Hi Mike,
That's interesting! My husband, an oriental Jew (who during the 60's and 70's
were considered second class citizens in Israel), was already at the age of 14
earning his living as a laborer, but he is highly literate and self-taught in
archeology and ancient history. He often goes touring sites by the dead sea
etc. and reads a lot on the subject. With all my University Education I
consider him far more literate and intelligent than myself - I never write a
course paper without consulting him. Also I have had the privilege of serving
my community as a librarian; the most avid readers and highly literate self
educated library users, where workmen (plumbers, builders etc.) of oriental
background; the most popular books among these clients was research literature
on archeology, history, political science, economics. In other words, at the
end of a hard day's work these workman use leisure for self-education. My
husband in his younger years tutored a 20-year-old who couldn't read and
write - he succeeded within 3 months to get her to a level of literacy that
enabled her to read newspapers and write letters. Another workman in my
community (a Jew from North Africa) has since his retirement been successfully
tutoring junior-school kids with learning disabilities. I'm presently
finishing my M.A. Theses on personal book collections and cultural identity -
one of the points I want to prove is that literacy DOES NOT CORRELATE with
formal education.
Alisa
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