February 7, 2010
The Spiritual Literacy
Stanely James- one of the African-Americans that Deborah Brandt had interviewed- says, “My grandfather was in slavery. And my grandmother was a full-blooded Cherokee Indian. She had a little education. But they could both read the Bible. It is one of the most peculiar things in my life. My grandfather could not read a newspaper but he could read a Bible and understand it. He was religious. All of our family was” (Brandt 114). This is quite interesting, yet it is true. Personally, I know a number of uneducated people who cannot read a sentence in anywhere except in the Holy Quran. They can read it “just like that”. One of my interpretations to this puzzle is that a person can achieve and master what he or she loves. (A simple advice to teachers: if you want your students to read, find what they love, i.e. what field the student prefers, e.g. sports, music, religion, travel, etc.) The first word appeared in the Holy Quran was “iqra” which means read (the imperative verb). Therefore, when a religious person states that he or she could read only the religious books, we cannot undermine his or her astonishing spiritual ability.
Aside from this understanding, the authors of Literacy state,” ..members of a church share assumptions about how the prayer book should be read during Sunday services” (p. 54). This statement is quite impressive for two reasons. First, it could be linked to the paragraph above assuming that spirituality can promote literacy in religious uneducated people (and of course in religious educated people, too), and therefore, they can lead the prayer although they lack the basic elements of literacy. The second reason is that statement supports the common understanding of how reading should be practiced. We accept the fact that the ability to read signifies literacy; however, the question is what happens after literacy is learned or acquired; in other words, what are those different outputs that people produce?
Hmoud,
ReplyDeleteI like the religious aspects of Literacy as well. In terms of Brandt, Religion can be a type of sponsor that helps to give practitioners access to various trade routes. Alot of terminology from Brandt, but Religion can be a powerful influence on literacy. At least for Brandt and some others scholars, they point out that religion can be seen as both positive and negative because of the ideology that comes with religion. In other words, religion has a motivation (output)behind its giving. Like conversion or allegiance. Does that make sense? I was really interested in your quote from the Koran...you'll have to tell me more.
Ugh. My post didn't post.
ReplyDeletetrying again. Let me see if I remember what I said . . . :)
Yes! So interesting. Fascinating, in fact. I love that the first word of the Quran is "read." In light of Brandt's findings, especially in terms of the "spiritual literacy" you describe, it seems a fascinating project could emerge from a study of just the populations you describe. Most of these studies we read here will have ties to the Christian faith, largely because the majority are in mainstream American populations. What about studies of faith-based literacy practices in communities tied to the Quran? I think that'd be a wonderful and important study. Thoughts?
I especially like how you end your reading response with questioning why literacy should end with reading, and I agree with your idea that people are producing something after learning to read. I think reading is the beginning of the evolution found with literacy. While we may begin a literacy program with reading instruction; this language understanding doesn't want to stop with that. Just as a child begins with taking one step, they learn to toddle first, then proceed right in to walking confidently which changes to taking off on a run. Realizing we can learn anything connects the dot to wanting to learn more about what we just discovered we can do; we are all just waiting to discover that there is no limit to what the mind can learn.
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