This book explores what it means to adopt an "academic literacies"approach in policy and pedagogy... more This book explores what it means to adopt an "academic literacies"approach in policy and pedagogy. Transformative practice is illustrated through case studies and critical commentaries from teacher-researchers working in a range of environments, spanning geographical regions and contexts. Key questions addressed include: How can a wider range of semiotic resources and technologies fruitfully serve academic meaning and knowledge making? What kinds of writing spaces do we need and how can these be facilitated? How can theory and practice from "Academic Literacies" be used to open up debate about writing pedagogy at institutional and policy levels?
Literacy in the Digital University is an innovative volume bringing together perspectives from tw... more Literacy in the Digital University is an innovative volume bringing together perspectives from two fields of enquiry and practice: ‘literacies and learning’ and ‘learning technologies’. With their own histories and trajectories, these fields have seldom overlapped either in practice, theory, or research. In tackling this divide head on, the volume breaks new ground. It illustrates how complementary and contrasting approaches to literacy and technology can be brought together in productive ways and considers the implications of this for practitioners working across a wide range of higher education contexts.
The notion of what constitutes ‘literacy’ has shifted over time, from the de-coding of words wh... more The notion of what constitutes ‘literacy’ has shifted over time, from the de-coding of words where it is placed in the realm of an individual, cognitive skill to multiple literacies in the 21st century. This volume celebrates and critiques literacy in various forms indicated by the scope of the chapters. It makes a timely contribution to our understanding of literacy as a multi-faceted, complexly situated activity. The contributing authors represent a wide variety of theoretical and research perspectives. Each chapter provides the reader with a fresh perspective into a different site for literate behaviour, approaches, design and relationships. Presented are illustrations of ways in which scholars are beginning to respond to the challenge and also underscore the viability of the concept of literacy for specific purposes. The central plank of this scholarly and innovative volume is that literacy curriculum would need to evolve from its current one-dimensional/discrete perspective if it is to cater for the demands of the 21st century contemporary globalised society.
This paper offers a working conversation between the authors about the uneasy relationship betwee... more This paper offers a working conversation between the authors about the uneasy relationship between literacy studies and learning technologies. We come from the field of literacy studies but from contrasting perspectives: from academic literacies and work on literacies and technologies in higher education; from an interest in media theory and the implications of digital mediation for the contemporary university; from everyday literacies in informal settings and a concern for the gaps between policy and practice. We illustrate our perspectives through reference to post-compulsory education, especially higher education, but intend our arguments to be of broader value to all sectors of education and learning. We argue that it is probably inevitable that terms such as literacy/digital/network will be taken up by different arenas of scholarship and practice to mean different things, but what is important is finding spaces to make visible the embedded and implicit understandings, assumptions and ideological positions that are carried by these terms. In the paper, we attempt to lay bare some of the tendencies in the different approaches and argue the case for building on these differences in our work rather than seeing them as paradigm contests. We suggest that it would be more generative to the field to acknowledge the richness and diversity of these different traditions, rather than attempting the impossible task of forcing them into a superficial reconciliation.
Download this paper from the link above.
Gourlay, L., Hamilton, M., & Lea, M. R. (2014). Textual practices in the new media digital landscape: messing with digital literacies. Research in Learning Technology, 21.
This book explores what it means to adopt an "academic literacies"approach in policy and pedagogy... more This book explores what it means to adopt an "academic literacies"approach in policy and pedagogy. Transformative practice is illustrated through case studies and critical commentaries from teacher-researchers working in a range of environments, spanning geographical regions and contexts. Key questions addressed include: How can a wider range of semiotic resources and technologies fruitfully serve academic meaning and knowledge making? What kinds of writing spaces do we need and how can these be facilitated? How can theory and practice from "Academic Literacies" be used to open up debate about writing pedagogy at institutional and policy levels?
Literacy in the Digital University is an innovative volume bringing together perspectives from tw... more Literacy in the Digital University is an innovative volume bringing together perspectives from two fields of enquiry and practice: ‘literacies and learning’ and ‘learning technologies’. With their own histories and trajectories, these fields have seldom overlapped either in practice, theory, or research. In tackling this divide head on, the volume breaks new ground. It illustrates how complementary and contrasting approaches to literacy and technology can be brought together in productive ways and considers the implications of this for practitioners working across a wide range of higher education contexts.
The notion of what constitutes ‘literacy’ has shifted over time, from the de-coding of words wh... more The notion of what constitutes ‘literacy’ has shifted over time, from the de-coding of words where it is placed in the realm of an individual, cognitive skill to multiple literacies in the 21st century. This volume celebrates and critiques literacy in various forms indicated by the scope of the chapters. It makes a timely contribution to our understanding of literacy as a multi-faceted, complexly situated activity. The contributing authors represent a wide variety of theoretical and research perspectives. Each chapter provides the reader with a fresh perspective into a different site for literate behaviour, approaches, design and relationships. Presented are illustrations of ways in which scholars are beginning to respond to the challenge and also underscore the viability of the concept of literacy for specific purposes. The central plank of this scholarly and innovative volume is that literacy curriculum would need to evolve from its current one-dimensional/discrete perspective if it is to cater for the demands of the 21st century contemporary globalised society.
This paper offers a working conversation between the authors about the uneasy relationship betwee... more This paper offers a working conversation between the authors about the uneasy relationship between literacy studies and learning technologies. We come from the field of literacy studies but from contrasting perspectives: from academic literacies and work on literacies and technologies in higher education; from an interest in media theory and the implications of digital mediation for the contemporary university; from everyday literacies in informal settings and a concern for the gaps between policy and practice. We illustrate our perspectives through reference to post-compulsory education, especially higher education, but intend our arguments to be of broader value to all sectors of education and learning. We argue that it is probably inevitable that terms such as literacy/digital/network will be taken up by different arenas of scholarship and practice to mean different things, but what is important is finding spaces to make visible the embedded and implicit understandings, assumptions and ideological positions that are carried by these terms. In the paper, we attempt to lay bare some of the tendencies in the different approaches and argue the case for building on these differences in our work rather than seeing them as paradigm contests. We suggest that it would be more generative to the field to acknowledge the richness and diversity of these different traditions, rather than attempting the impossible task of forcing them into a superficial reconciliation.
Download this paper from the link above.
Gourlay, L., Hamilton, M., & Lea, M. R. (2014). Textual practices in the new media digital landscape: messing with digital literacies. Research in Learning Technology, 21.
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Books by Mary R Lea
Published 2015 WAC Clearinghouse/Parlour Press.
This book is available online at http://wac.colostate.edu/books/lillis/
Papers by Mary R Lea
Download this paper from the link above.
Gourlay, L., Hamilton, M., & Lea, M. R. (2014). Textual practices in the new media digital landscape: messing with digital literacies. Research in Learning Technology, 21.
Published 2015 WAC Clearinghouse/Parlour Press.
This book is available online at http://wac.colostate.edu/books/lillis/
Download this paper from the link above.
Gourlay, L., Hamilton, M., & Lea, M. R. (2014). Textual practices in the new media digital landscape: messing with digital literacies. Research in Learning Technology, 21.