5. Responding to Impacts of Violence in Literacy

In this section I want to explore the range of issues which are not usually visible and which take energy away from the literacy learning process for many students who are survivors of trauma. Much current talk in literacy is focused on “outcomes.” This talk needs to shift to include the complexity of what many learners are dealing with. Much of the learning that has to take place, and which takes the energy of the learner, is not visible even to learners or workers, let alone planners and funders. Where “outcomes” include only the ability to read and write better, both workers and learners are likely to be frustrated, wondering why there is not more progress, rather than noticing the layers of learning which ARE taking place. We need to examine new possibilities for literacy practice, in light of observations of learners' struggles with the series of impacts of violence that affect their learning.

Presence
One literacy worker wrote to me about the experience of a student in her class:

She thought she pretty much had sorted out her childhood but Math has brought it back BIG TIME. She is going to keep a journal - she's very articulate and observing. We are talking a lot as she struggles but the struggle is really extreme and I'm worried Yesterday she managed to blank completely for an hour so that she arrived too late to write a make-up test - now she's wondering if she really needed to miss the original test. She made arrangements the night before to get here at a particular time, she ate a particularly soothing breakfast - her partner knew this was THE PLAN for the day then all of a sudden it was an hour later and she hadn't left. Later she remembered a conversation with herself about what time class really started and so when she really needed to get here! When she arrived she couldn't feel her lower extremities at all. A couple of times through the test she was having trouble breathing. I did everything I could - let her talk about it - gave her help with the questions to make it more like a class and not a test, etc., etc. but she was determined to go on with it. Finally she quit and left - she was okay I think - I urged her to figure out how to care for herself in the afternoon.

Therapists and counselors I interviewed often spoke of experiences of trauma leading to dissociation. Therapists use this term to refer to a process whereby a person who is experiencing unbearable trauma distances herself from it. This strategy, learned at the time of the initial trauma, becomes an ongoing process which a survivor may unconsciously slip into when something triggers memory.

One caution I have about the concept of dissociation, and particularly some of the more medical interpretations of it as “disorder” or ailment, is the way in which it suggests that “normal” is to be present, and “abnormal” to be dissociated. This either/or approach can easily erase the complexity of degrees of presence and the wide range of factors which could lead to greater or lessor presence in any particular situation. As I stated earlier, it is important to avoid sliding into pathologizing learners as “ill” if they dissociate, and diagnosing who is dissociating and who is merely “daydreaming.” I chose to use the word “presence” in order to focus on the nuances of presence, and to create a positive way of speaking about the challenge for learners to explore what hinders and supports their presence, rather than focusing learners' attention negatively on dissociation, or not paying attention, as a problem.

Literacy workers are very familiar with the idea that many learners have difficulty paying attention for any stretch of time, and that many often appear to be daydreaming or bored. This discourse of “inattention” can lead some literacy workers to identify those who are not paying attention as not serious students, or not motivated. Others might think about learning disabilities, intellectual disabilities, or fetal alcohol or attention deficit disorders. Still others might judge their own teaching as not interesting enough and be continually looking for ways to make the class or group more stimulating or interesting in order to hold the learners' attention better. Whatever the judgment as to the cause, the result is likely to be frustration for workers and learners alike. Greater efforts at stimulation may even be counter-productive to creating a relaxed learning environment. One instructor told me that she worked with many students who, although they were in the class regularly, frequently were so spaced out that they did not even recognize work that they had done as their own. She said that, just as missing schooling as children had meant that they did not get a good grasp of the material overall, as adults they were also missing classes, even though they were physically in the classroom. So again, they were having trouble making meaning for themselves and understanding the whole. As a consequence, students often told her that they must be stupid because, if they were in class and still had not “got it”, then there was no other explanation. This learner frustration makes it crucial to search for explanations which lead to new possibilities for learning.