Literacy Practices with Mary Hamilton

Rapporteurs: Janet Isserlis, Elsa Auerbach

Participants in Mary Hamilton's course were asked to prepare a case study of a literacy event before they arrived. The course allowed time for each person to delve more and more deeply into their case studies.

Mary began by talking about how literacies are inferred from observable "events" or "moments" and are patterned by social institutions and power relationships. This approach encourages us to look beyond texts themselves to what people do with literacy, with whom, where and how. Events and moments can be documented; they are specific. What can people do? What are the actions around literacy? In what ways do people use the artifacts of literacy?

This view is an alternative to the view that literacy is specified, measurable practice. Assembling the evidence to make this assertion secure has big implications for policy and practice. If enough people buy into it, policy change can occur and ideas can change.

Social practice theory includes the following building blocks

• activities
• settings
• domains or institutional spaces
• resources
• participants

Mary said she hoped participants could pull out aspects of the social practice approach from their case studies. She asked them to notice, write them, and reflect them back.

Over the four days, participants worked on creating posters which documented their case study. The posters were a way of sharing their findings with other participants at the Institute. They will be available on the RiPAL website (www.nald.ca/ripal).