[NIFL-WOMENLIT:847] Re: UNESCO, Women and Literacy

From: A. Schofield/S.Smythe (andrewsc@interchange.ubc.ca)
Date: Thu Jun 29 2000 - 13:42:50 EDT


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From: "A. Schofield/S.Smythe" <andrewsc@interchange.ubc.ca>
To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-womenlit@literacy.nifl.gov>
Subject: [NIFL-WOMENLIT:847] Re: UNESCO, Women and Literacy
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This UNESCO initiative is very important in its encouragement and valuing of
work with and for women. I wonder about the "teach the mother reach the
child" approach though. After all, the African proverb is: "It takes a
village to raise a child", not "It takes a woman to raise a child." I hope
that the broader context of women's lives are taken into account in these
literacy initiatives and prize giving. More than direct mother-child
relationships, the involvement of fathers and extended families, the roles
and attitudes of community leaders and community organizations and the
impact of both local and global trade policies need to be taken into account
in efforts to education women and girls.

Really enjoyed Nurse Pat and the discussion she generated.

Suzanne Smythe
Vancouver, BC

----- Original Message -----
From: Daphne Greenberg <ALCDGG@langate.gsu.edu>
To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-womenlit@literacy.nifl.gov>
Sent: Thursday, June 29, 2000 10:27 AM
Subject: [NIFL-WOMENLIT:846] UNESCO, Women and Literacy


> I thought that some of you may be interested in the following email that
Tom Sticht sent me:
> Daphne:
> I will be back at UNESCO in Paris July 22-28, 2000 for my 22nd year as a
member of the International Literacy Jury that selects UNESCO's literacy
> prizes awarded each year on September 8. During all these years, in
keeping with UNESCO's education policies, the Jury members have
> encouraged women's literacy by paying particular attention to how programs
submitted for prizes have involved the literacy development of women and
girls.
> After the first of the year I will start work on a report of  UNESCO's
International Reading Association Literacy Awards and how they have
encouraged what I call "multiplier effects" of literacy, with a focus on the
intergenerational transfer of literacy and education for children that arise
from investments in women's literacy education. From a policy
> perspective, the concept of getting multiple returns to investment in
women's education has been a strong argument for investments in family
> literacy (Teach the Mother and Reach the Child is the title of a report
for UNESCO that Barbara McDonald and I wrote for UNESCO in 1991) and
> other programs that tend to engage women at rates beyond what typical
adult programs may accomplish. But with an estimated 1,000,000,000 adult
illiterates in the world and two-thirds of them women, we clearly have a
long, long way to go before women achieve their universal right to
> literacy. Namtip's report gives insights from Africa about this global
struggle for women's literacy.
> Go to the following web site for UNESCO information about women,
> literacy and violence by Namtip Aksornkool of UNESCO:
> http://www.unesco.org/education/educprog/literacy/index.html
>
>
> Daphne Greenberg
> Center for the Study of Adult Literacy
> Georgia State University
> University Plaza
> Atlanta, GA 30303-3083
> Fax: 404-651-1415
> Ph: 404-651-0400
> E-mail: alcdgg@langate.gsu.edu
>



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