Abstract
This article is based on ethnographically-informed research carried out as part of a wider study of adult literacy education in Timor-Leste (Boon 2014). The research was designed as a multi-site and multi-scalar case study that was conducted in 2011. It included class observations and interviews with adult learners, teachers and coordinators who were involved in different types of literacy programs. In the article, I present some of the insights that I gleaned into the ways in which the research participants understood what it means to be literate, into their representations of the significance of involvement in literacy programs, into their understandings of the challenges and opportunities associated with such programs and into their discourses about literacy. The research findings are presented in three central sections of the article as follows: (1) literacy in the lives of adult learners; (2) teachers and coordinators navigating the challenges and opportunities of local literacy programs; and (3) teachers’ and coordinators’ discourses about adult literacy. The research presented here complements other research on adult literacy in Timor-Leste by building knowledge about what is happening “on the ground” in post-independence literacy programs.
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© 2019 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Articles
- Literacy in the study of social change: Lusophone perspectives
- Discourses about language and literacy education in Portugal: past and present
- Timor-Leste 1974–1975: Decolonisation, a nation-in-waiting and an adult literacy campaign
- Adult literacy in Timor-Leste: Insights from ethnographic research with teachers, learners and coordinators of contemporary literacy programs
- A critical analysis of literacy discourses in two urban neighbourhoods in Brazil
- Meanings of literacy in the intersection of religious and secular practices: examining local and global changes in a Brazilian bairro
- Taking account of discourses, literacy practices and uses of texts in ethnographic research on educational inclusion: insights from two studies in Brazil
- Opening up ideological spaces for multilingual literacies at the margins of the Portuguese education system? Ethnographic insights from a Russian complementary school
- Book Review
- Judy Kalman and Brian Street: Literacy and numeracy in Latin America: local perspectives and beyond
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Articles
- Literacy in the study of social change: Lusophone perspectives
- Discourses about language and literacy education in Portugal: past and present
- Timor-Leste 1974–1975: Decolonisation, a nation-in-waiting and an adult literacy campaign
- Adult literacy in Timor-Leste: Insights from ethnographic research with teachers, learners and coordinators of contemporary literacy programs
- A critical analysis of literacy discourses in two urban neighbourhoods in Brazil
- Meanings of literacy in the intersection of religious and secular practices: examining local and global changes in a Brazilian bairro
- Taking account of discourses, literacy practices and uses of texts in ethnographic research on educational inclusion: insights from two studies in Brazil
- Opening up ideological spaces for multilingual literacies at the margins of the Portuguese education system? Ethnographic insights from a Russian complementary school
- Book Review
- Judy Kalman and Brian Street: Literacy and numeracy in Latin America: local perspectives and beyond