Tales of Literacy for the 21st Century : The Literary Agenda

__The Literary Agenda__ is a series of short polemical monographs about the importance of literature and of reading in the wider world and about the state of literary education inside schools and universities. The category of "the literary" has always been contentious. What is clear, however, is how increasingly it is dismissed or is unrecognised as a way of thinking or an arena for thought. It is sceptically challenged from within, for example, by the sometimes rival claims of cultural history, contextualized explanation, or media studies. It is shaken from without by even greater pressures: by economic exigency and the severe social attitudes that can follow from it; by technological change that may leave the traditional forms of serious human communication looking merely antiquated. For just these reasons this is the right time for renewal, to start reinvigorated work into the meaning and value of literary reading. __Tales of Literacy for the 21st Century__ wrestles with critical, timely questions for 21st-century society. How does literacy change the human brain? What does it mean to be a literate or a non-literate person in the present digital culture: for example, what will be lost in the present reading brain, and what will be gained with different mediums than print? What are the consequences of a digital reading brain for the literary mind and for writing itself? Can knowledge about the reading brain and advances in technology offer new forms of literacy and new forms of knowledge to the peoples in remote regions of the world who would never otherwise become literate? By using both research from cognitive neuroscience, psycholinguistics, child development, and education, and considering literary examples from world literature, Maryanne Wolf plots a course that seeks to preserve the deepest forms of reading from the past, while developing the cognitive skills necessary for this century's next generation. Cover The Literary Agenda: Tales of Literacy for the 21st Century Copyright Series Introduction Contents List of Figures 1: Introduction Working assumptions Structure of the book Notes 2: A Linguist's Tale A linguistic primer for oral and written language Phonology Four tiers of sound Morphology Syntax Semantics Pragmatics Orthography The linguist's tale of a bear Notes 3: A Child's Tale On turning ten Pre-reading can last a very long time What's in a word What's in a letter What's in the visual cortex. What is not in a word, a letter, or the visual cortex for the non-literate personThe first "revolution in the brain" Literacy and child's play Notes 4: A Neuroscientist's Tale of Words Overview Tales of words-structural, temporal, and physiological A few basic design principles that allowed us to read Connectivity and neuroplasticity Retinotopic and tonotopic organization principles Working groups / cell assemblies Plato, Socrates, and who taught whom Eidolon-imaging the word through processes of attention and vision Attention Vision Onoma-retrieving the name of the word. Finding the nameMeanings-connecting semantic and syntactic systems Semantic contributions to the meaning of a word Syntactic contributions to understanding the word Notes 5: The Deep Reading Brain Episteme-connecting the name to the reader's knowledge Entry processes-imagery, perspective-taking, and background knowledge Imagery Perspective-taking Background knowledge Metacognitive "scientific method" processes-analogical, inferential, and critical analytical abilities Analogy as bridge Inferential abilities (observation, deduction, and induction) Critical analyses. Generativity processes: the time for insight and novel thought"Towards a neural signature of insight" Generativity Notes 6: A Second Revolution in the Brain Habits of the young and old The changing nature of attention and its effects Distraction and its sources How we attend affects how we read: the "new norms" in reading The relationship between how we attend and what we read Information: how much is too much? Knowledge: how much is too little? Deep reading and what comes next A first algorithm for what comes next Notes 7: A Tale of Hope for Non-Literate Children. History of the projectPrinciples and framework for first deployments Tablet content principles and the app map Immediate first goals First assessment Next steps Summary and next directions Notes Epilogue Notes Acknowledgments Selected Bibliography Index. The Literary Agenda is a series of short polemical monographs about the importance of literature and of reading in the wider world and about the state of literary education inside schools and universities. The category of 'the literary' has always been contentious. What is clear, however, is how increasingly it is dismissed or is unrecognised as a way of thinking or an arena for thought. It is sceptically challenged from within, for example, by the sometimes rival claims of cultural history, contextualized explanation, or media studies. It is shaken from without by even greater pressures: by economic exigency and the severe social attitudes that can follow from it; by technological change that may leave the traditional forms of serious human communication looking merely antiquated. For just these reasons this is the right time for renewal, to start reinvigorated work into the meaning and value of literary reading. Being Literate in the 21st Century wrestles with critical, timely questions for 21st-century society. How does literacy change the human brain? What does it mean to be a literate or a non-literate person in the present digital culture: for example, what will be lost in the present reading brain, and what will be gained with different mediums than print? What are the consequences of a digital reading brain for the literary mind and for writing itself ? Can knowledge about the reading brain and advances in technology offer new forms of literacy and new forms of knowledge to the peoples in remote regions of the world who would never otherwise become literate? By using both research from cognitive neuroscience, psycholinguistics, child development, and education, and considering literary examples from world literature, Maryanne Wolf plots a course that seeks to preserve the deepest forms of reading from the past, while developing the cognitive skills necessary for this century's next generation. Cover; The Literary Agenda: Tales of Literacy for the 21st Century; Copyright; Series Introduction; Contents; List of Figures; 1: Introduction; Working assumptions; Structure of the book; Notes; 2: A Linguist's Tale; A linguistic primer for oral and written language; Phonology; Four tiers of sound; Morphology; Syntax; Semantics; Pragmatics; Orthography; The linguist's tale of a bear; Notes; 3: A Child's Tale; On turning ten; Pre-reading can last a very long time; What's in a word; What's in a letter; What's in the visual cortex.;Being Literate in the 21st Century tackles some of the most difficult questions for the next generation around literacy and thought, as we continue to move into a digital culture. It explores research from multiple disciplines on what it means to be literate, and addresses the problem of universal literacy. Tales of Literacy for the 21st Century wrestles with critical, timely questions for twenty-first century society. How does literacy change the human brain? What does it mean to be a literate or a non-literate person? In the present digital culture what will be lost in the present reading brain, and what will be gained with different mediums than print? By both using research from cognitive neuroscience, psycholinguistics, child development, and education, and considering literacy examples from world literature, Maryanne Wolf plots a course that seeks to preserve the deepest forms of reading from the past, while developing the cognitive skills necessary for this century's next generation around the world