Facts about Literacy

Along these lines, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has defined literacy as the "ability to identify, understand, interpret, create, communicate and compute, using printed and written materials associated with varying contexts.

Literacy comprises a number of sub-skills, including phonological awareness, decoding, fluency, comprehension, and vocabulary.

Functional illiteracy refers to the inability of an individual to use reading, writing, and computational skills efficiently in everyday life situations.

Literacy has also been used as a way to sort populations and control who has access to power.

Up until that point, materials associated with literacy were prohibitively expensive for people other than wealthy individuals and institutions.

Other ideas about expanding literacy are described below.

Literacy rates are a crucial measure of a region's human capital.

One of the more curious aspects of Versailles are the chapels.

Literacy can also refer to proficiency in a number of fields, such as art or physical activity.

Functional illiteracy also severely limits interaction with information and communication technologies (using a personal computer to work with a word processor, a web browser, a spreadsheet application, or using a mobile phone efficiently).

Some have argued that the definition of literacy should be expanded.

That is, literacy learning was increasing outside of formal settings (such as schools) and this uncontrolled, potentially critical reading could lead to increased radicalization of the populace.

Illiteracy is the condition of not being able to read or write.

The Kennedy Center Partners in Education, headquartered in Washington, DC, is one organization whose mission is to train teachers to use an expanded view of literacy which includes the fine arts.

Some scholars argue that literacy is not autonomous or a set of discrete technical and objective skills that can be applied across context.

India and China were advanced in literacy in early times and made many scientific advancements.

Mass schooling was meant to temper and control literacy, not spread it.

Increases in literacy do not necessarily cause increases in wealth, nor does greater wealth necessarily improve literacy.

Literacy involves a continuum of learning in enabling individuals to achieve their goals, to develop their knowledge and potential, and to participate fully in their community and wider society".

Historically, the literacy rate has also been high in the Lutheran countries of Northern Europe.

The standards for what constitutes "literacy" vary, depending on social, cultural, and political context.

During the Civil War era in the United States, white citizens in many areas banned teaching slaves to read or write presumably understanding the power of literacy.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) projected worldwide literacy rates until 2015.

From another perspective, the historian Harvey Graff has argued that the introduction of mass schooling was in part an effort to control the type of literacy that the working class had access to.

Literacy is usually defined as the ability to read and write, or the ability to use language to read, write, listen, and speak.

The correlation between crime and functional illiteracy is well-known to criminologists and sociologists throughout the world.

Traditional definitions of literacy consider the ability to "read, write, spell, listen, and speak.