Audio-Visual Learning
by the Anti-Literates!
In these days of telephones, TV, radio, videogames and the web, do we still
need to make literacy the foundation of education?
The law in many if not all countries:
- makes education compulsory for young people;
- makes government the arbiter in disputes as to what would be
a suitable education;
- makes reading and writing compulsory elements of education;
- thus keeps up the justification for its own bureaucracy.
What constitutes a suitable education is rarely explained - typical
phrases are that education should allow children to develop their full
potential and that education should prepare children for life in a modern
civilised society. Isn't that just another piece of arbitrary law?
What if families wanted to postpone education in reading and
writing for their children until the children really wanted to
start reading and writing?
What if a family wants their child(ren) to focus more on audio-visual communication?
What if the family feels:
- that talking and listening to others is more important than spelling;
- that the spoken word is superior to the written word;
- that a movie can better convey a story than a book;
- that a picture is worth a thousand words;
- that it's better for a child to keep an open mind than to conform to dogma;
- that bureaucracy (based on literacy) is a bad thing;
- that compulsory teaching in reading and writing is a form of indoctrination;
- that such an education brainwashed their children at impressionable age
with the wrong values as to what is important in society.
If such a family decided to ignore the law, should such a family be hunted
down by police, educational bureaucrats and the justice system, all eager to ensure that
the children become literate enough to read the lawbooks, legal notices, bibles, etc?
Indeed, who decides what this 'full potential' is supposed to look like?
Does literacy really prepare children for life in a modern civilised
society? Or does an education that focuses on literacy hold children back from
participating in a modern civilised society? Who sets the standards as to what people
need in this 'civilised society'?
The 'Anti-Literates' regard literacy as an outdated form
of communication that is about to be supplanted by audio-visual
communication, except perhaps in archaic parts of society such as churches,
courtrooms and parliaments that derive their power from indoctrinating
people with literacy. The problem is that the latter are likely
to be the places where legal educational standards are set! Isn't that a
conflict of interest? Can we expect people who derive
their degrees (and thus positions of power) from being literate, to
be unbiased when determining what good education is? Wouldn't they be more inclined
to make literacy a compulsory part of education?
If people aim to be protected from intrusive and dictatorial law, then
why not abolish compulsory education altogether?
Any law that makes education compulsory, isn't that such just another piece
of literacy that keeps a dicatorial system in place?
What values are important for the future? Blind trust in and
submissiveness to arbitrary law, to the dogmas of religious texts,
to the patronage of goverment and teachers?
Or assertiveness, self-confidence, creativity and an open and
spontaneous personality?
If you have a web-site, add the
icon with the broken pencil to point visitors to the URL below, where
they can read this and other texts by the Anti-Literates!
The Anti-Literates!
antiliterates@hotmail.com
http://www.optionality.net/anti-literates
Like-minded people and groups with WEB-sites are encouraged to add
a link to their site at the
Support Page
of the Optionality Network, sponsor of this site.
| 
