Scribner and Cole 1991

Scribner, Sylvia, and Michael Cole. 1991. "Literacy without schooling: Testing for intellectual effects." In Minami and Kennedy 1991. (Reprint from Scribner and Cole 1978.) Interest level: academic.

Considers the effects of becoming literate separately from the effects of attending school, based on research with the Vai people in Liberia. Raises questions about how to evaluate intellectual skills of nonliterate people if literacy is a precondition for abstract thinking. Asks what people can conclude about the reasoning abilities of a college student who writes an incoherent essay.

Refers to oral language as context-dependent and written language as independent of immediate reference. Comments on the differences between school-based literacy practices and literacy practices unrelated to schooling, or cultural uses of literacy. Concludes that different literacy activities are linked to different intellectual outcomes and that reading and writing activities need to be tailored to desired achievements.

• Bibliography module: Scribner and Cole 1991
• In overview module: Bibliography (Literacy): S
• In modular book: Bibliography (Literacy), by Doris Gallemore, Trudi C. Hunt, Jeanne Swanson, and Stephen L. Walter
• In document collection: Reference materials
• In bookshelf: Literacy

This page is an extract from the LinguaLinks Library, Version 4.0, published on CD-ROM by SIL International, 1999. [Ordering information.]

Page content last modified: 28 June 1999

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