Literacy and Production

I n recent years, “literacy” has been defined in a number of different ways and claimed by a number of different disciplines within education and related theory. Literacy is prefixed by words that reflect different educational movements, controversies, debates, and, occasionally, attempts to “sell” an educational solution in response to rapid societal and technological change. Thus, it is possible to find examples of any or all of the following in press, web pages, journals, and books of all kinds from the latter phases of the twentieth century through to the present day, from academic theory through to teacher and parental guidance: digital literacy, computer literacy, visual literacy, film literacy, information literacy, cultural literacy, games literacy, emotional literacy , and more, up to and including media literacy . Aligned to this at a metalevel are ways of grouping and conceptualizing “literacies” and later sections will address examples of these—namely, Multiliteracies and New Literacy Studies (Cope and Kalantzis 2000).