Furthermore, competence appears crucial to the development of critical consciousness. Returning to the reader response excerpt discussed earlier (p. 25 of this document), I see Ellen’s need for Sullivan (2003) to recognize and respect her demonstrated competencies with employing the tone of social-science writing as motivating her to break the protective silence around personal details of her life. But she did more than only assert her competence with language: she offered a scathing and sophisticated critical analysis of both the assigned text and the memoir assignment she failed earlier in the semester. Ellen demonstrates that she “gets the point” of both Percy’s article and Sullivan’s assignment. Then, she critiques Percy’s “privileged upper class perch high above the Grand Canyon” (and through implication, Sullivan’s elevated position as teacher) from which they appear neither to understand nor respect her position as a student. She argues for her right to learn and acquire the impersonal, but well worn, language of science, this language she desires because it is a beaten path that can privilege her with release from the multiple forms of domestic abuse she endured at home. Through this response, Ellen demonstrates how students come “to speak back to the world,” (Sommers & Saltz (2004, p. 129)—and reflects the critical consciousness Freire poses as both the means and end of literacy development.