Allan Luke and James Albright (2008) have a new edited book on Bourdieu (in the picture) and Literacy for Routledge. I'm reading it at the moment for more ideas for my own book called 'Literacy on the Left' which has its own thesis about political backgrounds to literacy pedagogy.
Luke and Albright's opening chapter starts this way:
"Literacy education is indeed at a historical crossroads. If we are to take educational policymakers, politicians and the media at their word, it is the same old great debate replayed over and over again: declining standards, loss of the literary canon, troubled and unruly students, irresponsible parents and overly permissive teachers. These we are told yet again, can be fixed by marketization of schools, increased testing, a return to the basics of reading and writing, better teachers, and a more disciplined approach to child-rearing, education and schooling. In this way the neo-liberal focus on tightened accountabilities and steering mechanisms blends seamlessly with a neoconservative educational fundamentalism: economic and bureaucratic rationalism in the delivery of the basics. This is the public policy doxa of literacy education" (2008:5)
'Doxa' is a term that Bourdieu uses to conceptualise the way 'we' tend to take certain aspects of our world for granted - indeed the business of social life can only carry on by taking much of it for granted. So, for literacy we begin to take what politicians, media and policymakers are saying about it as the truth. We could compare the term 'hegamony' with the notion of the 'doxic experience' perhaps. I think Luke and Albright's opening paragraph makes sense. I'm looking forward to reading more.
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