This volume presents case studies of literacy practices as shaped by culture, language, community, and power. Covering a range of contexts and exploring a number of relevant dimensions in the evolving picture of literacy as situated, multiple, and social, the studies are grouped around four overarching themes:
*Language, Literacy, and Hegemony;
*The Immigrant Experience: Language, Literacies, and Identities;
*Literacies In-/Out-of-School and On the Borders; and
*New Pedagogies for New Literacies.
It is now generally recognized that literacy "is" multiple and woven within the sociocultural lives of communities, but what is not yet fully understood is "how" it is multiple--how this multiplicity plays out across and within differing sociocultural contexts. Such understanding is critical for crafting school literacy practices in response to the different literacy sets brought to school by different learners. Toward this end it is necessary to know what those sets are composed of. Each of the case studies contributes to building this knowledge in new and interesting ways. As a whole the book provides a rich and complex portrait of literacy-in-use.
"Cultural Practices of Literacy: Case Studies of Language, Literacy, Social Practice, and Power" advances sociocultural research and theory pertaining to literacy" "development as it occurs across school and community boundaries and cultural contexts and in and out of school. It is intended for researchers, students, professionals across the field of literacy studies and schooling, including specialists in family literacy, community literacy, adult literacy, critical language studies, multiliteracies, youth literacy, international education, English as a second language, language and social policy, and global literacy.

Academic literacy - prepare to learn is different from traditional courses in that it is task-based: it requires of language learners who are developing their academic literacy to do authentic academic tasks and to solve real academic problems. It assumes that telling students about how tasks must be done is never enough - they must be allowed to demonstrate that they can actually do real academic work.

This book reviews what the authors term advocacy research in literacy education-research that explicitly addresses issues of social justice, equity, and democracy with the distinct purpose of social transformation. It surveys what educational researchers who are working for social justice have accomplished, describes current challenges, and outlines future possibilities. The first section maps the terrain of advocacy research in literacy education. The authors group this large and expanding body of research into four categories: Critical Literacy(ies); Radical Counternarratives in Literacy Research; Literacy as Social Practice; and Linguistic Studies. Each chapter describes the research area, traces its history, provides example studies, and assesses the contributions of research to advocacy work now and potentially in the future. The second section provides a deeper consideration of challenges to the field of advocacy research and suggests future directions for research and scholarship; this section reflects the need to complicate and trouble the terms and relations between and among social justice, ethics, democracy, freedom, and literacy. As a whole, this book is a response to the current popular understandings of literacy education that limit the efficacy of advocacy work in these troubled times-understandings that support the proliferation of standardized testing, teacher testing, and scripted lessons and programs, along with the privileging of particular forms of research. Intended for those who work or soon will work in literacy education-students, teacher educators, researchers, and practitioners-this book represents the authors' belief that it is time for advocacy workers to strengthen and intensify their efforts to promote the most principled, effective literacy education for democratic life. It is their hope that this book will contribute to such an effort.

Using literacy practices in the newly independent post-apartheid Namibia as a lens through which to examine the effects of globalisation, this broad case study looks at issues surrounding tourism, state control and the new forces of consumerism. By placing literacy at the centre of an investigation into social and cultural change as experienced by individuals, Papen shows that in times of change, reading and writing are always implicated in structures of power and inequality. The book considers language practices that can exclude some members of Namibian society and also looks at the strategies used by local people to accommodate and even embrace the onward march of global English and the influx of foreign visitors, practices and modes of commerce and interaction.

This book examines the history of women's bookstores in the US from the 1970s to the 1990s. It establishes that women's bookstores played an important role in feminism by enabling the dissemination of women's voices and thereby helping to sustain and enrich the women's movement. They improved women's literacy - their abilities to read, write, publish, and distribute women's voices and visions - and helped women to instigate a feminist revolution in literacy.

The third edition of With Literacy and Justice for All: Rethinking the Social in Language and Education continues to document Carole Edelsky's long involvement with socially critical, holistic approaches to the everyday problems and possibilities facing teachers of language and literacy. This book helps education professionals understand the educational/societal situations they are dealing with, and literacy instruction and second language learning in particular contexts. Edelsky does not offer simplistic pedagogical formulas, but rather, progressively works through differences and tensions in the discourses and practices of sociolinguistics, bilingual education, whole language, and critical pedagogy--fields whose practitioners and advocates too often work in isolation from each other and, at times, at cross purposes. In this edition, what Edelsky means by rethinking is improving and extending her own views, while at the same time demonstrating that such rethinking always occurs in the light of history. The volume includes a completely new Introduction and two entirely new chapters: one on reconceptualizing literacy learning as second language learning, and another on taking a historical view of responses to standardized testing. Throughout, in updating the volume, Edelsky uses a variety of structural styles to note contrasts in her views across time and to make the distinction clear between the original material and the current additions. This edition is a rare example of a scholarly owning-up to changes in thinking, and a much needed demonstration of the historically grounded nature of knowledge. As a whole, the third edition emphasizes recursiveness and questioning within a deliberately political framework.

The third edition of With Literacy and Justice for All: Rethinking the Social in Language and Education continues to document Carole Edelsky's long involvement with socially critical, holistic approaches to the everyday problems and possibilities facing teachers of language and literacy. This book helps education professionals understand the educational/societal situations they are dealing with, and literacy instruction and second language learning in particular contexts. Edelsky does not offer simplistic pedagogical formulas, but rather, progressively works through differences and tensions in the discourses and practices of sociolinguistics, bilingual education, whole language, and critical pedagogy--fields whose practitioners and advocates too often work in isolation from each other and, at times, at cross purposes. In this edition, what Edelsky means by rethinking is improving and extending her own views, while at the same time demonstrating that such rethinking always occurs in the light of history. The volume includes a completely new Introduction and two entirely new chapters: one on reconceptualizing literacy learning as second language learning, and another on taking a historical view of responses to standardized testing. Throughout, in updating the volume, Edelsky uses a variety of structural styles to note contrasts in her views across time and to make the distinction clear between the original material and the current additions. This edition is a rare example of a scholarly owning-up to changes in thinking, and a much needed demonstration of the historically grounded nature of knowledge. As a whole, the third edition emphasizes recursiveness and questioning within a deliberately political framework.

This timely book tackles underlying issues that see disproportionate numbers of African American males with dyslexia undiagnosed, untreated, and falling behind their peers in terms of literacy achievement. Considering factors including dialectic linguistic difference, limited phonological awareness, and the intersectionality of gender, language, and race, the studies included in this volume illustrate how classroom practices at preschool and elementary levels are failing to support students at risk of reading and writing difficulties. Promoting Academic Readiness for African American Males with Dyslexia shows that it is possible to provide every girl and boy, and particularly African American boys with effective support and appropriate interventions enabling them to read at a level that is conducive to ongoing academic performance and success. This, argue the authors of this volume, is vital to the social, emotional, moral, and intellectual development of our society. This edited volume was originally published as a special issue of Reading & Writing Quarterly: Overcoming Learning Difficulties. It will be of great interest to graduate and postgraduate students, researchers, and academics in the field of African-American Education, Educational Equity, Race studies, Multiple learning difficulties and Literacy development.

The goal of this book is to encourage educators and researchers to understand the complexities of adolescent gang members' lives in order to rethink their assumptions about these students in school. The particular objective is to situate four gang members as literate, caring students from loving families whose identities and literacy keep them on the margins of school. The research described in this book suggests that advocacy is a particularly effective form of critical ethnography. Smith and Whitmore argue that until schools, as communities of practice, enable children and adolescents to retain identities from the communities in which they are full community members, frightening numbers of students are destined to fail. The stories of four Mexican American male adolescents, who were active members of a gang and Smith's students in an alternative high school program, portray the complicated, multiple worlds in which these boys live. As sons and teenage parents they live in a family community; as CRIP members they live in a gang community; as "at risk" students, drop-outs, and graduates they live in a school community, and as a result of their illegal activities they live in the juvenile court community. The authors theorize about the boys' literacy in each of their communities. Literacy is viewed as ideological, related to power, and embedded in a sociocultural context. Vivid examples of conversation, art, tagging, rap, poetry, and other language and literacy events bring the narratives to life in figures and photographs in all the chapters. Readers will find this book engaging and readable, yet thought provoking and challenging. Audiences for Literacy and Advocacy in Adolescent Family, Gang, School, and Juvenile Court Communities include education researchers, professionals, and students in the areas of middle/high school education, at-risk adolescent psychology, and alternative community programs--specifically those interested in literacy education, sociocultural theory, and popular culture.

The goal of this book is to encourage educators and researchers to understand the complexities of adolescent gang members' lives in order to rethink their assumptions about these students in school. The particular objective is to situate four gang members as literate, caring students from loving families whose identities and literacy keep them on the margins of school. The research described in this book suggests that advocacy is a particularly effective form of critical ethnography. Smith and Whitmore argue that until schools, as communities of practice, enable children and adolescents to retain identities from the communities in which they are full community members, frightening numbers of students are destined to fail. The stories of four Mexican American male adolescents, who were active members of a gang and Smith's students in an alternative high school program, portray the complicated, multiple worlds in which these boys live. As sons and teenage parents they live in a family community; as CRIP members they live in a gang community; as "at risk" students, drop-outs, and graduates they live in a school community, and as a result of their illegal activities they live in the juvenile court community. The authors theorize about the boys' literacy in each of their communities. Literacy is viewed as ideological, related to power, and embedded in a sociocultural context. Vivid examples of conversation, art, tagging, rap, poetry, and other language and literacy events bring the narratives to life in figures and photographs in all the chapters. Readers will find this book engaging and readable, yet thought provoking and challenging. Audiences for Literacy and Advocacy in Adolescent Family, Gang, School, and Juvenile Court Communities include education researchers, professionals, and students in the areas of middle/high school education, at-risk adolescent psychology, and alternative community programs--specifically those interested in literacy education, sociocultural theory, and popular culture.

Review of Adult Learning and Literacy: Connecting Research, Policy, and Practice, Volume 6, is the newest volume in a series of annual publications of the National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy (NCSALL) that address major issues, the latest research, and the best practices in the field of adult literacy and learning. Each Review opens with an overview of significant recent developments in the field of adult literacy during the previous year, followed by a set of chapters presenting in-depth reviews of research and best practices on topics of high interest to the field. Volume 6 includes chapters on: Demographic change and low-literacy Americans; The role of vocabulary in Adult Basic Education; Implications of research on spelling for Adult Basic Education; Issues in teaching speaking skills to adult ESOL learners; The preparation and stability of the Adult Basic Education teaching workforce; The adult literacy system in Ireland; and Broad-based organizing as a vehicle for promoting adult literacy. the field and is an essential resource for all stakeholders who need to know what research can reveal about how best to serve adult learners.

Focusing primarily on reading and writing, this book presents summaries of state-of-the-art theory and research dealing with academic competence in school. The editors thoroughly utilize both information-processing and social-collaborative models as interventions. An enlightening final section discusses how this research could better prepare educators to teach reading and writing. It examines the role of NP-movement vs. lexical rules in accounting for alternations in grammatical functions. It presents the role of the lexicon in syntactic theory. It offers debates between major practioners in the field. It includes the nature of argument and structure. It examines the relation of argument nature to constituent structure and binding theory.

The acquisition and maintenance of literacy is of pressing interest and concern to educators and educational policy makers worldwide. What are the common themes, the common questions, and the unique circumstances and initiatives that spring from this interest and concern? To address these questions, Understanding Literacy Development: A Global View brings together leading experts from around the world to explore ways to best provide teaching and learning opportunities, tailored to specific educational needs, to help all children become better readers. The premise is that current generic "one-size-fits-all" approaches are inappropriate for many children and can lead to underachievement and failure. The contributors write from a stance that reflects not only their own particular expertise and experience, but also sheds light on literacy development across cultures, countries, and circumstances. Taken together, chapters in this volume target a wide and comprehensive set of literacy issues, and offer an extensive exploration of the complexities of literacy development, including issues related to early literacy, school instruction, family literacy, adolescent and adult literacy, and teacher development. At a time when education is burdened by increasing economic pressure to do more with less, it is imperative that educators and decision makers at all levels have access to current, broad-ranging, and in-depth information and evidence to inform their choices. This volume, compiling critical research on a wide spectrum of literacy concerns, is an invaluable tool for scholars, teacher educators, professionals and graduate students in the fields of literacy education, early childhood education, educational psychology, educational policy, and related areas.

Designed to stimulate debate and critical thinking and to draw readers' attention to the ideological nature of literacy education across a broad range of literacy contexts, this book crosses traditional boundaries between the study of family, community, and school literacies to offer a unique global perspective on multiple literacies, from theory to case studies of various settings. These examples suggest ways that literacy practices should be created by simultaneously shaping relationships and identity, and by privileging particular literacy practices in particular situations. The dialogue within the book among chapter authors writing across traditionally distinct fields highlights the interconnections among diverse literacy sites and stimulates the pursuit of a more integrated and interdisciplinary approach to literacy education. The critical and dialogic approach serves to challenge and extend many conventional notions surrounding literacy education in communities, schools, and families.
"Portraits of Literacy Across Families, Communities, and Schools: Intersections and Tensions" is particularly relevant for scholars and students in the area of literacy, broadly speaking, including family literacy, community literacy, adult literacy, critical language studies, multiliteracies, youth literacy, English as a second language, language and social policy, and global literacy. Additionally, the inclusion of studies derived from a variety of research methods and designs makes this is a useful text in research methodology courses that aim to present and analyze real-life examples of literacy research designs and methods.

The book provides a historical overview of adult literacy theory, policy, practice, and research from the mid-1980s to the present. The main focus is a descriptive analysis of three distinctive schools of literacy: the Freirean-based participatory literacy movement grounded in oppositional politics and grass-roots community activism; the British-based New Literacy Studies that focuses on the ways in which diverse students utilize various literacy practices in their daily lives; and the U.S. federal government's focus on functional literacy linked to a 45-year policy emphasis on workforce readiness. These three schools of thought lead to substantially different implications over such critical areas as curriculum, assessment and accountability, and the socio-cultural role of literacy, policy, and political culture, which are discussed throughout the chapters of the book. This discussion includes a chapter on research traditions that closely parallels these perspectives on literacy education. Demetrion argues that unless values grounded ultimately in political culture emerge, it is exceedingly unlikely that the adult literacy field will be able to move from its current marginalized status toward that of achieving the level of public and policy legitimacy many believe it needs for its long-term institutional flourishing. It is argued that any settlement of this issue must be accomplished in the field of practice rather than the ground of theory, even as theoretical insight can help to frame the issues. Conflicting Paradigms in Adult Literacy Education: In Quest of a U.S. Democratic Politics of Literacy speaks to a wide audience, including not only the adult literacy community, but anyone interested in educational theory, practice, policy, research traditions, or political culture, and more fundamentally, in their intersection. Given the breadth of the topics covered, as well as the broad scope of the argument, the book is also meant for those who would like to gain a useful perspective on contemporary U.S. culture, through the window of these conflicting tensions within the field of adult literacy education.

The book provides a historical overview of adult literacy theory, policy, practice, and research from the mid-1980s to the present. The main focus is a descriptive analysis of three distinctive schools of literacy: the Freirean-based participatory literacy movement grounded in oppositional politics and grass-roots community activism; the British-based New Literacy Studies that focuses on the ways in which diverse students utilize various literacy practices in their daily lives; and the U.S. federal government's focus on functional literacy linked to a 45-year policy emphasis on workforce readiness. These three schools of thought lead to substantially different implications over such critical areas as curriculum, assessment and accountability, and the socio-cultural role of literacy, policy, and political culture, which are discussed throughout the chapters of the book. This discussion includes a chapter on research traditions that closely parallels these perspectives on literacy education. Demetrion argues that unless values grounded ultimately in political culture emerge, it is exceedingly unlikely that the adult literacy field will be able to move from its current marginalized status toward that of achieving the level of public and policy legitimacy many believe it needs for its long-term institutional flourishing. It is argued that any settlement of this issue must be accomplished in the field of practice rather than the ground of theory, even as theoretical insight can help to frame the issues. Conflicting Paradigms in Adult Literacy Education: In Quest of a U.S. Democratic Politics of Literacy speaks to a wide audience, including not only the adult literacy community, but anyone interested in educational theory, practice, policy, research traditions, or political culture, and more fundamentally, in their intersection. Given the breadth of the topics covered, as well as the broad scope of the argument, the book is also meant for those who would like to gain a useful perspective on contemporary U.S. culture, through the window of these conflicting tensions within the field of adult literacy education.

This CIERA sponsored book is based on the premise that high-quality texts of all kinds are essential to good teaching in elementary classrooms. Experts on a variety of text-related topics were asked to summarize existing research and then apply it to literacy development in an "ideal" classroom. The most comprehensive and up-to-date book in its field, it moves progressively from an examination of discrete literacy processes and forms to a holistic overview and assessment of the classroom literacy environment. Content coverage in this outstanding new book includes:
*Literacy Processes--Part I examines basic reading processes (instruction, comprehension, word recognition, fluency, and motivation) as they relate to text features.
*Forms of Texts--Part II examines the wide variety of text types (fiction, nonfiction, leveled, local, and electronic) that comprise an effective classroom literacy program. Discussions include the nature of these texts, their qualities and quantities, how they fit into an instructional plan, and how a teacher might assess their effectiveness.
*Text Selection--Part III examines special issues (linguistic diversity and teachers as censors) related to the selection of classroom texts.
*Personal Applications--The final, hands-on chapter synthesizes the book's ideas and offers practical tools (checklists and inventories) whereby teachers can self-assess the literacy environment of their own classrooms.
This book is suitable for anyone (graduate students, in-service reading specialists and curriculum directors, college faculty, and researchers) who deal directly with issues of classroom literacy.

Who are the teachers in children's literacy lives beyond their school teachers and parents? This text is a compilation of studies conducted in a variety of cross-cultural contexts where children learn language and literacy with siblings, grandparents, peers and community members. Focusing on the knowledge and skills of children often invisible to educators, these illuminating studies highlight how children skillfully draw from their varied cultural and linguistic worlds to make sense of new experiences. generative activity of young children and their mediating partners - family members, peers and community members - as they syncretize languages, literacies and cultural practices from varied contexts. Through studies grounded in home, school, community school, nursery and church settings, we see how children create for themselves radical forms of teaching and learning in ways that are not typically recognized, understood or valued in schools. about literacy learning as well as their own teaching practices and beliefs. It should be useful reading for teachers, teacher educators, researchers and policy makers who seek to understand the many pathways to literacy and use that knowledge to affect real change in schools.

Who are the teachers in children's literacy lives beyond their school teachers and parents? This text is a compilation of studies conducted in a variety of cross-cultural contexts where children learn language and literacy with siblings, grandparents, peers and community members. Focusing on the knowledge and skills of children often invisible to educators, these illuminating studies highlight how children skillfully draw from their varied cultural and linguistic worlds to make sense of new experiences. generative activity of young children and their mediating partners - family members, peers and community members - as they syncretize languages, literacies and cultural practices from varied contexts. Through studies grounded in home, school, community school, nursery and church settings, we see how children create for themselves radical forms of teaching and learning in ways that are not typically recognized, understood or valued in schools. about literacy learning as well as their own teaching practices and beliefs. It should be useful reading for teachers, teacher educators, researchers and policy makers who seek to understand the many pathways to literacy and use that knowledge to affect real change in schools.

Concept Oriented Reading Instruction (CORI) is a unique, classroom-tested model of reading instruction that breaks new ground by explicitly showing how content knowledge, reading strategies, and motivational support all merge in successful reading instruction. A theoretical perspective (engagement in reading) frames the book and provides a backdrop for its linkage between hands-on science activities and reading comprehension. Currently funded by the Interagency Educational Research Initiative (IERI), this model has been extensively class tested and is receiving national attention that includes being featured on a PBS special on the teaching of reading.
Key features of this outstanding new volume include:
*Theoretical Focus--CORI's teaching framework revolves around the engagement perspective of reading: how engaged reading develops and the classroom contexts and motivational supports that promote it.
*Content-Area Focus--Although science is the content area around which CORI has been developed, its basic framework is applicable to other content areas.
*Focus on Strategy Instruction--CORI revolves around a specific set of reading strategies that the National Reading Panel (2000) found to be effective. In some current CORI classrooms collaborating teachers implement all aspects of CORI and in other classrooms teachers implement just the strategy instruction component.
*Illustrative Vignettes and Cases--Throughout the book vignettes and mini-case studies convey a situated view of instructional practices for reading comprehension and engagement. A detailed case study of one teacher and of the reading progress of her students is featured in one chapter.
This bookis appropriate for graduate and advanced undergraduate students in education and psychology, for practicing teachers, and for researchers in reading comprehension and motivation.

Concept Oriented Reading Instruction (CORI) is a unique, classroom-tested model of reading instruction that breaks new ground by explicitly showing how content knowledge, reading strategies, and motivational support all merge in successful reading instruction. A theoretical perspective (engagement in reading) frames the book and provides a backdrop for its linkage between hands-on science activities and reading comprehension. Currently funded by the Interagency Educational Research Initiative (IERI), this model has been extensively class tested and is receiving national attention that includes being featured on a PBS special on the teaching of reading. Key features of this outstanding new volume include: *Theoretical Focus--CORI's teaching framework revolves around the engagement perspective of reading: how engaged reading develops and the classroom contexts and motivational supports that promote it. *Content-Area Focus--Although science is the content area around which CORI has been developed, its basic framework is applicable to other content areas. *Focus on Strategy Instruction--CORI revolves around a specific set of reading strategies that the National Reading Panel (2000) found to be effective. In some current CORI classrooms collaborating teachers implement all aspects of CORI and in other classrooms teachers implement just the strategy instruction component. *Illustrative Vignettes and Cases--Throughout the book vignettes and mini-case studies convey a situated view of instructional practices for reading comprehension and engagement. A detailed case study of one teacher and of the reading progress of her students is featured in one chapter. This book is appropriate for graduate and advanced undergraduate students in education and psychology, for practicing teachers, and for researchers in reading comprehension and motivation.

This authoritative landmark text examines the highly topical and important issue of ICT in literacy learning. Its distinctive focus on providing a systematic review of research in the field gives the reader an essential, comprehensive overview. As governments worldwide continue to invest heavily in ICT provisions in educational institutions, this book addresses the need to gather and synthesise evidence about the impact of ICT on literacy learning. An expert team of writers draw upon two recent reports by the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development, which highlighted the considerable differences between nations in the access and use of ICT, to take a discursive and expansive look at the subject. Within its wide range and scope, chapters cover areas on: * the history of literacy and ICT * evidence for the effectiveness of ICT on literacy learning * the impact of networked ICT on literacy learning * the relationship between verbal and visual literacies. This book will be an invaluable and informative read with international resonance for student teachers, teachers, academics and researchers worldwide.

This authoritative landmark text examines the highly topical and important issue of ICT in literacy learning. Its distinctive focus on providing a systematic review of research in the field gives the reader an essential, comprehensive overview. As governments worldwide continue to invest heavily in ICT provisions in educational institutions, this book addresses the need to gather and synthesise evidence about the impact of ICT on literacy learning. An expert team of writers draw upon two recent reports by the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development, which highlighted the considerable differences between nations in the access and use of ICT, to take a discursive and expansive look at the subject. Within its wide range and scope, chapters cover areas on: * the history of literacy and ICT * evidence for the effectiveness of ICT on literacy learning * the impact of networked ICT on literacy learning * the relationship between verbal and visual literacies. This book will be an invaluable and informative read with international resonance for student teachers, teachers, academics and researchers worldwide.

Reading Work: Literacies in the New Workplace explores changing understandings of literacy and its place in contemporary workplace settings. It points to new questions and dilemmas to consider in planning and teaching workplace education. By taking a social perspective on literacies in the workplace, this book challenges traditional thinking about workplace literacy as functional skills, and enables readers to see the complexity of literacy practices and their embeddedness in culture, knowledge, and action. A mixture of ethnographic studies, analysis, and personal reflections makes these ideas accessible and relevant to a wide range of readers in the fields of adult literacy and language education and helps to bridge the divide between theory and practice in the field of workplace education. Reading Work: Literacies in the New Workplace features: *four distinct but related ethnographies of literacy use in contemporary workplaces; *a social practice view of literacy brought to the workplace; *collaborative research undertaken by experienced workplace educators and academics working in the areas of adult literacy and second language learning; *implications chapters for both practice and theory--presented not as a series of steps but rather as reflections by seasoned educators on shared dilemmas; and *engaging, accessible writing that encourages workplace practitioners to read, learn from, and do their own research. This book is an important resource for practicing workplace educators, trainers, and instructors; academics who teach workplace educators; unionists, policymakers, human resource managers, supervisors, or quality coordinators who believe education can make a difference and are interested in seeing maximum results from workplace learning. Visit the In-Sites Research Group Web site: http://www.nald.ca/insites/.

Reading Work: Literacies in the New Workplace explores changing understandings of literacy and its place in contemporary workplace settings. It points to new questions and dilemmas to consider in planning and teaching workplace education. By taking a social perspective on literacies in the workplace, this book challenges traditional thinking about workplace literacy as functional skills, and enables readers to see the complexity of literacy practices and their embeddedness in culture, knowledge, and action. A mixture of ethnographic studies, analysis, and personal reflections makes these ideas accessible and relevant to a wide range of readers in the fields of adult literacy and language education and helps to bridge the divide between theory and practice in the field of workplace education. Reading Work: Literacies in the New Workplace features: *four distinct but related ethnographies of literacy use in contemporary workplaces; *a social practice view of literacy brought to the workplace; *collaborative research undertaken by experienced workplace educators and academics working in the areas of adult literacy and second language learning; *implications chapters for both practice and theory--presented not as a series of steps but rather as reflections by seasoned educators on shared dilemmas; and *engaging, accessible writing that encourages workplace practitioners to read, learn from, and do their own research. This book is an important resource for practicing workplace educators, trainers, and instructors; academics who teach workplace educators; unionists, policymakers, human resource managers, supervisors, or quality coordinators who believe education can make a difference and are interested in seeing maximum results from workplace learning. Visit the In-Sites Research Group Web site: http://www.nald.ca/insites/.