The New Economy, and New Literacies

This week's readings help us turn a corner in our course work from the algebra of considering the variable of human diversity, to the calculus of considering not only diversity of learners, but also the diversity or multiplicity of literacies.

We read extensively from James Gee, a prominent literacy scholar. Over the past several years he has argued for an expansion of literacy practices and instruction, as other course authors have argued. However, in contrast to other authors, Gee's analysis of new literacies incorporates an analysis of a new economy, a new-er world order of power relations of labor, innovation, and skill.

Pay attention to the new economy that Gee describes, and to the implications of social and economic class (shown in his comparison of how middle class and working class teens talk) on who has access to the kinds of literacy practices that float to the top of the new hierarchy that is forming.


Chapters 14 and 16, informed by Gee's work and New Literacy Studies, also describes lived and imagined new literacies among youth. This territory of unsanctioned literacies is fertile ground for our thinking about multiple literacies that meet the needs of students in an emergent economy.

I am including three short films in this post, each to support your reading this week. The first is a short talk by Jim Gee, in which he brings together the theses of each of the articles we read from him. The two others are by Michael Wesch, an Assistant Professor at Kansas State University, created with help from his undergraduate students. The first can be interpreted as an extension of Gee's musings on the new economy, called "A Vision of Students Today," the second is an explanation of Web 2.0 technology, the technology that affords much of the change in economic relations that Gee predicts.