Where to from here?
Drawing new lines linking literacy and healing may offer great
potential for learning. A key question now is whether the literacy
movement will be able to build on the discourses which support
diverse possibilities for teaching in ways that recognize the
widespread nature of violence and the impact of violence on learning.
Change is already occurring in many individual literacy programs. As
new discourses become more broadly recognized, the simple divide
between literacy and therapy may shift. Addressing the impact of
violence on learning may seem less of a "can of worms" and more
enticing, offering the potential for creating nurturing spaces for
workers and learners alike. Or, as Tammy L. Stockman a job coach
based in New England suggested, maybe we can come to see worms
as life-giving and necessary for growth, not something to be contained
at all cost. I am left with questions about what will allow discourses
of violence and education to shift radically in order to create the
necessary, widespread change in the whole terrain of literacy work. |