Metaphors that teachers live by: a cultural model of literacy in the era of new literacies

Abstract

Bridging home literacy practices and school has been a key theme for many New Literacy Studies researchers, yet there is no clear consensus on the impact of multiple or new literacies in K-12 classrooms. American classrooms remain book-centric. Multiple literacies represent a fundamental paradigm shift in the ways we understand and enact literacy and learning, but most teachers continue to respond to literacy instruction in ways that inadequately address the complexities of twenty-first century literacy needs. While the existing structures and policies of education make schools problematic sites for enacting multiple and new literacies, one important explanation can be found in the metaphors that constitute teachers’ cultural model of literacy. This study provides a metaphorical analysis of interview excerpts from classroom teachers in order to reconstruct their cultural model of literacy that I presuppose underlies their talk about bookishness. But membership in this category is determined by an ideal exemplar. Teachers’ metaphors reveal a moral model that draws upon a conceptual category where bookishness serves as a cognitive prototype. Understanding teachers’ cultural model of literacy and its associated metaphors offers opportunities to reframe critical conversations about twenty-first century classroom literacy pedagogy.

Keywords:

• classroom literacy
• identity
• literacy
• cognition
• cultural models
• multiliteracies

Acknowledgements

I am very grateful for the extensive recommendations of two anonymous reviewers. Matt Aronson, Victoria Gillis, Samara Madrid, and Peter Moran offered important feedback for an early draft. Naomi Quinn, Charles Fournier, and Allen Trent provided critical advice for the revision.

Note

Notes

1. My questions that explored teaching practices began with those that removed the onus of self-disclosure: ‘What does literacy instruction mean to you?’ ‘What does good classroom literacy instruction look like?’ ‘What are good examples of classroom literacy instruction?’ ‘Is there anything about your own background that informs your literacy instruction?’ ‘What do you think about a teacher who…?’ Many of my follow-up questions were non-directive such as, ‘What do you mean when you say…?’ ‘I’m not sure I understand what you said about…’ ‘Could you say more about…?’