‘A Strong Belief in the Possibility of a Better Life’: The Pedagogy of Contingency and the Ethic of Solidarity in the Yes, I Can! Aboriginal Adult Literacy Campaign

Raising the standards of literacy in the developing world has been a major goal of the less developed countries since most of them became independent in the process of decolonisation that followed World War II. The Human Development Report 2004, brought out by the United Nations Development Programme lists some major improvements in increasing literacy levels of a number of countries between the year 1990 and 2002. For example, low human development countries like Togo increased their adult literacy rates from 44.2 percent in 1990 to 59.6 percent in 2002. Congo saw an increase in its literacy rate for the same period from 67.1 percent to 82.8 percent. The rates for Uganda, Kenya, Yemen, and Nigeria are 56.1 percent and 68.9 percent, 70.8 percent and 84.3 percent, 32.7 percent and 49.0 percent, and 48.7 percent and 68.8 percent respectively. If one examines the breakdown by region, the least developed countries as a group saw an increase in their adult literacy rates from 43.0 percent to 52.5 percent, the Arab states from 50.8 percent to 63.3 percent, South Asia from 47.0 percent to 57.6 percent, Sub-Saharan Africa from 50.8 percent to 63.2 percent and East Asia and the Pacific from 79.8 percent to 90.3 percent. If we look at the increase in the levels of literacy from the perspective of medium human development and low human development, the figures are 71.8 percent and 80.4 percent, and 42.5 percent and 54.3 percent, respectively.

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Back to the Future?: Timor-Leste, Cuba and the return of the mass literacy campaign

Literacy and Numeracy Studies ◽

10.5130/lns.v18i2.1898 ◽

1970 ◽

Vol 18 (2) ◽

pp. 58-74 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

Bob Boughton

Keyword(s):

Latin America ◽

Adult Literacy ◽

Original Research ◽

Literacy Campaign ◽

Independence Movement ◽

Timor Leste ◽

International Literacy ◽

Literacy Course ◽

National Literacy ◽

National Literacy Campaign

In December 2005, eleven Cuban educational advisers arrived in Timor-Leste to begin work on a national literacy campaign. Adapting the program known in Latin America as Yo, Sí Puedo (Yes I Can), the Cubans trained over 400 local tutors to run classes in every part of the country, using a method they call ‘alphanumeric’, delivered via audiovisual technology. The campaign was launched in March 2007, and the first classes began in June of that year. By September 2010, three years later, over 70,000 adults, over one fifth of the total illiterate population, had successfully completed a thirteen week basic literacy course. Drawing on original research undertaken in Timor-Leste between 2004 and 2009, followed by further investigations in May 2010 in Havana, Cuba, this paper describes the Timor-Leste campaign, locating it within the historical commitment of the country’s independence movement to adult literacy, and the broader context of Cuba’s international literacy work.

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‘I can speak on this here’: empowerment within an Aboriginal adult literacy campaign

The Australian Journal of Indigenous Education ◽

10.1017/jie.2019.27 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 1-8

Author(s):

Frances Williamson ◽

Bob Boughton

Keyword(s):

Adult Literacy ◽

Well Being ◽

Social Determinant ◽

Self Control ◽

Literacy Campaign ◽

Learning To Read ◽

Australian Aboriginal ◽

The Relationship ◽

Social Determinant Of Health

Abstract This case study details the impacts of an Aboriginal-led adult literacy campaign in Brewarrina between 2015 and 2017. Forming part of a wider investigation into literacy as a social determinant of health, the study explores the relationship between involvement in the literacy campaign and the capacity of graduates to take greater control of the conditions affecting their lives. Empowerment is used here as the central explanatory construct despite robust criticism of theoretical slippage. We argue that empowerment remains relevant particularly in the context of ongoing and entrenched disenfranchisement of the low-literate in Australian Aboriginal communities. Drawing on in-depth ‘yarning’ interviews, we find strong evidence of individual empowerment among graduates of the adult literacy campaign, particularly in terms of increased self-control and confidence. However, collective change such as increased participation and organisation at the community level is less apparent. This finding underscores two important aspects of empowerment. Firstly, like learning to read and write, the task of regaining personal and collective power can be a slow and difficult undertaking. Secondly, achieving empowerment is intimately linked to addressing the causes of disempowerment. This ultimately means tackling those power relations which impact choices, opportunities and well-being beyond the borders of individual's lives and communities.

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