Critical Literacy

Exploring Critical Literacy

Various theoretical paradigms have influenced definitions of critical literacy as well as informed its practice. These include feminism, queer theory, and post-structuralist theories as well as antiracist and multiculturalism literacy theories.

Discussions regarding the roots of critical literacy often begin with principles associated with critical theory and the Frankfurt school from the 1920s and, more prominently, Paulo Freire in the late 1940s. The intellectuals who created the Frankfurt school carved out a space for developing theories of Marxism within the academy and independently of political parties. Their focus was on political and economic philosophy with an emphasis on the importance of class struggle in society. Paulo Freire's work focused on key concepts including the notion that literacy education ought to highlight the critical consciousness of learners. Another concept popularized by Freire, in his work with Donaldo Macedo, is that reading is not just about decoding words. It is also about what they referred to as “reading the world,” meaning that our reading of any text is mediated through our day-to-day experiences. The Frankfurt school scholars and Freire focused their work on adult education. In the 1960s, Freire organized a campaign for hundreds of sugar cane workers in Brazil to participate in a literacy program that centered on critical pedagogy. His work became known as liberatory because he worked to empower oppressed workers. Critiques of Freire have focused primarily on claims that the liberatory pedagogy he espoused was unidirectional because educators liberated students.

Critical literacy work also took root in countries experiencing issues of struggle such as Nicaragua and South Africa. In South Africa, for instance, Hilary Janks used critical literacy as a tool in the struggle against apartheid. Her work focused primarily on young adults and adolescents.

Critical literacy work with younger children began to take place in Australia in the 1990s where Barbara Comber's work has been very influential. In particular, her work with Jenny O'Brien on creating spaces for critical literacy in an elementary school classroom, using newspaper and magazine ads, has been highly cited in the literature. Allan Luke and Peter Freebody are also from Australia. Their work has played a central role in the spread of critical literacy across continents. In particular, their four resources model has been widely adapted for use in classrooms. This model focuses on different literacy practices that readers and writers should learn. These practices are learning to be code breakers; recognizing, understanding, and using the fundamental features of written text such as the alphabet; learning to be text participants; using their own prior knowledge to interpret and make meaning from text; understanding how to use different text forms and becoming critical consumers of those forms; learning to critically analyze text; and understanding that texts are never neutral. Michelle Knobel and Colin Lankshear challenge Luke and Freebody's model, claiming it does not support literacy practices in a digitized world. Joanne Larson and Jackie Marsh have argued that Lankshear and Knobel's model focuses primarily on text production rather than text analysis. In comparison, Janks includes both text analysis and text design as integral elements of critical literacy in her work. Other elements included in what she refers to as an interrelated model are access, domination, and diversity. These complementary and competing positions speak to the complexities of engaging with critical literacies.

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