The unlettered state: illiteracy and intrusion in US social

policy
Paper presented at SCUTREA, 32nd Annual Conference, 2-4 July 2002, University of Stirling

Ralf St.Clair, Texas A&M University, USA

Jennifer A. Sandlin, Texas Center for Adult Literacy and Learning, USA

The idea of illiteracy has been around for a long time—some writers suggest at least as long as the 16th
century (Barton, 1994). During the five centuries of its existence it has served many uses, and
continues to do so today. In this paper we provide an extremely brief review of the uses of illiteracy and
show how the idea currently manifests in literacy policy in the United States. We argue that illiteracy is
a key conceptual category in this form of policymaking, used to ascribe generalised incompetence to
individuals. This incompetence is then seen to justify marginalisation and vilification of those
considered illiterate and to underpin degrees of intrusion and surveillance otherwise unacceptable.

Illiteracy as a social and economic threat

Throughout history, social policy discourse has consistently positioned the ‘illiterate’ as
someone who not only lacks basic reading and writing skills, but also the personal
characteristics of hard working, upstanding citizens – morals, a work ethic, and self-control.
‘Illiteracy’ itself has been described as an insidious disease – something to be combated and
eradicated. It has been cited as the cause of a multitude of social and economic problems,
including welfare dependency, unemployment, and the erosion of ‘family values,’ as well as
real or perceived ‘crises’ in social, economic, or political arenas (Gee, 1996; Gowen, 1992;
Quigley, 1997).

In the North American context nineteenth-century discourses linking illiteracy with immorality and a
state of sin extended the European churches’ ancient concern with literacy (Graff, 1995). The influx of
immigrants in the late 1800s and early 1900s raised new concerns in popular rhetoric about
domesticating a ‘”barbarous” population, whose inclinations towards “materialism” and “ignorance”
threatened cultural continuity, political order, and Protestant morality’ (deCastell & Luke, 1988: 162).
Bills were proposed and passed in Congress in 1896, 1909, and 1915 (and then vetoed by incumbent
presidents) that would have refused immigration to anyone who could not read or write in any language
(Quigley, 1997). These ‘illiterates’, with their ‘ignorance, superstition, shiftlessness, vulgarity and
vice’ (Mayo, cited in Quigley, 1997: 78) were seen as a threat to the ‘American Way’.

Illiteracy was also used as a justification for denying certain groups social and civic rights while these
same groups were also denied the opportunity to become literate. Throughout the period of slavery in
the United States, literacy education was denied to slaves as part of state, regional, and plantation
policies ‘for the suppression and control of an “inferior race”’ (Quigley, 1997: 75). One legacy of these
policies of ‘forced illiteracy’ was that even after African Americans were officially given the right to
vote in 1870, they were effectively banned from doing so by the implementation of literacy tests.

Beginning in the mid twentieth century, illiteracy began to be perceived as a threat to national
economic productivity, a perception that continues today. In the 1940s and 50s, illiteracy was decried
as a hindrance to economic growth, foreshadowing literacy education’s explicit link to workforce
education several decades later. In the second half of the twentieth century, illiteracy quickly became
the new scapegoat for rising unemployment, welfare dependency, and a host of other national economic
problems. Policy makers warned that national productivity and the ability to compete in the global

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market would also be at risk if illiteracy continued to exist in society. Quigley (1990: 212) states that
the history of social policy has presented
an historic leitmotif of illiteracy as more than a national issue which is linked to
national crises. It is historically called up as a spectre of hidden, devious, forces
which is working against the good efforts of real Americans and, in its
personification, illiteracy has helped create and sustain the nation’s problems.
The use of the term throughout history suggests strongly that illiteracy is not a measure but a metaphor.
It has been used over the last several hundred years as a synonym for ‘Immoral,’ ‘African-American,’
‘Female,’ ‘Stupid,’ ‘Poor,’ and ‘Lazy,’ among other terms. Reversing the meaning of ‘literacy’ is a
useful way to begin to understand ‘illiteracy,’ but the full meaning requires consideration of the role it
performs as a coded reference in its own right. This is a complex undertaking, as while all agree that
illiteracy has something to do with reading and writing on some level, the implications of this
connection are remarkably different depending on stance. Throughout the rest of this paper, we attempt
to expose a few of the layers of the metaphor of illiteracy as they relate to the role of the individual as
the subject of state policy.

Illiteracy and marginalisation

The notion that to be illiterate is to be in some way excluded from mainstream society remains
powerful. This notion is supported by both the political Left and the Right, and even their reasons for
supporting it differ only subtly. A good example of the conservative approach can be found in ‘Cultural
Literacy’ (Hirsch 1986), an attempt to lay out all the things the ‘literate American’ should know about.
Whilst the idea of a common stock of knowledge for all irrespective of ethnicity, wealth, gender, sexual
orientation, and other dimensions may be attractive on some levels, it ultimately works to obscure the
existence and importance of diversity within society. However it is worth examining the rationale
Hirsch (1986: 12) puts forward for his scheme, the
basic principle that underlies our national system of education in the first place—that
people in a democracy can be entrusted to decide all important matters for themselves
because they can deliberate and communicate with one another.
The progressive approach of Freire (Friere & Macedo, 1987) offers an equally weighty understanding
of literacy and illiteracy. One of his most important arguments was that literacy education ‘becomes a
vehicle by which the oppressed are equipped with the necessary tools to reappropriate their history,
culture, and language practices (Freire & Macedo, 1987: 157). In other words overcoming systemic
alienation requires the adult learner to overcome alienation from the language.

While Hirsch and Freire would disagree profoundly on what literacy looks like, they would have
common ground in regarding illiteracy as a lesser state of existence which leaves the individual outside
the democratic conversation. This shared orientation regarding the importance of literacy as a
knowledge and a practice can be found throughout the political spectrum—it is difficult indeed to find
anybody advocating in favour of illiteracy. The metaphor of illiteracy retains its power to signal a
condition of marginalisation from the mainstream despite wide variety in its application and
diametrically opposed views of its significance.

The meaning attached to illiteracy continues to change, and there are two ways in which the metaphor
of illiteracy has shifted significantly in the last twenty years. The first shift has been in the meaning of
the term ‘literacy,’ which has both expanded to include media other than text, and been applied to
children in school. Rather than a matter of adult reading and writing ability, literacy now becomes a
concern about whether nine year olds can make meaning from art or music—not to mention the
ubiquitous computer literacy. The shared understanding of illiteracy is, in this case, also transformed,
from a struggle with a specific set of abilities to a more generalised form of incompetence. The
illiterate person can be any age, and not only cannot read, but is totally cut off from informed use of
any information medium.

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The second shift in illiteracy has been the adoption of the measure contained within the National Adult
Literacy Survey. Conducted in 1992, this large-scale survey analysed the distribution of three types of
literacy in the US population. Attainment was divided into five levels of literacy function, with level 1
as the lowest. Level 2-3 is considered as the functional literacy level for a text based society. Between
45 and 50 % of the US population scored in level 1 or 2 on the survey and can be considered, by this
measure, functionally illiterate (Binkley, et al, 1997). The notion of illiterate broadens once again, to
mean not just those who have no knowledge of reading or writing, but those who are considered to
have abilities below those deemed necessary.

The cumulative effect of these metaphorical transformations has been that while the term ‘illiteracy’ is
no longer bandied about, the idea of illiteracy as a state of incompetence experienced by huge numbers
of adults and rendering them incapable of essential engagement with information has become ever
more pervasive. Illiteracy is still claimed to lead to unemployment, lost production, bad morals,
disease, and poverty (Quigley, 1997). Apparently it also leads to a crisis of participation, where apathy
towards political process is underpinned by apathy towards the information streams that lubricate the
wheels of democracy. Though the term itself is no longer as acceptable as it once was, we believe it is
useful to retain it as an analytical concept—as we shall show, the metaphorical uses of ‘illiteracy’
outlive the term itself.

Family literacy and the unlettered state

The broadening of the illiteracy metaphor has supported many equally broadened interventions in the
lives of those deemed to be illiterate. A good example of this effect is Even Start provision in the US, a
federally funded family literacy program providing states with $250 million in budget year 2002.
Examining the details of this programming demonstrates how learners are assumed to suffer from
generalised incompetence almost entirely on the basis of their engagement with information media. If
the individual does not meet the ordained standard of reading and writing in English, they are assumed
to be bad parents, unemployable, and of little economic or moral worth.

In order to understand the state’s use of the illiteracy metaphor in family literacy it is important to
review the political context for state action during the last few years. The crisis of the role of the state
in late modernism has been noted by many authors over the last thirty years (for example, Offe, 1996).
In the United States one of the most significant manifestations of this crisis has been the advancement
of two contradictory ends—small government and effective intervention. Small government means
lower taxes and less legislation, especially around business, and the idea has had some effect. During
the 1990s the lowest paid 95% of the population (which includes the crucial middle classes) did end up
paying less tax, albeit because the soaring incomes of the richest 5% resulted in them paying more
(Business Week, 2002). The White House claims that when President Bush’s latest tax cuts are fully
implemented over 100 million individuals and families will pay less tax (White House, 2002b). The
small government ideal does not necessarily result in emaciated state apparati, but it does create
pressure for government to appear to be reducing its fiscal and legislative reach.

The other goal of government has been effective intervention, with high degrees of accountability being
introduced in law enforcement, education, health, and welfare systems. Taxpayers and legislatures
want to know that programs will achieve their goals, which tends to lead to extremely simplified
statements of objectives set up so that they can, indeed, be achieved. It also fits well with conservative
agenda items such as the radical restructuring of the welfare system, which can be presented as a move
towards efficiency rather than an attack on a vital safety net for the poor (Fraser, 1989).

The two goals—of small government and effectiveness—are to a large extent contradictory. It is
difficult to conceive of a program really changing the social experience of a large number of people
without having the resources to do so. Changing a whole country is not cheap. Yet the administration
is not particularly concerned about this disjuncture, claiming that:

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 The President's budget plan is shaped around a clearly defined goal—the conviction
that Government should play a role that is both activist and limited. The Government
has an important role to play in fostering an environment in which all Americans have
the opportunity to better themselves and their families . . . (White House, 2002a)
As observers of the US politic, we have come to believe that the key to making policy with
contradictory aims credible is careful management of key metaphors, of which illiteracy is one. The
importance attached to literacy/illiteracy at the federal level is well illustrated in the hyperbole attached
to reauthorisation of the funding for Even Start:
. . . the federal Even Start family literacy program is helping parents reduce their
dependence on public assistance, obtain employment, and advance in their current
jobs. This in turn, allows parents to become a part of their children’s education and
helps children to become better students. I am convinced that literacy is the key to
ending the cycle of poverty . . . (Committee on Education and the Workforce, 2000)
If literacy is the key to breaking the cycle of poverty, then illiteracy is clearly the most significant
factor making people poor. This is overtly stated in the wording of the bill allocating funds for
Evenstart, which claims ‘it is the purpose of this part to help break the cycle of poverty and illiteracy by
improving the educational opportunities of the Nation's low-income families’ (‘No Child Left Behind
Act’ 2001). Within this arena it appears that illiteracy still has explicit power as a means to understand
the links between educational and economic disadvantage.

The field of family literacy is based on the premise that parents (or other responsible adults, but it is
usually stated as parents) have a critical role to play in ensuring children attain the literacy skills they
need to be successful in society. It then follows that the parents themselves must also have a high
degree of literacy in order to be able to teach the children. If parents are not fully engaged with literacy
an appropriate response is to treat the whole family as a learning unit. This uncontroversial description
of the perspective underlying family literacy provision already starts to demonstrate the power of
illiteracy. The ‘failure of literacy’ in the parents has now expanded to become a signal of an illiterate
family, and further indicates a general failure of parenting. Irrespective of any other behaviour or
values, the parent who is not demonstrating literate acts cannot be a good parent.

Even Start programs tackle the deficit family through four components. The first two are early
childhood education and adult education, which do seem a reasonable fit. Adults are able to leave their
children with responsible, child-oriented people while studying for a GED or learning English. The
other two components are parenting education and parent and child together time (PACT). The former
seeks to teach adults how to act as parents while the latter is an activity lab where parents and children
are encouraged to interact around practical or arts activities. Within these activities there is a clear
assumption that the adults involved have no parenting strategies at all, or if they do, they are so faulty
as to be useless. The implicit aim is to fill this gap with the parenting culture of the school and the
middle class (Tett & St.Clair, 1997).

This attempt occurs not only in the Even Start setting, but also in the home environment. Even Start
programs require a home visit, usually on a monthly basis, to ensure that parents are applying the
lessons of the programme throughout their lives. The drive for accountability mentioned earlier has
created a demand for an instrument to capture parenting skills and provide a means to demonstrate
improvement. In many states the instrument of choice is the HOME inventory (Caldwell & Bradley,
1984), a remarkably culturally insensitive approach. For example, the observer is required to note
whether the ‘parent teaches the child some simple manners—to say ‘please,’ ‘thank you,’ and ‘I’m
sorry’ (ibid.: 109). Other concerns include whether the ‘mother uses correct grammar and
pronunciation’ (ibid.: 110) and that the ‘mother spontaneously praises child’s qualities or behaviour
twice during the visit’ (ibid.: 112). Even Start involves a remarkably high degree of intrusion by
professionals into the domestic sphere.

In understanding the significance of this intervention it is important to remember that it is justified not
by an observed failure to ensure the safety of the child, or even by a negative attitude towards

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schooling. It is entirely predicated upon the ascribed functional illiteracy of the adult member of the
household in English. It makes little difference if the literacy issues arise because of problems with
schooling or because the family is newly arrived in the US and uses another language to a high level.
Illiteracy is rigidly attached to general incompetence in a stereotyping and unexamined way.

Even Start legislation sets out to serve the ‘most in need’ population. This is a key factor making the
link between illiteracy and incompetence credible. The families involved in Even Start are poor, which
in the US very often means African-American or Hispanic. White Americans, including the enormous
middle classes, find it all too easy to believe that other groups are deficient in some way, and the
structures of family literacy do nothing to challenge that belief. Rather than accepting, or even
considering, that other cultural groups have their own values concerning parenting and literacy. Even
Start begins from the premise of deficit and failure. The question is how this approach benefits the
state supporting these programmes.

Even Start is a useful programme for the federal government. It uses the metaphor of illiteracy, with
the complex of negative judgements it entails, to underpin a form of provision which combines the
need for government to be doing something to support business (small government) and providing
effective programmes (accountability). It supports business by claiming to fix the poor, providing an
educated pool of potential employees and active consumers. It claims effectiveness by showing how
much all the participants have learned, and how much less likely the children are to be a burden on the
tax system compared to their parents. On a moral level, it is a relatively cheap programme able to
intrude into the homes of hundreds of thousands of people in the US and change their fundamental
values. Illiteracy serves the needs of many constituencies in Even Start provision.

Conclusion

Our argument is that illiteracy as a metaphor for moral and economic failure is alive and well
in contemporary US educational policy. It justifies high levels of intrusion into the domestic
lives of the poorest citizens and blames them for the conditions in which they find themselves.
Illiteracy has come to metaphorically represent generalised incompetency, serving the
interests of policy makers at federal and state levels. We remain dismayed that the subjects of
such policy do not so easily find their interests represented.

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