Category: Literacy

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Literacy: It’s Probably More Than You Think

Literacy, as defined down by contemporary CYA “edumacationists” is merely the ability to decode the funny lil squiggles found on the printed page (in whatever form) into words. Comprehension? Notsomuch. Ability to take printed text, comprehend its meanings and reason from it? That’s not really what contemporary “edumacationists” are after, from all evidence at hand. (You can do your own searches on strings like “literacy declines” etc.)

Simple material literacy is just that: decoding printed text.

Formal literacy is more, much more, and involves having a wide written vocabulary, a grasp of correct grammar, and the ability to write using proper orthography in order to communicate as well as possible.

More and more, nowadays, folks write just what they have heard and in the way they speak. This is not all bad, but much depends on the speech they have heard and their ability to understand even that. The problem comes when these same people only read text written by others of their ilk, so that substandard usage, misheard (or misused) words and expressions have entered their speech and then their own text, so that poor language use is promulgated to yet another subliterate reader.

A couple of quick “tests” determine whether a writer is really literate or simply mistaken in thinking he is. (And there’s one right there: the use of the masculine pronoun to indicate a generic human.):

Word and phrase misusage. Does the writer constantly move a literate reader to invoke Inigo Montoya? (“You keep using that word [or phrase]. . . “) Subliterate. “Chomps” (at the bit) for “champs,” “snigger” for “snicker,” “beg the question” with an intended meaning of “begs that a question be asked” instead of its long accepted meaning of a form of argument where the conclusion is assumed in one of the premises, etc., etc. The stupidities are almost endless.

Another quick test: does the writer even know how to use pronouns? Many, if not most, illiterate/subliterate self-inflicted victims of the Dunning-Kruger Effect have NO idea how to use reflexive pronouns, such as “myself, himself, herself,” etc., and so consistently misuse them in place of “my, him, her,” etc. Does the writer even have a fricking clue about objective case and subjective case pronouns, or does he constantly use “I” when he should be using “me”?

These are all signs of a grasp of English that is verbal rather than literate, and that such grasp is influenced by the language (spoken and written) of others of the writer’s subliterate class.

Of course, a grasp of good grammar, proper orthography, and a decent vocabulary are just the barest beginnings of formal literacy. The person who would be literate must then read and soak up the language use and content of great literature, then use the knowledge gleaned to read widely. . . and deeply on many subjects in order to also become culturally literate. History, science (no, not crap science as presented by the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind), the various arts, etc., are ALL the province of a literate person. These once were the realm of a liberal arts education, but, sadly, no longer, save in a few scattered institutions of genuine education.

In truth, literacy is a lifelong learning experience. Anyone who is not fascinated to find ” holes and gaps, lacks and losses, absenses, silences, impalpabilities, insipidities, and the like”1 in one’s own literacy is simply not literate enough to do so. *sigh*

Of course, my post title could be an unfair imputation of ignorance. Perhaps the reader already knows this, and more. If so, I am open to instruction.

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It’s the Size of the Fight in the Dog

As Peter Grant quoted when he posted this, “It’s not the size of the dog in the fight; it’s the size of the fight in the dog.” ~ Mark Twain

BTW, I recommend Peter Grant’s sci-fi milfic/space opera books as HIGHLY appropriate for readers whose literacy reaches (legitimate) middle school levels, no matter what their ages. Sometimes a bit saccharine, but that’s better than destructively “gritty” in my book, especially for young readers. Think sci-fi milfic/space opera pretty much as written by Zane Grey. Or maybe less fantastic “Doc” Smith translated though a Zane Grey-ish filtering. *heh* (The more I think on that, the more Grant’s new Western series makes real sense.)

A big bonus is that Grant’s books seem to be very competently edited, so that readers are rarely led astray (and mistaught) by misused words, poor grammar, and punctuation errors. That’s just competent line editing. In addition, the content editing eliminates all (or almost all) of the plot bobbles so common to many books published nowadays, even (sometimes especially!) from big publishing houses. This is important, IMO, since reading engaging stories with good morals and ethics that are WELL-WRITTEN can help readers just pick up all these good things along the way.

Of course, unless a book is exceptionally well-written (and by that I mean of stellar class, worthy of survival to become an enduring classic such as “Pilgrim’s Progress”), didacticism can be a killer. No, just well-written (and competently edited) stories that have moral, ethical characters facing conflicts and choosing wisely, and therefore teach good lessons without having to stop and pound lessons into the reader.

Of course, there are competently-written books whose protagonists are bad examples for readers to emulate. I despise that sort of crap.

Poorly-written books that either have protagonists who are “good” examples or protagonists who bad examples are both to be condemned as simply poorly-written books. I find both to be anathema.

And then there are the kinds of books thatb Holly Lisle has correctly classified as “suckitudinous fiction.” Technically well-written but worthless “lit-ra-chure” such as Fitzgerald is celebrated (by self-made moral morons) for having written. Of them I can only say, “Gagamaggot.”

Peter grant’s fiction is all, as far as I have read in his sci-fi milfic/space opera (I have not yet read his new Western novel), light, entertaining, sometimes saccharine (to the point of nearly Goody Two-shoes saccharine), well-written fluff that is highly appropriate for YA readers and engaging even for folks nostalgic for an earlier ethos in sci-fi, where a more elevated moral/ethical behavior would be expected.

Here’s Peter Grant’s Amazon page.

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As Seen on Farcebook

Seen on FarceBook: “bordum.” No, cupcake, for you that’s “bore-dumb.” For everyone else, it’s “boredom.” *sigh*

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If You Can Read This

DON’T thank a teacher, at least not necessarily. Literacy ain’t what the “edumacationists” say it is, and, for the most part, is NOT what schools foster. (Yes, there are exceptions, but the system we now have militates against literacy. The exceptions swim against the tide. Let’s remain grateful for them.)

The Literacy Crisis in American Schools

Sidebar: teachers in schools were entirely incidental to whatever literacy I attained while in school and get no credit whatsoever for whatever literacy I have managed to acquire outside school. Seriously.

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Cliff Notes Lives

It’s really sad to hear people talk about how they “grew up with The Jungle Book” and realize they’re talking about an animated (or, perhaps an earlier live action) movie they recall from their childhood, NOT the book (or the sequel). The best of the movies were derived from just three Mowgli stories taken from the book. All the rest of the riches the book offers? Lost to these folks. Sad. New “Jungle Book” movie is being produced by one of these “Cliff Notes” kids. (But I’m almost certain I slander Cliff Notes summations, since I’m sure Cliff Notes dealt with the whole book.)

A Tale of Two Cities? I’m sure however many folks still relate to Dicken’s tale, most have never read the book, and most of those either read a Cliff Notes (or, if they’re old enough, a Classics Illustrated comic version) summary or sat through the late 50s movie with Dirk Bogarde that featured a Reader’s Digest version of the book. LOADS missing.

And so it goes. If it’s not a recent crappy Hollyweird movie, chances are it’s terra incognita/ignota to most folks. That’s just sad.

Continue reading “Cliff Notes Lives”

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May I? Please?

May I dope slap someone for using “abit” to stand in for “a bit”? Please? Pretty please with sugar on top? Would it help my case if I told you the same folks used the adjective “backdoor” when they meant “back door”? Hmm?

[excessively polite mini-rant /off]

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Warning Signs

1.) The book blurb for a self-pub contains orthographic and grammar errors as egregious as this, first sentence of a blurb did,

“A global flu pandemic has wiped out ninety nine [sic] percent of the worlds [sic] population.”

The first page of the book includes, among other offenses, “He staggered back, unable to breath.”

You might well, with signs like this, think, “Hmmm, Cupcake, if you haven’t bothered to learn basic English, why should you expect to have English speakers/readers buy your book?”

Oh, and if “Cupcake” thinks so highly of his own subliterate capabilities (and is so dismissive of his readers) as to eschew paying a competent line editor to mend his execrable grasp of grammar and vocabulary, well, that’s another strike against him and his “literary” non-efforts.

(And yeh, the butchery of English continued in that case, until I finally exited the snippet and sought some mind-cleansing in better-written text.)

Note: there is a lot of non-fiction written nowadays that is just as bad as in the fiction referred to above. Damn democratic influences in the arts! *heh*

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#gagamaggot Number 5,386, 237

*sigh* This sort of thing used to baffle me, until I realized just how woefully subliterate (in general and especially historically) more and more people are nowadays. From a book blurb (for a book probably best avoided):

“. . . a cop finds a trove of ancient documents that may — or may not — be an undiscovered Shakespeare play. . .”

“Ancient,” used in reference to historical documents, almost always refers to Classical Antiquity — ancient Greece, Rome or the Middle East, etc. Sometimes it is loosely used in reference to medieval and earlier times, mostly by folks who are only moderately aware historically.

Shakespearean manuscripts could not be considered “ancient” by even the loosest, least meaningful sense of the term, since Shakespeare died just under 500 years ago, smack in the middle of the Renaissance.

Since these book blurbs for self-pub books are most often written by the “authors,” I’d say giving this book a pass might just be a sensible time saver.

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Good, Bad and Downright Ugly

I “buy” more than a few free ebooks. Book blurbs, reader reviews, and sample text allow me to filter many unworthy offerings, but some do slip through. And then there are the borderline examples. Well-written, for the most part, interesting stories (again, for the most part) with characters that seem more genuine than not (not that “genuine” is always good, when a young, semi-or-sub-literate writer is genuinely reflecting his/her own cohort *sigh*), etc., but with gaping holes in literacy, research, or understanding of a few basic concepts.

Many of the problems noted here could be easily mended were it not for the frequently overriding problem of the Dunning-Kruger Effect. It seems many writers don’t feel a need to have competent, literate line and copy editors (or are too chintzy to pay for such). After all, they have their attendance certificate (diploma) from some college or university, so that MUST mean they are literate and competent, and do not need to seek out someone who is literate and competent to line/copy edit their “masterwork,” right? Wrong. Even the most literate and competent writer can use literate, competent editing by a third party, preferably an adult. No, a real one.

The worst problems aren’t language or character development or plotting. No, the worst problems in a lot of writing in many of these freebies by millennial “grups” lie in their basic world view, their misunderstandings of human nature formed by living in a morass of media fantasy instead of

An example (I’ll name one author who deserves praise and not name another who tried really, really hard [#gagamaggot] to write a decent story but failed, “deserving” only a “participation trophy”): Many of the freebies I read are introductions to series. Good practice. . . if the intro is a good read. Some of them I read specifically to review for recommendation/disapprobation for my Wonder Woman who is always seeking new writers to appeal to her students, especially her 7th/8th grade students. This practice led me to read (for review) a book by Shelley Adina, “Lady of Devices,” a steampunk “romance” (NOT capitalized), where, for the first book at least, “romance” ~ “adventure,” as it once meant. I was so surprised by the quality of the writing (in all aspects–good use of English, good plotting, character development and descriptive narrative, etc., as well as a really sensible Victorian feel to the book that I have since read everything else Adina has written in the series,* and felt privileged to pay to do so.

Another book I just finished attempted to do what Adina accomplished, in the same genre, but the writer was both not competent in those areas where I praise Shelley Adina and apparently did not see the need (or was too cheap to pay) for competent, literate line/copy editing. On top of that, the writer committed the cardinal sin of placing “message” above story and periodically throughout the text ended up pontificating on points of the society she had designed with which she disagreed, instead of letting the story simply speak for itself. Bad writing, that, really bad writing.

And that was on top of presenting some basic concepts of human nature and relationships in what I have come to expect to be typical of jejune, shallow, millennial crybabies.

Sad. There were moments of sound grade “C” writing, with gusts up to “B+” on occasion, but I had to give the book a “One star that should be zero stars” rating and could NOT recommend it for young adolescents, as I resoundingly recommended the Adina books.

Seriously, most of these young writers really, really need to submit their work for correction and critique to literate, competent adults (NOT something they are likely to find among their circles of acquaintances) before releasing it into the wild.

*She’s also written some contemporary “juvies” directed toward (it seems middle school girls. I’ve not read those, but I did suggest that my Wonder Woman look into them for her libraries, given the quality of Adina’s steampunk books.

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Fostering Subliteracy

Speaking of a past event, with the context implying a past perfect contrafactual, some moronic TV writer has a character spread illiterate speech with, “If that limo didn’t have Lojack. . . ” But the limo DID have Lojack, and so the character was found and rescued. So, “If that limo hadn’t had Lojack. . . ”

These kinds of exceptionally stupid errors with tenses indicate a failure of temporal awareness, a failure of reasoning ability, and extreme laziness. When writers do it, it’s also a sign of contempt for their readership/audience. Really? Yep. If they had any respect for their readership/audience, such writers would have learned how to form such phrases literately, correctly.

I despise such lazy, disrespectful, unethical thieves. Yes, thieves. They take money for supposedly using their writing skills but have not bothered to acquire the skills they accept pay for (or are too disrespectful of their readership/audience to properly use skills they have. Frauds. Such people should be lashed daily with dangling participles, for the rest of their disgusting lives.