Francis J. Sullivan

Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Analyzing Cultural Literacy as a Classroom Performance

This paper examines “cultural literacy” as a “pedagogical genre.” I outline a theoretical framework that synthesizes recent work on curricular and pedagogical codes (Bernstein, 1996; Atkinson et al., 1995; Cazden, 1995) with systemic work on the coding of discursive genres that enact socio-culturally conditioned orientations to meaning production (Martin, 1992; Halliday; 1995). This framework views classrooms as polyvocalic social structures in which conflict and difference bind members together (Pratt, 1987). In such structures, the particular organization of conflicting voices in curriculum, pedagogy, and teacher/student interaction intersect to produce multiple, yet highly situated meanings for the class.

Examined within this framework, both reactionary and liberatory classrooms tend to develop multiple orientations toward the term “cultural literacy,” as do students within the classes. To illustrate, I apply the framework to two productions of cultural literacy: examples of pedagogical methods and readings texts given in Hirsch and related texts; and an ongoing case study of student writing and reading in a university general education course on “great books.”

This paper raises several complex questions. It problematizes the relationship between theory and practice in education for “resistance.” It builds upon recent work to re-integrate and extend relationships between Bernstein’s work on classroom codes and SFL’s work on discursive codes. More generally, it raises questions about the possibilities for relating structural and interactionist approaches within a postmodern theoretical frame.