements of critical information literacy, informed by both formal and informal discourses on the topic, were incorporated into an undergraduate communications course.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 131

SCOTT ENGAGING UNDERGRADUATE COMMUNICATIONS STUDENTS

131

Case study: oral communication at the University of Memphis All undergraduate students at the University of Memphis are required to pass Communications 2381 (COMM 2381). This course, called Oral Communication, aims to impart ‘Principles and practices of public speaking using live and mediated formats; emphasis on researching, analyzing, writing, and delivering effective spoken messages with appropriate visual support in informative and persuasive settings’ (University of Memphis, 2015). One instructor suggested that the librarian should address COMM 2381 students as ‘curious citizens in training’ and not as scholars or experts. This description resonated with the librarian, who sees a strong connection between responsible information use and engaged citizenship. It also helped the librarian to understand both the needs of the students and the expectations of the instructor. The students would not be conducting novel research and did not need to find peer-reviewed articles. Instead, the instructor wanted students to find well-written yet accessible information that they could synthesize and integrate with existing experiences and knowledge to construct compelling speeches. The instructor defined this process of inventorying personal knowledge, researching to fill gaps and summarizing findings as ‘responsible knowledge’. Responsible knowledge is a helpful construct in that it validates the student’s view of, and appreciation for, a given topic, but also highlights the need for an increasingly sophisticated understanding of the complexity of the topic and the ability to synthesize and make sense of various and disparate information sources. This dialogical learning process resembles Freire’s (2000, 109) ‘problem-posing method – dialogical par excellence – [which] is constituted and organized by the student’s view of the world, where their own generative themes are found’. This approach fits well with the philosophy of information literacy instruction, both in addressing gaps in personal knowledge and in evaluating information sources. In COMM 2381, students deliver various types of speeches, including introduction, informative, persuasive and tribute speeches. The specific requirements of the persuasive speech differ from one instructor to another. One of the instructors requires that students advocate a specific position and deliver a ‘call to arms’. The purpose of this speech assignment within the undergraduate curriculum is in line with the third of Powell et al.’s (2001, 775) oft-quoted critical literacy assumptions: ‘Critical literacy assumes that the literacy instruction can empower and lead to transformative action.’ With this goal in mind, the librarian and the instructor collaborated to create a learning experience in which students would take control of, and responsibility for, their own convictions and learning process with the goal of empowerment and action. To do so, students would be required to select and examine various information sources, synthesize personal and external knowledge and persuasively advocate their position.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 132

132

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Simmons (2005, 299) wrote: ‘When collaborating in the education of undergraduate students, the specialized scholar and the interdisciplinary librarian make an unusually powerful pedagogical partnership.’ In the case of COMM 2381, the librarian and the instructor endeavoured to harness the power of this relationship by splitting the teaching responsibilities. Instead of formatting the two library sessions as lectures and offering extended demonstrations of the online catalogue, databases and discovery layer, the librarian and the instructor both asked and answered questions throughout the session. This marked an uncomfortable change for some students, who were expecting the librarian to ‘dispense order through providing texts to help the user solve an information need or “problem”’ (Kapitzke, 2003, 45). Instead, the librarian challenged – and empowered – them to find and examine the information sources and to speak for themselves. Encouraging students to speak in the instruction session – soliciting and legitimizing their questions, answers and comments – prepares students to engage critically with their topic and the research process. Keer (2010, 154–5) highlights the importance of ‘giving voice’ in critical pedagogy, ‘not only giving the students the opportunity to speak, but also being aware, as an instructor, of one’s own speech patterns, word choice, and attitude toward non-standard English in the classroom’. Keer also states that the teaching librarian should be mindful of how library jargon can alienate students. Inclusive and accessible language encourages responses; technical terms and excessively erudite language exclude. Although the librarian works in systems, she consciously avoided using technical library terminology like ‘ILS’ [integrated library system], ‘discovery layer’, ‘link resolver’ and ‘bibliometrics’.

Format of the sessions The class met in the library’s classroom so that students would gain familiarity with the library’s physical space and to ensure access to a computer. The first library visit focused on print or traditionally published sources and the second session on non-print sources. The librarian began both sessions by telling students about the library’s reference services and the course LibGuide (library guide) and encouraged students to make good use of both. She then briefly demonstrated specific search strategies in a few platforms. To increase engagement, the librarian chose topics relevant to the students and asked students to respond to questions about searching the platforms and the results yielded. Instead of detailing where exactly to point and click, the librarian demonstrated how she might begin to investigate an author’s expertise, an organization’s political affiliations and a publication’s reputation.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 133

SCOTT ENGAGING UNDERGRADUATE COMMUNICATIONS STUDENTS

133

Rather than teaching a specific process, both librarian and instructor agreed that it was more important to emphasize the importance of asking questions. Asking questions has long been acknowledged as essential to the research process, and Rothstein and Santana (2011) have found that teaching students to formulate and articulate their own questions is a singularly empowering pedagogical practice. Not only does asking questions help to organize thoughts and understanding, it also leads students to take responsibility for their learning and encourages self-regulated learning. To this end, the instructor and librarian collaborated on two worksheets that would encourage students to continue this practice of examining various aspects of information creation, authority, purpose, relevance and evidence. The worksheets begin with some structure and guidelines, but do not include a one-size-fits-all checklist for completing the assignment. For example, the URL for the course’s LibGuide with recommended databases is provided, but students were not limited to specific databases. Both of the two-page worksheets are composed of several open-ended questions relating to specific sources identified and cited by the students. Brief explanations of evaluation criteria precede questions so as to provide scaffolded points of entry and accommodate students’ varying comfort levels with these new parameters. The openness of the questions allows students to draw on both personal experience and the librarian’s demonstration to investigate information sources authentically and at their own skill level. Students need to find compelling evidence, especially when preparing a short, persuasive speech. Prior to the library sessions, the instructor discussed various types of evidence, including statistical/quantitative, analogical, testimonial and anecdotal. During the instruction session, the librarian briefly explained these various types of evidence within the context of articles. The worksheets asked students to identify various forms of evidence within their sources and to gauge the efficacy of the evidence. Questions included: ‘What type of evidence/supporting materials does the author use to substantiate his/her arguments? List two examples’ or ‘What types of evidence does this offer (fact, statistic, narrative, example, or testimonial)? Explain how the evidence used relates to the credibility of the source.’ The instruction and worksheet also provided some guidance for students on examining evidence. Students were asked to find a testimonial relevant to their speech. Instead of insisting on expert testimonial, students were asked: ‘Is this lay or expert testimonial? Both can be credible; provide two reasons you think this source is (or is not) sound.’ When students critically examine and value the evidence, they are more likely to better integrate the evidence into their speeches. Students were also asked to examine authorship and authority. The worksheet suggested that when considering authority, students should start by asking: ‘Who is the author and what can you learn about his/her

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 134

134

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

relationship to the topic? If not authored by an individual, what can you find out about the organization/corporation/corporate author/sponsors?’ Students found that this was more difficult to analyse with web pages than with traditionally published and academic sources. Traditional sources often make this information explicit by listing the author’s name, credentials, affiliation and previous publications. Non-traditional sources require the reader to consult a variety of documents to determine who – whether an individual, anonymous or corporate author – is responsible for producing and publishing information and the nature of the producer’s relationship with the information. The source or platform in which information is published must also be examined. The instruction session and worksheet provided some guidance for examining the information source. Students were encouraged to ask, for example: ‘In what journal/magazine/website is this published? What can you learn about the source’s history, target audience, funding, and bias? Who can publish in this source? How are authors and content selected for inclusion?’ Students were also encouraged to examine the funding sources and political affiliation of the organization: ‘Find an organization’s website on your topic. How is this organization funded?’ ‘Does it support any political campaigns? If yes, do the organization’s political donations make you reluctant to cite the source? List two reasons [why] this matters.’ Some students expressed discomfort with this process. Although they may have had some concerns about the complex relationship of money and power to information, some were not eager to question an information source that was relevant to, and potentially useful for, their speech. The librarian’s role is to introduce complexity into the selection process, but to do so in a way that feels manageable to the student. The purpose of an information source, from the point of view of both its creator and user, relates directly to its relevance and application. The worksheet asked students to consider the purpose of the source and how it related to their task, with a reminder that all of the sources should be suitable for use in a specific speech. Students said that they were accustomed to being told precisely what types of information were acceptable; lecturers often require a specific number of peer-reviewed articles and tell students to avoid online sources. Students related that they had heard several times that .com domains were not credible sources, but admitted that they had not stopped to ask why. In this course, students were encouraged to consider what would be the point of including a commercial website in a speech and how they would justify the selection. Several students said that they preferred absolute rules for evaluating websites, but the librarian and the instructor encouraged them instead to embrace questions as a mechanism for understanding the content. The

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 135

SCOTT ENGAGING UNDERGRADUATE COMMUNICATIONS STUDENTS

135

students were challenged to understand that although texts are constructed to serve particular interests, groups engaged in advocacy are not necessarily disreputable information sources. The assignments opened up any format of information, with the stipulation that students closely examine the quality of the content and select a diverse group of sources. This means, however, that students need to take responsibility for their selections and understand that the appropriation and inclusion of a source reveals a great deal about their familiarity with the discourse surrounding a topic. One of the tasks on the worksheet was to find a relevant, but inappropriate, website and provide a few reasons why the student was reluctant to use it as a source for their speech. The instructor said that this question was one of the most useful, as it forced the students to thoroughly critique a relevant web page.

Conclusion Lauren Smith (2013, 24–5) identified several obstacles to offering criticalinformation literacy instruction in a secondary school library setting: ‘limited school resources ... qualification and education of library workers ... and challenging the status quo’. Although the initiative described in this chapter took place in an undergraduate setting, the librarian and instructor still had to address these and other pitfalls. Challenging the status quo required a great amount of effort by all parties. The students had to quickly change direction when it became obvious that they were not in just another library-orientation session and were expected to contribute to the discussion. The librarian and instructor hoped to promote critical literacy in a setting with great relevance and immediacy by asking students to answer questions about the production of, and potential biases of, information sources, and to apply this evaluation to a specific assignment. Because the worksheets that are produced include discrete questions that can be asked of many information sources, they offer transferability and provide students with concrete steps to take as they engage in critical literacy practices beyond the assignment. In a university, information-literacy instruction is uniquely situated both to help students effectively research and address gaps in their personal knowledge and to encourage them to engage dialogically with information sources. While teaching resources and search strategies may be more traditional and comfortable roles for the librarian, the process of empowering students to understand the social and cultural framework of information sources has the possibility to profoundly impact on how they interact with information beyond researching a single speech-writing assignment.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 136

136

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

References Broidy, E. (2007) Gender and the Politics of Information: reflections on bringing the library into the classroom, Library Trends, 56 (2), 494–508. Bruce, C. S. (2004) Information Literacy as a Catalyst for Educational Change, a background paper. In Danaher, P. A. (ed), Lifelong Learning: whose responsibility and what is your contribution?, the 3rd International Lifelong Learning Conference, 13–16 June 2004, Yeppoon, Queensland. Elmborg, J. (2006) Critical Information Literacy: implications for instructional practice, The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 32 (2), 192–9. Elmborg, J. (2012) Critical Information Literacy: definitions and challenges. In Wilkinson, C. W. and Bruch, C. (eds), Transforming Information Literacy Programs: intersecting frontiers of self, library culture, and campus community, Association of College and Research Libraries. Freire, P. (2000) Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Bergman Ramos, M. (trans.), Continuum. Kapitzke, C. (2003) Information Literacy: a positivist epistemology and a politics of outformation, Educational Theory, 53 (1), 37–53. Keer, G. (2010) Critical Pedagogy and Information Literacy in Community Colleges. In Accardia, M., Drabinski, E. and Kumbier, A. (eds), Critical Library Instruction: theories and methods, Library Juice Press. Kopp, B. M. and Olson-Kopp, K. (2010) Depositories of Knowledge: library instruction and the development of critical consciousness. In Accardia, M., Drabinski, E. and Kumbier, A. (eds), Critical Library Instruction: theories and methods, Library Juice Press. Mackey, T. P. and Jacobson, T. E. (2010) Reframing Information Literacy as a Metaliteracy, College and Research Libraries, crl-76r1. Maybee, C. (2006) Undergraduate Perceptions of Information Use: the basis for creating user-centered student information literacy instruction, The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 32 (1), 79–85. McDonough, B. A. (2014) Critical Information Literacy in Practice: an interpretive synthesis, unpublished dissertation. Peterson, E. (2010) Problem-based Learning as Teaching Strategy. In Accardia, M., Drabinski, E. and Kumbier, A. (eds), Critical Library Instruction: theories and methods, Library Juice Press. Powell, R., Cantrell, S. C. and Adams, S. (2001) Saving Black Mountain: the promise of critical literacy in a multicultural democracy, The Reading Teacher, 54 (8), 772–81. Reale, M. (2012) Critical Pedagogy in the Classroom: library instruction that gives voice to students and builds a community of scholars, Journal of Library Innovation, 3 (2), 80–8. Rothstein, D. and Santana, L. (2011) Make Just One Change: teach students to ask their own questions, Harvard Education Press. Simmons, M. (2005) Librarians as Disciplinary Discourse Mediators: using genre

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 137

SCOTT ENGAGING UNDERGRADUATE COMMUNICATIONS STUDENTS

137

theory to move toward critical information literacy, Portal: libraries and the academy, 5 (3), 297–311. Smith, L. (2013) Critical Information Literacy Instruction for the Development of Political Agency, Journal of Information Literacy, 7 (2), 15–32. Swanson, T. A. (2004) A Radical Step: implementing a critical information literacy model, Portal: Libraries and the Academy, 4 (2), 259–73. University of Memphis (2015) Undergraduate Catalog: COMM course descriptions, www.memphis.edu/ugcatalog/coursedescrip/ccfa/comm.php.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 138

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 139

CHAPTER 13

Exploring pedagogical implications of students’ search mediation experiences through the lens of critical information literacy Sarah Clark

Introduction In my pilot study of the information-seeking narratives of mature students, ‘Ashley’ shared a provocative story of an information search that was stymied by uncertainty and fear. During a library instruction class she attended early in the semester, the librarian discussed the multiple ways students could use library resources and staff to find information more effectively. In addition, Ashley’s instructor encouraged her students to seek help and provided additional resources for finding and evaluating appropriate information for scholarly enquiry. Despite all these available resources, Ashley simply became ‘blocked’ (Clark, 2014, 69), and could not overcome her anxiety sufficiently to attempt to explore her topic, or even to ask for help. Eventually, after failing her first research assignment because she did not use any library sources, Ashley consulted her boyfriend, whom she already respected because his computer skills had helped her a great deal in her other projects. Although he was helpful to an extent, she still did not feel that she had learned as much about information seeking as she could have done. When asked why she had not consulted with a formal mediator (Kuhlthau, 2004) such as a librarian or her instructor, Ashley said, ‘Smart people intimidate me. And people who are in charge of me’ (Clark, 2014, 70). Upon hearing this story, I became curious about how information seekers selected and worked with search mediators, and how seekers’ encounters with the people they asked for help influenced the search process as a whole. Scholars of information literacy such as Kuhlthau (1991; 1993; 2004), Limberg and Sundin (2006), McKenna (2009) and Shah and Kitzie (2012) contend that information seekers’ interactions with search mediators, particularly formal mediators such as librarians, play an important role in assisting seekers to overcome the common experience of uncertainty and to successfully navigate

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 140

140

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

the information-search process. However, those same scholars observe that even when they are aware of the availability and merits of asking librarians for help, students seem to consistently select and engage with mediators in ways that appear to experts to be relatively ineffective for learning how to navigate the information search process. This ‘perplexing and enigmatic state’ of affairs (Clark et al., 1977, 7) suggests that current literature on the information-search process and information-search mediation may not fully or accurately depict the aspects of search mediation that are actually the most important to students who are performing an information search. An in-depth study of students’ experiences of search mediation encounters and their perceptions of how those encounters influence the feelings, thoughts and actions experienced during the information-search process could provide guidance for librarians seeking to better serve students. Recent critiques of information literacy theoretical frameworks and new information about students’ search-mediation preferences suggest that the value of information literacy and formal search mediation may not be as selfevident as it appears at first glance. The tensions between the practice of information literacy, emerging theories of critical information literacy pedagogies and the lived experiences of information seekers form the problem at the heart of this study. As part of a dissertation research project, I explored the lived experiences of eight community college students who consulted librarians, friends, family or other search mediators while seeking information for a first-year English composition class assignment in a university in the United States. After a very brief discussion of the most relevant literature, this chapter will explore aspects of their experiences which appear to have particular relevance to theorists and practitioners of critical information literacy. It concludes by discussing potential implications for information literacy instructors, reference librarians and others striving to foster critical information consciousness in information seekers.

Critical information literacy in a community college setting In an article that became the foundation of the rapidly growing subfield of critical information literacy, Elmborg (2006) contended that librarians must encourage students to question both the information they find and the organizational systems that privilege one type of information over another. Swanson (2004; 2011) describes such a model in greater detail. According to Swanson (2011), a model of critical information literacy should incorporate the following six key elements: different creators construct information to serve different purposes; information evaluation is a continual process; different readers interpret information differently, depending on their

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 141

CLARK EXPLORING PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS OF STUDENTS’ SEARCH EXPERIENCES 141

viewpoints; and students need many opportunities to practise information skills, to seek to understand information seekers on their own terms and to ‘center libraries within the curriculum as the experts on overcoming many of the obstacles to conducting successful research in the ever-changing information world’ (Swanson, 2011, 891, italics added). Although Swanson’s proposal of the traits of critical information literacy is promising, he seems to have embedded an assumption that libraries and librarians are the undisputed ‘experts’ in search mediation. In his discussion of the implications of critical information literacy in the community college context, Patterson (2009) critiques a paradox that he observes within information-literacy theory, which he frames as a conflict between increasing students’ critical thinking about information while also reinforcing traditional ideas about the value of different types of information. He notes that librarians are often in the position of providing ‘free’ access to information and information literacy skills on the one hand, while simultaneously locking information within cumbersome, password-protected security systems required by database vendors on the other hand. Patterson discusses this and other examples as evidence of librarians’ ongoing struggle to balance the values of critical pedagogy and a neoliberal attitude toward intellectual property. Patterson counsels librarians to forge a middle way, teaching students how to navigate within the current information landscape, while simultaneously helping them to develop the critical consciousness needed to critique these power structures and to create information of their own. Some practitioners may find this critical pedagogy difficult to adopt, as it requires librarians to have the courage to admit and critique their own roles in what Freire (1970) called the ‘banking model of education’. However, Patterson (2009) argues that such a pedagogy would enable traditionally disadvantaged students to achieve the ‘cultural capital’ (Bourdieu, 1986) necessary to transform existing power structures. If librarians intend to guide students toward becoming liberated and truly critical seekers and evaluators of information, then scholars and practitioners must have the courage to turn a critical lens on themselves. Building on Elmborg (2006), Swanson (2004; 2011) and Patterson (2009), it seems unlikely that information seekers categorize the mediators as ‘formal’ or ‘informal’. This binary opposition certainly does not originate in students’ behaviours, but in Kuhlthau’s (1991; 1993; 2004) attempts to build a model of the different levels of formal search mediators. Information seekers’ continuing choices to consult different mediators in different ways from those that librarians might suggest do not necessarily indicate a lack of education on the part of students. In fact, upon taking on the humility recommended by scholars and promoters of critical information literacy, it seems quite

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 142

142

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

possible that information seekers may experience information searchmediation encounters very differently than academic librarians think they do.

Research purpose, questions, and methods The purpose of this research was to explore community college students’ thoughts, feelings and actions as they engage in, and reflect on, information search-mediation encounters over the course of the information-search process. This study explored two questions: what are the characteristics of search-mediation encounters as experienced by students and how do students use search-mediation encounters to navigate the information-search process?

Overview of research methodology This research project was a qualitative multiple case study (Stake, 2006) of the lived information-search experiences of Composition II students, a class in which information-seeking tasks are often part of course requirements. As described above, this study is chiefly concerned with understanding undergraduate students’ information search-mediation encounters. This includes both the students’ experiences of these encounters and the ways in which these various encounters may change a student’s experience of an information search as a whole. For that reason, I explored the topic of searchmediation encounters through the lens of several different cases. Each case is one student’s experience of a single information search as defined by Kuhlthau (2004), spanning from the initial selection of a topic to the submission of the completed assignment to the student’s instructor. The study took place at Urban Community College (UCC), a communitycollege system in the southern United States. Eight students from three sections of Composition II participated in 30- to 45-minute semi-structured qualitative interviews regarding their search-mediation experiences and the information-search process as a whole. After the interview, participants were given approximately 15 minutes to draw a picture depicting their experiences related to the information-seeking experience and the influences of different mediation encounters. Students then explained the drawings to me in their own words. This method, as discussed by Kearney and Hyle (2004), typically causes participants to explore the emotional aspects of their experiences more fluently and also serves as a means to triangulate interview data. Further, Mannay (2010) contends that visual data generated by participants can challenge a researcher’s tacit assumptions by ‘making the familiar strange’ (p. 94). Stake (2006) suggests analysing a multiple case study in two separate phases: the creation of individual case reports that examine each case in isolation, followed by a cross-case analysis. In order to ensure that the

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 143

CLARK EXPLORING PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS OF STUDENTS’ SEARCH EXPERIENCES 143

findings are credible, transferable, dependable and confirmable (Lincoln and Guba, 1986), the study included negative case analysis to identify data that did not support emerging patterns; triangulation using multiple data sources to verify findings; interviewees’ checking of transcripts; peer debriefing among academic librarians familiar with information literacy theory and practice; and a reflexivity journal to reflect on the research process.

Research findings After completing an analysis of the participants’ interviews and drawings, I noticed a subtle but intriguing distinction among several of my participants’ information search-mediation goals. Some simply hoped to learn enough to survive the class, while others were striving for a high grade, or even to attain knowledge for its own sake. Four students’ stories particularly depict the different ways in which this theme played out.

Hunter Hunter, a young man who was much more focused on his growth as an artist than as a college student or an information seeker, seemed at times to think of assignments as deadlines that needed to be met in order to achieve a passing grade, rather than as opportunities to succeed or grow. Although he drew only one picture for this project (Figure 13.1), he described a series of images that came to mind when describing his journeys consulting search mediators and completing the information-search process for his annotated bibliography on Ebola. Hunter explained that the drawing he completed, shown in Figure 13.1 on the next page, described a series of mediation experiences with his friend from the online community Second Life,1 whom Hunter considered to be a skilled writer, researcher and proof-reader. Hunter said: This represents, sort of like the communication block I go through reviewing it to somebody online … This is me crinkling my essay – just like super furious about it, ‘I gotta get this done, I need to get three hours of sleep tonight!’ [Laughter] … I’m really reaching out because I’m the kind of guy that doesn’t ask for help unless he really needs it. … If I can’t do this, then something’s seriously wrong and I need to change something. So I’m going to ask somebody and say, ‘I don’t know what to do!’

In short, Hunter seems willing to ask for help, but only when he is driven to a point of complete frustration. When describing another mental image he had of his information-search journey, which was reminiscent of Dali’s The

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 144

144

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Figure 13.1 Hunter’s drawing

Persistence of Time, Hunter said, ‘The clock is drooping down and I’m looking at it with a worried expression on my face. And I’m hunched over like this, melting [laughter]’. Because of his time anxiety and lack of interest in anything beyond moving on to the next deadline, Hunter tended to consult the most convenient people possible, such as his mother and his friend on Second Life. At the time of our interview, Hunter was very worried that he had missed too many deadlines to pass. However, a few weeks later he texted me especially to let me know that he had passed.

Kaliq Kaliq accidentally selected a very hard topic for his essay on a true crime: a 1950s-era murder in a distant city. Kaliq found that the meagre newspaper database that UCC could afford was of little help on this relatively obscure topic. As Kaliq commented in a resigned tone, ‘[The librarian] explained to me that they don’t have as many as he would like as far as filed in their databases because of, you know, funding. It’s all because of funding.’ Undaunted, Kaliq decided to call two local research universities and spoke with two faculty members who gave him advice about finding relevant information for his search. As Kaliq put it, ‘You’ve got to think those are the people who do it at a higher level all the time so they probably have a lot of great suggestions.’ That said, Kaliq did not just select authoritative mediators

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 145

CLARK EXPLORING PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS OF STUDENTS’ SEARCH EXPERIENCES 145

because he wanted to write an ‘exemplary’ paper, but also because he thought it would actually save time in the end. ‘Getting a few good solid suggestions on where to go just seemed more efficient to me.’ Kaliq’s drawing and post-project reflection assignment bore out this attitude as well. He knew he had gone above and beyond in his information seeking and hoped that his efforts would be rewarded with the gigantic ‘A’ grade depicted in his drawing (Figure 13.2). As he wrote in his reflection, his information-search process was ‘the product of long, caffeine driven nights, adorned with sloppy shorthand notes and hand drawn maps, reminding me of possible avenues of discovery’. For Kaliq, both the quality of sources found and his ‘seriously agonizing’ and time-intensive information-seeking process were indications that he had completed an exemplary research paper.

Figure 13.2 Kaliq’s drawing

Ana Kaliq’s classmate Ana was very motivated to perform well at UCC in order to transfer to her dream institution to finish her undergraduate and graduate programmes. She also felt a great deal of anxiety about whether her writing was good enough to succeed at the college level. She commented: I feel like half the time my paper doesn’t make sense. But I don’t know if it was just me critiquing my own work or ... But the other people that I had read it, they said it sounded fine. … It did make me feel like, ‘Okay, my paper’s not terrible. I’m not going to fail this.’ … It was reassuring.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 146

146

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Ana took a straightforward approach to selecting mediators, exclusively asking friends and her instructor, ‘Mrs A’, for help. Having never written a paper that required a section refuting her argument, Ana asked Mrs A for advice on finding sources that opposed her thesis. Also, as Ana and a friend were both studying at the library, they helped each other to find sources for the other’s papers: ‘She read my rough draft, and so she researched [The BTK Killer]. She found a site that I hadn’t even looked at which showed some very gruesome photos which I actually incorporated into my PowerPoint.’ Summing up the role of search-mediation encounters in her information search, Ana said, ‘It helps to reassure, yeah, whether my paper was good or not … and to see what someone else thought about them, my case, besides just what I was thinking.’

Frank Frank, a mature student attending UCC as a first step toward his ultimate goal of becoming a substance-abuse counsellor, had a different attitude towards information seeking than did Hunter, Kaliq or Ana. As Frank talked, I soon realized that it would be impossible to understand his journey as a solitary one, even by the standards of a study exploring the social aspects of the information-search process. Frank described to me a world filled with family and friends; mentors and protégés; and a free-flowing exchange of information and guidance that permeated and powered his entire social web. Frank stated that he regularly asked for help from professors, librarians and tutors, but most of all from educated friends and family, many of whom held advanced degrees in various fields. In one of his most fascinating stories of information-search mediation, Frank described wandering around a family reunion asking for help with his humanities essay on Antigone: I’m asking people, ‘What do you know about Antigone?’ [And they replied] ‘Who?!’ [Laughter] Oh, my God. It was crazy. … And my niece who got her – she got her doctor’s from Ole Miss. … So I’m like, ‘You had to write a dissertation. Come on, man. Help me. Give me a bone here.’ … She said, ‘You’re a writer. You can do this. You can do this.’ And I ended up making an A on the paper.

However, the A wasn’t Frank’s goal, but, rather, a signpost that he was on the right track. Frank repeatedly described his information seeking within a larger journey toward becoming ‘an educated person’.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 147

CLARK EXPLORING PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS OF STUDENTS’ SEARCH EXPERIENCES 147

Deadlines, grades and becoming educated: discussion of implications for critical information literacy The journeys made by Hunter, Kaliq, Ana and Frank through searchmediation encounters and the information-search process as a whole echoed the tension described by Patterson (2009) in his discussion of critical information literacy. All four students seemed to accept the notion that a particular grade assigned to their worth by the authority of the institution was a valid assessment of their work, and possibly even a currency of sorts in their attempts to gain greater cultural capital within existing power struggles through college education. However, none of the students discussed above saw their information searches as mere transactions within a banking model of education. Hunter spoke of finding topics that he found engaging. He also drew and described striking images depicting his work, from a stressed-out figure clenching his paper in frustration when asking a friend for help, to a sense of disintegration when staring at a clock ticking down toward a deadline. Kaliq was driven to create new ideas about his topic and Ana was thrilled when her friend found striking, albeit ‘gruesome’, images to capture her classmates’ attention when presenting her research in class. Frank perhaps spoke most eloquently of the transcendent and transformative powers of education, saying that in his estimation, ‘Education shouldn’t limit you, but it should expand you’. By starting with the stories of how students actually do engage with information seeking and search mediators, rather than with theories of how a critically conscious information seeker ‘should’ go about these activities in order to become liberated, a more interesting and nuanced picture emerges. All four students are interested in attaining success, but success as they define it. Although each student values both a good grade and creative expression to varying degrees, none seems to follow a simple neoliberal desire for economic success, nor a Freirean vision of cultural transformation. In a similar vein, these students each used mediation to learn both ‘the grammar of information’ (Elmborg, 2006) and the skills and mind-sets needed to create meaning from the information they found. In idiosyncratic ways, each student found a way to ‘create works written with the authority that flows from understanding information’s political, social, and economic dimensions’ (Patterson, 2009, 358). The students in this study seemed to consult mediators not from a position of supplication, but from a keen understanding of their needs and shortcomings in the cognitive, emotional and procedural aspects of information seeking. Although these students are still grappling with the basics of search mechanics and digital literacy, they all seemed to be highly capable of identifying who would have the skills or expertise required to help them. By attending to their stories and

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 148

148

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

experiences of information seeking, our students may eventually teach us how to best guide them to a critically conscious mind-set that will empower both information seekers and the communities in which they live and work. That prospect would likely make Paulo Freire smile.

Note 1

http://secondlife.com/.

References Bourdieu, P. (1986) The Forms of Capital. In J. Richardson (ed.), Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, Greenwood. Clark, D. L., Guba, E. G. and Smith, G. R. (1977) Functions and Definitions of Functions of a Research Proposal, University of Indiana. Clark, S. (2014) Exploring the Lived Information-seeking Experiences of Mature Students, Journal of Information Literacy, 8 (1), 58–84. Elmborg, J. (2006) Critical Information Literacy: implications for instructional practice, Journal of Academic Librarianship, 32 (2), 192–9. Freire, P. (1970) Pedagogy of the Oppressed (30th anniversary edn), Continuum. Kearney, K. and Hyle, A. E. (2004) Drawing Out Emotions in Organizations: the use of participant-produced drawings in qualitative inquiry, Qualitative Research, 4 (3), 361–83. Kuhlthau, C. C. (1991) Inside the Search Process: information-seeking from the user’s perspective. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 42 (5), 361–71. Kuhlthau, C. C. (1993) A Principle of Uncertainty for Information Seeking, Journal of Documentation, 49 (4), 339–55. Kuhlthau, C. C. (2004) Seeking Meaning: a process approach to library and information services, 2nd edn, Libraries Unlimited. Limberg, L. and Sundin, O. (2006) Teaching Information Seeking: relating information literacy education to theories of information behaviour, Information Research, 12 (1), 7–22. Lincoln, Y. S. and Guba, E. G. (1986) But Is it Rigorous? Trustworthiness and authenticity in naturalistic evaluation, New Directions for Program Evaluation, 30, 73–84. Mannay, D. (2010) Making the Familiar Strange: can visual research methods render the familiar setting more perceptible? Qualitative Research, 10 (1), 91–111. McKenna, J. (2009) The Actions of Teacher-Librarians Minimize or Reinforce Barriers to Adolescent Information Seeking, Evidence Based Library and Information Practice, 4 (2), 168–71. Patterson, D. (2009) Information Literacy and Community College Students: using

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 149

CLARK EXPLORING PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS OF STUDENTS’ SEARCH EXPERIENCES 149

new approaches to literacy theory to produce equity, Library Quarterly, 79 (3), 343–61. Shah, C. and Kitzie, V. (2012) Social Q and A and Virtual Reference – Comparing Apples and Oranges with the Help of Experts and Users, Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 63 (10), 2020–36. Stake, R. E. (2006) Multiple Case Study Analysis, Guilford Press. Swanson, T. A. (2004) A Radical Step: implementing a critical information literacy model. Portal: Libraries and the Academy, 4 (2), 259–73. Swanson, T. (2011) A Critical Information Literacy Model: library leadership within the curriculum. Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 35 (11), 877–94.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 150

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 151

CHAPTER 14

Diffusing critical web literacy in a teachereducation setting: initial reflections and future planning Evangelia Bougatzeli and Efi Papadimitriou

Introduction Despite the fact that the web was not designed for use either by children or in educational settings, many governments throughout the world, including Greece (Τζιμογιάννης, 2011), have adopted policies to support its use in educational settings. However, effective online reading demands different capabilities and attitudes as compared to reading printed texts (Coiro and Dobler, 2007). These capabilities and attitudes are often termed ‘web literacy’, ‘an ability to recognize and assess a wide range of rhetorical situations and an attentiveness to the information conveyed in a source’s non-textual features’ (Sorapure et al., 1998, 410). Sorapure et al. (1998, 410) argue that ‘teaching such a literacy means supplementing the evaluative criteria traditionally applied to print sources with new strategies for making sense of diverse kinds of texts presented in hypertextual and multimedia formats’. A common distinction is made between three principal subcategories of webliteracy abilities, namely: • web-searching abilities (e.g. defining appropriate keywords/phrases, knowing alternative ways to locate information) • web-reading abilities (e.g. navigating meaningfully through hyperlinks, exploiting web pages’ features such as internal searching, indices) • web-evaluation abilities (e.g. assessing the reliability and authority of online information). However, web literacy also encompasses intricate higher-order skills and cognitive capabilities required not only to evaluate the content credibility of the accessed information, but also to reveal both the interests that constructed this specific content and the forces that dominate and shape the whole web.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 152

152

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Enhancing web literacy among students requires that teachers themselves become web literate. However, there is a scarcity of web-literacy training for teachers (David, 2009). For example, in Greece a recent study (Bougatzeli et al., 2015) showed that there is a need for web-literacy initiatives to ensure (a) effective pluralism in information provision in educational settings, and (b) the critical evaluation and exploitation of information resources for the benefit of learners. This chapter describes a multi-level intervention which has been designed and implemented within the undergraduate programme of the Department of Primary Education of the School of Education at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. It outlines the content and implementation of this intervention and then describes student reactions. As the initiative took place in a Greek university, the chapter starts with a brief description of the Greek educational context.

The Greek educational context The Greek Constitution Law (article 16) declares that education is a basic mission of the state and that all Greeks have the right to be educated by state institutions at all levels, free of charge. In addition, compulsory education should not last less than nine years. Within primary and secondary education, the curriculum is national, compulsory and uniform. It is designed, formulated and controlled by the Ministry of Education and Religious Affairs. The curriculum is more like a syllabus, as subject matter and the number of hours allocated for each area of content are described in detail. There is a single compulsory textbook for each subject, approved by the Ministry. Each textbook contains the topics and lessons to be taught, the questions to be posed and problems to be solved by the pupils, as well as assessment and evaluation sheets. Textbooks cover a great deal of subject matter in an almost encyclopedic way. Furthermore, there is an almost complete lack of school libraries and a weak presence of public libraries. It could therefore be claimed that the teaching environment in primary and secondary Greek education is dominated by a reproductive, knowledge transmission-oriented philosophy, with the teachers’ focus being on covering the textbook material. As a result, most students enter pre-service training and education with a teacher-centred philosophy that supports an information-transmission and examinationsoriented model of education (Drenoyianni, 2004). However, recently two innovations have been introduced. The first is the compulsory teaching of a ‘Research Project’1 as a separate course within the 10th- and 11th-grade curricula. The second is the design of a language curriculum2 for compulsory education based on principles of critical literacy and incorporating the exploitation of web information resources. To date,

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 153

BOUGATZELI AND PAPADIMITRIOU DIFFUSING CRITICAL WEB LITERACY 153

however, there have been no studies about how these innovations, both introduced in 2011–12, are being implemented in the classroom and what impact they are having on pupils’ learning. Teacher education in Greece takes place at university level and consists of an eight-semester study programme. The content and structure of initial primary teacher-education programmes varies across universities and is greatly influenced by the extent of funding, the availability of human resources and the number of students admitted. Most primary teachereducation curricula follow a three-phase model. The first phase focuses on general pedagogical, psychological, sociological and historical principles underlying approaches to teaching and learning; the second concentrates on subject-specific methodologies of teaching and learning; and the third on student practical experience, which involves observation of classroom teaching and the preparation and implementation of lesson plans in primary schools (Trilianos, 1998).

Designing the integration of critical web-literacy components in teacher education This section describes the overall design of a critical web-literacy course within the primary education undergraduate programme at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and provides some examples to illustrate how this translates into taught sessions.

Overview of course design The design of this web-literacy intervention draws on the assumption that teachers are more likely to embrace a web-literacy curriculum that connects to pedagogical strategies to improve how they teach traditional school subjects. The tutors have therefore sought to design the integration of webliteracy components into teaching information literacy and language modules using a scaffolding approach (Table 14.1 on the next page). The theoretical background of the intervention is based on the critical literacy perspective that texts are considered to be carriers of ideology, containing political views and being positioned at a certain place on the political spectrum (Lankshear and McLaren, 1993). In particular, it draws on the application of the critical-literacy principles in the mass media – critical media literacy (Sholle and Denski, 1993) – resulting in a focus of interest on exposing the ideology behind media content and on understanding the political and economic context of the media as cultural institutions. According to this approach, the media form part of the economic system, in the sense that they ‘sell’ the content of mass culture and have a direct connection to

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 154

154

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Table 14.1 A multi-level approach to critical web literacy Course and year of study Content outline and web-literacy focus Year 1 Development of students’ information literacy Information Literacy abilities (Compulsory module, Websites as information sources 18 hours) (1 workshop) Year 2 Language and New Literacies at School (Compulsory module, 36 hours)

Websites as a medium for teaching (evaluation of websites proposed by http://digitalschool.minedu.gov.gr/) (2 workshops)

Year 3 Media Literacy and Teaching Language (Elective module, 36 hours)

Focused on the clarification of concepts, nature and attributes of the web as a whole. Reflections on web access and functional issues from a pedagogical perspective. Reflections on the nature of information itself, what we search for on the web and what we ask our students to search for. (3 workshops)

Year 4 Multimodal Discourse Teaching Practices (Elective module, 36 hours)

Students develop, plan and implement lesson plans which integrate critical web literacy into their language-teaching practices in schools. (3 workshops)

policy making and, therefore, to political interests. This means that media analysis is concerned both with ownership issues – that is, who controls the media and therefore holds the power – and with the ways in which the forces of the communication market operate, which undoubtedly includes in terms of profit. Consequently, the web, and the internet more broadly, are not neutral, coming from nowhere, not belonging to anyone. Rather, they are perceived as an environment where interests and power relations develop between individuals, groups, organizations and companies, promoting an ideology that favours those in positions of power. This raises issues of access to information (what kind of access, access to what information); of content control; of the privatization of social discourse; and of the internet as an educational and democratic means. As a result, it is considered necessary to examine or, more precisely, to re-examine issues related to what constitutes content, who controls the content, how much the content costs and how that content can serve education (Burbules and Callister, 2000). In this sense, teachers and students must have a set of abilities that will enable them to ‘manage’ the issue of not merely evaluation but also critical understanding of the wide range of conflicting political ideas and the ideological framework of the internet and the web (Fabos, 2004; Fabos, 2008). In other words, if our aim is to utilize the web as an educational tool, we need first to develop the ability to judge the web as a whole and understand that

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 155

BOUGATZELI AND PAPADIMITRIOU DIFFUSING CRITICAL WEB LITERACY 155

all ‘discourses’ are inherently ideological and that all ‘texts’ – including complex web multimodal resources – are built on political and economic foundations. Therefore, the ultimate aim is for teacher-education students not to accept information on the web as given, but to challenge it and to try to see ‘behind the screen’ by posing questions such as: • • • •

Why does this information exist/what is its purpose? Whose interests does this information serve/undermine? How does web searching function/how does a website function? Could it work differently and how? (Baynham, 1995, 2)

The intervention at Aristotle University consists of weekly 3-hour workshops, which are held in a computer lab. It focuses on the processes of teaching and learning, rather than on the provision of instruction and the delivery of prespecified content. It uses problem-solving approaches in addition to resource-based learning and group work. Furthermore, the learning tasks and web activities are designed to be realistic and relevant to students’ professional lives, both in the university and at school. As such, tasks are interesting and motivating because they have a clear significance which trainees can readily understand and because they reinforce the connection between the pre-service training experience and tangible, real-life web use. The tasks and assignments are carefully designed so as to develop trainees’ information literacy and web information-handling abilities. Hence, they involve information seeking and analysis, interpretation, evaluation and synthesis, and reflection on the web as a learning medium at school. Assessment methods (mainly group assignments and presentations) tend to concentrate on the improvement of practice and are directly connected to teaching practice. For example, for their final assignment students might interview an in-service teacher regarding the ways in which they apply web information sources within their teaching. In this way the students gain the opportunity both to map a professional’s attitudes towards the web and their actual web teaching practices, and to reflect ‘critiquely’ (Gee, 2000, 62) on the ways in which systems of power and injustice influence the theory and practice of using web resources in education. The learning environment is supportive and competition free. Help, support and guidance from peers and tutors are greatly valued and trainees are encouraged to work collaboratively in the pursuit of common learning aims, to share ideas, to have discussions and, most importantly, to enjoy themselves. To paraphrase Allan Luke’s (2000, 453) words, the overall aim of this critical web-literacy intervention is to create a learning environment where students and tutors together work to see how the worlds of hypertexts in the web work to construct their worlds, their cultures and their identities in powerful, often overtly ideological ways.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 156

156

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Examples of practical sessions The following are some examples of how these ideas have been translated into practical activities within the taught sessions for different years of the course.

Language and new literacies at school During two workshops for the Language and New Literacies at School course, second-year students evaluate websites that the Ministry of Education suggests for use in classrooms3 and reflect on the use of web information resources as a medium for teaching and learning. The objectives here are for students to: • understand how multimodal messages on a website construct meaning • determine who created a specific message in a website, and why • acknowledge what the creator of the message wants the reader to believe or do • acknowledge the ‘tools of persuasion’ that are used • recognize bias, premium of specific views, misinformation and false information • identify what is not said • evaluate the website’s multimodal messages from the teacher’s standpoint. During the first workshop students learn about hypertext, analyse the multimodality of a specific website and evaluate it with the help of a rubric. For the next workshop, each team chooses a website from the digital textbooks4 and creates a 20-minute presentation evaluating this website as a medium for teaching and learning.

Media literacy and teaching language During three workshops in the Media Literacy and Teaching Language course, third-year students learn about the concepts of the internet and the web and acquire basic knowledge about their structure, function and history. By conducting the same search in various ways, they also reflect on the ways in which we access web information resources (mainly through commercial search engines), decode their function and purposes and realize that such access is intrinsically interwoven with the quality of information. This leads them to reflect on the very nature of the information itself. By completing these workshops students are expected to acquire an understanding that some data or ‘facts’ are inevitably situated more advantageously than others within a particular social, economic and political context.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 157

BOUGATZELI AND PAPADIMITRIOU DIFFUSING CRITICAL WEB LITERACY 157

Multimodal discourse teaching practices During three workshops for the Multimodal Discourse Teaching Practices course, fourth-year students develop, plan and implement lesson plans which integrate critical web-literacy components into their language teaching practice in schools. At the end, the groups present their applied lesson plans and discussion follows about the pedagogical implications arising from the application of such teaching activities in the classroom.

Students’ reactions During the last session of the course, first-year students were asked to complete an online questionnaire commenting on the content, structure, benefits and limitations of the course. This feedback together with the second-, third- and fourth-year students’ presentations, discussions and assignments, and the field notes kept by the course tutors and authors of this paper, constituted a comprehensive record of the intervention. This demonstrated that students in the lower years of the course lacked basic knowledge about how the web works. Therefore, considerable time needed to be devoted to the explanation of hypertext technology and the websites’ design elements, and their consequences for education. Many students trusted websites simply ‘because these are proposed by the Ministry of Education, a formal and impartial body. The information available to us through this body is valid and objective’ (Second-year student). However, the fourth-year students did display critical web-literacy abilities to some extent. Well before using any web resources to support their teaching, the students checked their validity and credibility, even if they were suggested by reputable institutions (educational or official). They were becoming aware that such resources can present the appearance of being impartial, but in fact may be used to serve political and economic/commercial interests: while the impression is created that this website refers to interactive books, surfing leads to books that are for sale and invites the reader to buy. So, the teacher strays from the initial target which is to promote reading and wonders about the potential trade targets of this website, which are connected with specific publishing houses that the website displays and thanks, subtly but frequently. This is a serious factor affecting the reliability of the website, since it is committed to serving commercial purposes, therefore we are not talking about objectivity in knowledge. (Fourth-year student)

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 158

158

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Conclusion This chapter has illustrated how an intervention might be designed to teach critical literacy, as well as web-literacy skills, within an undergraduate teacher-education course. This is clearly challenging for trainee teachers who have themselves been educated within a system that is dominated by knowledge transmission rather than more questioning and exploratory approaches. However, there is evidence that, by the end of their course, students are beginning to acknowledge and implement notions of critical literacy as they explore the web to identify teaching resources. If they can carry this into their practice as newly qualified teachers, this is likely to have a significant impact both on their own teaching practices and on the ways their students are taught to use the web.

Notes 1 2 3 4

http://ebooks.edu.gr/new/course-main.php?course=DSGL-A107. http://digitalschool.minedu.gov.gr. http://digitalschool.minedu.gov.gr. http://digitalschool.minedu.gov.gr.

References Baynham, M. (1995) Literacy Practices, Longman. Bougatzeli, E., Papademetriou, E. and Douka, M. (2015) Critical Search and Evaluation Practices of Web Information Resources Applied by Senior Students in the Department of Primary Education of AUTH for the Design of Alternative Projects in Teaching Language. In Grollios, G., Liambas, A. and Pavlidis, P. (eds), Proccedings of the IV International Conference on Critical Education ‘Critical Education in the Era of Crisis’. Burbules, N. C. and Callister, T. A. (2000) Watch IT: the risks and promises of new information technologies for education, Westview Press. Coiro, J. and Dobler, E. (2007) Exploring the Online Reading Comprehension Strategies Used by Sixth-grade Skilled Readers to Search for and Locate Information on the Internet, Reading Research Quarterly, 42 (2), 214–57. David, J. (2009) Teaching Media Literacy, Educational Leadership, 66 (6), 84–6. Drenoyianni, H. (2004) Designing and Implementing a Project-Based ICT Course in a Teacher Education Setting: rewards and pitfalls, Education and Information Technologies, 9 (4), 387–4. Fabos, B. (2004) Wrong Turn on the Information Superhighway: education and the commercialization of the internet, Teachers College Press. Fabos, B. (2008) The Price of Information: critical literacy, education and today’s internet. In Coiro, J., Lankshear, C., Knobel, M. and Leu, D. J. (eds), Handbook of

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 159

BOUGATZELI AND PAPADIMITRIOU DIFFUSING CRITICAL WEB LITERACY 159

Research on New Literacies, Routledge. Gee, J. P. (2000) New People in New Worlds: networks, the new capitalism and schools. In Cope, B. and Kalantzis, M. (eds) Multiliteracies: literacy learning and the design of social futures, Routledge. Lankshear, C. and McLaren, P. (1993) Critical Literacy: politics, praxis, and the postmodern, State University of New York Press. Luke, A. (2000) Critical Literacy in Australia: a matter of context and standpoint, Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 43 (5), 448–59. Sholle, D. and Denski, S. (1993) Reading and Writing the Media: critical media literacy and postmodernism. In Lankshear, C. and McLaren, P. (eds), Critical Literacy: politics, praxis, and the postmodern, State University of New York Press. Sorapure, M., Inglesby, P. and Yatchisin, G. (1998) Web Literacy: challenges and opportunities for research in a new medium, Computers and Composition, 15, 409–24. Trilianos, A. (1998) Teaching Practice Developments for Students Intending to Become Primary School Teachers: the Greek perspective, European Education, 30 (2), 73–8. Τζιμογιάννης, Α. κ.α. (2011) Το Πρόγραμμα Σπουδών για τον Πληροφορικό Γραμματισμό στο Δημοτικό: Οδηγός για τον εκπαιδευτικό. 1ηέκδ. Αθήνα: ΠαιδαγωγικόΙνστιτούτο. [in Greek].

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 160

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 161

Further information The following are suggestions for further information about the various concepts introduced in this book. This is not intended to be an exhaustive list but, in conjunction with the references at the end of each chapter, indicates where further details about particular themes can be found. It includes resources related to the development and practice of critical pedagogy; critical literacy, both in general terms and in its application in library settings; critical literacy teaching resources; and the related theories of new literacies and New Literacy Studies.

Critical pedagogy Freire, P. (1970) Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Herder and Herder. One of the foundational texts of critical pedagogy. First published in Portuguese in 1968 and translated into English in 1970. Pedagogy of the Oppressed website, www.pedagogyoftheoppressed.com/. Background to Freire’s life and critical pedagogy. Freire Institute (University of Central Lancashire, UK), www.freire.net/. An organization for transformative community-based learning. The website includes articles, news items and background information about critical pedagogy. The Freire Project website, www.freireproject.org/. The Freire Project is dedicated to building an international critical community which works to promote social justice in a variety of cultural contexts. Its website contains networking assistance, archival materials and public access publications and videos. Discussion with Noam Chomsky and Bruno della Chiesa, www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SOw55BU7yg. The Askwith Forum commemorated the 45th anniversary of the publication of Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed with a discussion about the book’s impact and relevance to education today.

Critical literacy Critical Literacy Journal (open access), www.criticalliteracyjournal.org/. The journal Critical Literacy: Theories and Practices publishes articles related to theoretical discussions and practices of critical literacy within a wide range of perspectives and disciplines. It proposes a definition of critical literacy as an educational practice that emphasizes the connections between language, knowledge, power and subjectivities.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 162

162

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

Luke, A. (2012) Critical Literacy Foundation Notes, Theory into Practice, 5 (1), http://eprints.qut.edu.au/41519/2/41519.pdf. In this article Allan Luke traces the lineage of critical literacy from Freire, through critical pedagogies and discourse analysis. He discusses the need for a contingent definition of critical literacy, given the increasingly sophisticated nature of texts and discourses. Behrman, E. (2006) Teaching about Language, Power, and Text: a review of classroom practices that support critical literacy, Journal of Adult and Adolescent Literacy, 49 (6), 490–8. Edward Behrman examines 35 articles published between 1999 and 2003 that present lessons or units to support critical literacy at the upperprimary or secondary levels. His review organizes the classroom practices into six broad categories: reading supplementary texts; reading multiple texts; reading from a resistant perspective; producing countertexts; conducting student-choice research projects; and taking social action. Shannon, P. (2002) Critical Literacy in Everyday Life, Language Arts, 79, 415–24. Patrick Shannon shares stories of his family’s literacy projects in schools, at home and on the street to explore how critical literacy can become part of our everyday lives and dreams for a better future. Rogers, R., Kramer, M. A. and Mosley, M. (2009) Designing Socially Just Learning Communities: critical literacy education across the lifespan, Routledge. This collaboratively written book draws on the voices of classroom teachers, adult educators, university professors and community activists in a teacher-led professional development group that have worked together over a number of years to better understand the relationship between literacy and social justice. Mulcahy, C. M. (2008) Chapter 1: The Tangled Web We Weave: critical literacy and critical thinking, Counterpoints, 326, Critical Literacy as Resistance: teaching for social justice across the secondary curriculum, pp. 15–27, www.jstor.org/stable/42980102?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents. A discussion of critical literacy and critical thinking and the way they compare to each other.

Libraries and critical literacy Elmborg, J. (2012) Critical Information Literacy: definitions and challenges. In Wilkinson, C. W. and Bruch, C. (eds), Transforming Information Literacy Programs: intersecting frontiers of self, library culture,

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 163

FURTHER INFORMATION

163

and campus community, Association of College and Research Libraries, http://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1013&context=slis_pubs. An overview of key terms and issues in the field. Accardia, M., Drabinski, E. and Kumbier, A. (eds) (2010) Critical Library Instruction: theories and methods, Library Juice Press. A book focused on critical literacy-instruction methods, with chapters addressing issues including: critical approaches to standards and assessment practices; links between queer, anti-racist and feminist pedagogies and the library classroom; intersections of critical theories of power and knowledge and the library; and the promise and challenge of reflective instructional practices. Smith, L. (2013) Critical Information Literacy Instruction for the Development of Political Agency, Journal of Information Literacy, 7 (2), 15–32. Focuses on the ways in which the theory of critical information literacy may be of benefit to young people of secondary school age in terms of increasing their political agency. critlib, http://critlib.org/. A movement of library workers dedicated to bringing social-justice principles into their work. They engage in discussion about critical perspectives on library practice, including regular Twitter chats.

Teaching resources Ontario Ministry of Education’s Capacity Building Series, https://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/literacynumeracy/inspire/research/ Critical_Literacy.pdf. A brief overview of critical literacy for educators. Ontario Ministry of Education’s Literacy and Numeracy Secretariat and the Ontario Association of Deans of Education’s What Works? Research into Practice, https://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/literacynumeracy/inspire/research/ WW_PromotingCriticalLiteracy.pdf. An overview of critical-literacy research for educators. Center for Media Literacy (CML) Toolkit, www.medialit.org/cml-medialit-kit. Includes a range of critical media resources (both free and for purchase) that can be used for training workshops, in-service training, library reference and parent/community education as well as in the school classroom. The Critical Media Project, www.criticalmediaproject.org/. Designed for high school instructors and other educators who seek to

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 164

164

PART 2 CRITICAL LITERACY IN PRACTICE

incorporate critical media literacy into the classroom. The site contains a wide range of media artefacts that explore the politics of identity across issues of race and ethnicity, class, gender and sexuality.

Practical resources to support the teaching of critical literacy using comics Cartoon Movement, http://www.cartoonmovement.com/comic. Ad Astra Comix, http://adastracomix.com/. Arch Comics, www.archcomix.com/comicsarchive/. Sites that can support the teaching of critical literacy using comics, cartoons and related visual resources. Global Learning Programme, http://globaldimension.org.uk/glp. The Global Learning Programme aims to help young people understand their role in a globally interdependent world; explore strategies by which they can make it more just and sustainable; and stimulate critical thinking about global issues, both at a whole school and at individual pupil level. The website includes a range of teaching resources across age groups (3–16+), topics and curriculum areas.

New literacies and New Literacy Studies Gee, J. P. (2010) A Situated-Sociocultural Approach to Literacy and Technology. In Baker, E. (ed.), The New Literacies: multiple perspectives on research and practice, Guilford, www.csun.edu/sites/default/files/James-Gee-sociotech.pdf. Provides an overview of several related intellectual movements: New Literacy Studies, Situated Cognition Studies, the New Literacies Studies, and the New Media Literacy Studies. Coiro, J., Knobel, M., Lankshear, C. and Leu, D. (2008) Handbook of Research on New Literacies, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates/Taylor and Francis Group. This handbook reviews research on new literacies within six sections: methodologies; knowledge and inquiry; communication; everyday literacies; instructional practices and assessment; and multiple perspectives on new literacies research. Pahl, K. and Rowsell, J. (eds) (2012) Literacy and Education: understanding the New Literacy Studies in the classroom, Paul Chapman. A guide to current theory in New Literacy Studies, with an emphasis on practical applications in the classroom.

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 165

Index

academic honesty Higher Education Academy (HEA) 123 International Baccalaureate (IB) 123–8 plagiarism 123, 125, 127 school students 123–8 academic suppers, school students 112 ACRL Information Literacy Framework 26–8 ADA see Americans with Disabilities Act adult learning 79–89 andragogy 81–3 assumptions 81–2 challenges 88 defining 79 Flex-Track Program 79–82 information-search mediation 139, 146 Knowles, Malcolm 81–3 McClusky, H. 84–6 Mezirow, Jack 86–8 Roosevelt University 79–89 social justice 81–8

technologies 85 theory of margin 84–6 transformative learning 86–8 advice on reading, promoting fiction reading 8 aesthetic stance, reading stance 4–5 alternative endings, critical stance  13 alternative settings, critical stance 14 American Library Association media literacy 95–6 Young Adult Library Services Association 95–6 Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) 57, 58, 60 andragogy adult learning 81–3 Knowles, Malcolm 81–3 Aristotle University of Thessaloniki critical web literacy 152–8 teacher education 152–8 assets/barriers, international students’ information literacy 48–51 authority over information practices 71–4

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 166

166

CRITICAL LITERACY FOR INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS

barriers/assets, international students’ information literacy 48–51 Big6, information literacy model 105 caricatures, media literacy 99–100 Center for Media Literacy (CML) 95–6 characters’ points of view, critical stance 13–14 citizenship syllabus, school students 106 CML see Center for Media Literacy Communications and Culture (AQA), critical literacy in the school curriculum 107–9 communities of practice 69–71 community college context, critical information literacy 140–8 constructors of meaning, students as 23–6 contextualizing, critical stance 13 criminal justice system 93 Reading in a Secure Environment (RISE) 11 critical approaches, challenges 14 critical health literacy 33 critical information literacy community college context 140–8 information search mediation 140–8 library examples 129–30 obstacles 135 undergraduate communications students 129–35 University of Memphis 131–5 critical literacy, further information 161–2 critical pedagogy, further information 161 critical reflection/discourse, transformative learning 87

critical skills, school students 116–18 critical stance alternative endings 13 alternative settings 14 characters’ points of view 13–14 contextualizing 13 interrogating a text 12 juxtaposing texts 12 reading groups 11–14 reading stance 5–7 role reversal 13 critical web literacy 151–8 abilities 151 Aristotle University of Thessaloniki 152–8 course design 153–5 Greek educational context 152–3 multi-level approach 153–5 practical sessions 156–7 students’ reactions 157 teacher education 152–8 cultural differences information literacy 47–8 international students’ information literacy 47–8 curriculum, school students 105–6 digital habitats 69–71 disability 57–63 Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) 57, 58, 60 disability checklist 61 ILFA (International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions) 61 ‘includer’ mindsets 60–3 mindsets and learning 59–60 new literacies 59–60 Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) 58, 61–2 scenario planning 62–3 technologies 60, 61, 62

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 167

INDEX

education profession, theory– practice gap 65–6 efferent stance, reading stance 4–5 empowering patients, health-education comics 38–40 Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library (EVPL) media literacy 94–103 Youth Care Center (YCC) 94–103 fiction reading critical approach challenges 14 in libraries 10–14 promoting 7–10 Reading in a Secure Environment (RISE) 11 social justice concerns 11 Wirral National Model Project 11 ‘five Ws’, information literacy 119 Flex-Track Program adult learning 79–82 social justice 80–1 further information critical literacy 161–2 critical pedagogy 161 libraries and critical literacy 162–3 New Literacy Studies 164 teaching resources 163–4 gender media literacy 99–100 sexism 107–9 Georgia Conference on Information Literacy 24 Greek educational context, critical web literacy 152–3 HEA see Higher Education Academy health literacy see critical health literacy healthcare consultations, healtheducation comics 35–7

167

healthcare interactions, power relationships 32 health-education comics 31–41 critical health literacy 33 empowering patients 38–40 healthcare consultations 35–7 potential use 35–7 purposes 31, 35–7 reading critically 33–5 studying readers 35–40 hermeneutic framework information literacy 20–1 reading as interpretation 20–1 Higher Education Academy (HEA), academic honesty 123 humour, media literacy 101 IB see International Baccalaureate IFLA (International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions), disability checklist 61 ‘includer’ mindsets disability 60–3 practical applications 60–3 Independent Learning Challenge, school students 110–11 information literacy ACRL Information Literacy Framework 26–8 assumptions 47–8 barriers/assets 48–51 cultural differences 47–8 ‘five Ws’ 119 Georgia Conference on Information Literacy 24 hermeneutic framework 20–1 international students 43–52 librarians’ approaches 43–52 librarianship 21–3 measuring 47 models of instruction 26

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 168

168

CRITICAL LITERACY FOR INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS

information literacy (continued) New Literacy Studies 43–52 positivism 21–3 Prague Declaration 118 reading as interpretation 20–1 reading with prejudice 24–5 repositioning students 19–28 research as empowerment 25–6 SCONUL 118 ‘significance’, semantics 21 information literacy models ACRL Information Literacy Framework 26–8 Big6 105 PLUS 105 school students 105 information search mediation critical information literacy 140–8 mature students 139, 146 Urban Community College (UCC) 140–8 International Baccalaureate (IB) academic honesty 123–8 diploma programme 124–8 international students’ information literacy assumptions 47–8 barriers/assets 48–51 common observations 45–6 cultural differences 47–8 learning difficulties 46 librarians’ approaches 43–52 measuring information literacy 47 New Literacy Studies 43–52 recommendations 51–2 interrogating a text, critical stance 12 juxtaposing texts, critical stance 12 Khan Academy, school students 116 Knowles, Malcolm

adult learning 81–3 andragogy 81–3 learning, and mindsets 59–60 learning difficulties, international students’ information literacy 46 librarianship information literacy 21–3 positivism 21–3 libraries and critical literacy, further information 162–3 Lloyd, Annemaree context specificity of information literacy 67 views of information literacy 66–70 Malvern St James School, critical literacy in the curriculum 107–10 mature students see also adult learning information-search mediation 139, 146 McClusky, H. adult learning 84–6 theory of margin 84–6 media literacy 93–103 American Library Association 95–6 caricatures 99–100 Center for Media Literacy (CML) 95–6 Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library (EVPL) 94–103 gender 99–100 humour 101 Media Sensationalism and Youth programme 94, 96–103 news journals vs tabloids 96–8 power 99–100

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 169

INDEX

media literacy (continued) skills 101–3 tabloid creation 102 understanding 95–6 ‘yellow journalism’ 96–7 Young Adult Library Services Association 95–6 Youth Care Center (YCC) 94–103 Media Sensationalism and Youth programme, media literacy 94, 96–103 Mezirow, Jack adult learning 86–8 transformative learning 86–8 mindsets ‘includer’ mindsets 60–3 and learning 59–60 mock elections, school students 111–12 multiliteracies, New Literacy Studies 45 National Research and Development Centre for Adult Literacy and Numeracy 79 NCES (United States National Center for Education Statistics) 79 new literacies, disability 59–60 New Literacy Studies further information 164 international students’ information literacy 43–52 librarians’ approaches 43–52 multiliteracies 45 strength 52 traditional approach to literacy 44 new media critical literacy teaching 119–20 defining 115–16 school students 115–21 Wikipedia 115–21

169

YouTube 115–21 news journals vs tabloids, media literacy 96–8 oral communication undergraduate communications students 131–5 University of Memphis 131–5 PBL see problem-based learning plagiarism see also academic honesty school students 123, 125, 127 PLUS, information literacy model 105 positivism information literacy 21–3 librarianship 21–3 Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), disability 58, 61–2 power, media literacy 99–100 power relationships, healthcare interactions 32 Prague Declaration, information literacy 118 problem-based learning (PBL) 130 Project qualifications (AQA), critical literacy in the school curriculum 109–10 promoting fiction reading 7–10 academic libraries 8 advice on reading 8 approaches 9 events 7–8 PSHE (personal, social, health and economic education) syllabus, school students 106 PTSD see Post Traumatic Stress Disorder pupils see school students radical information literacy 74–6

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 170

170

CRITICAL LITERACY FOR INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS

reader development 9–14 Reader Organization 11 reading groups 11–14 social inclusion 10–11 reader response aesthetic stance 4–5 critical literacy 3–7 critical stance 5–7 efferent stance 4–5 reader response theory 3–4 Reading Agency 93–4 reading as interpretation hermeneutic framework 20–1 information literacy 20–1 reading groups 11–14 alternative endings 13 alternative settings 14 characters’ points of view 13–14 contextualizing 13 critical stance 11–14 interrogating a text 12 juxtaposing texts 12 role reversal 13 social justice concerns 11 Reading in a Secure Environment (RISE), fiction reading 11 reading with prejudice, students 24–5 reflective practice 75–6 research as empowerment, students 25–6 RISE see Reading in a Secure Environment role reversal, critical stance 13 Roosevelt University adult learning 79–89 Flex-Track Program 79–82 social justice 80–1 scenario planning, disability 62–3 school librarians academic honesty role and

contribution 123–8 critical literacy engagement 8, 105, 107, 110, 118–21 school students 105–13, 115–21 academic honesty 123–8 academic suppers 112 citizenship syllabus 106 critical literacy in the curriculum 107–10 critical literacy teaching 119–20 critical skills 116–18 curriculum 105–6 extra-curricular critical literacy 110–12 ‘five Ws’ 119 Independent Learning Challenge 110–11 information literacy models 105 Malvern St James School 106–7 mock elections 111–12 new media 115–21 plagiarism 123, 125, 127 PSHE (personal, social, health and economic education) syllabus 106 social networking sites (SNSs) 116–17 SCONUL, information literacy 118 SNSs see social networking sites social inclusion 109 critical literacy 10–11 reader development 10–11 social justice adult learning 81–8 andragogy 81–3 Flex-Track Program 80–1 Roosevelt University 80–1 social justice concerns, reading groups 11 social justice theory 81–8 social networking sites (SNSs), school students 116–17

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 171

INDEX

stewarding, digital habitats 70–1 students as constructors of meaning 23–6 making connections 24 models of instruction 26 reading with prejudice 24–5 research as empowerment 25–6 tabloid creation, media literacy skills 102 tabloids vs news journals, media literacy 96–8 teacher education Aristotle University of Thessaloniki 152–8 critical web literacy 152–8 teaching resources, further information 163–4 technologies see also new media adult learning 85 disability 60, 61, 62 harnessing 108–9 theory of margin adult learning 84–6 McClusky, H. 84–6 theory–practice gap, education profession 65–6 traditional approach to literacy 44 transformative learning adult learning 86–8 critical reflection/discourse 87 Mezirow, Jack 86–8 UCC see Urban Community College undergraduate communications students critical information literacy 129–35 library examples, critical information literacy 129–30 oral communication 131–5

171

problem-based learning (PBL) 129–30 University of Memphis 131–5 United States National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) 79 University of Memphis critical information literacy 131–5 oral communication 131–5 undergraduate communications students 131–5 Urban Community College (UCC), information-search mediation 140–8 value of information literacy, workplace 68 views of information literacy Lloyd, Annemaree 66–70 Wenger, Etienne 69–71 Whitworth, A. 74–6 web literacy see critical web literacy Wenger, Etienne communities of practice 69–71 digital habitats 69–71 stewarding 70–1 views of information literacy 69–71 Whitworth, A. radical information literacy 74–6 views of information literacy 74–6 Wikipedia, school students 115–21 Wirral National Model Project, fiction reading 11 workplace 65–77 context specificity of information literacy 67 value of information literacy 68 ‘yellow journalism’, media literacy 96–7

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 172

172

CRITICAL LITERACY FOR INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS

Young Adult Library Services Association, media literacy 95–6 Youth Care Center (YCC)

Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library (EVPL) 94–103 media literacy 94–103 YouTube, school students 115–21

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 173

McNicol_Critical literacy 2016 29/03/2016 18:08 Page 174