Steve White: the trouble with academic literacies

Academic Literacies (AL) is an approach to teaching and supporting learning that seems to be integral to Learning Development - but should it be? Apart from the focus of its purported transformational value on seeing and being but not doing, leaving it thin on practical pedagogical value, it bundles up tensions and contradictions that are difficult – some might say impossible – to reconcile. Rather than privileging these ideas of voice and power and rejecting the central role of knowledge in education, Steve suggests that a more useful way forward is to strive for nuance, without condemning anything that isn’t AL as morally deficient. It shouldn’t be wrong to try different techniques as the context requires, nor should it be impossible to critique those theoretical positions and epistemologies, like social constructivism, that raise doubts in our minds. The key is to read widely, looking for alternative perspectives, and then giving ourselves permission to craft something new that works for us. We’re Learning Developers: learning is what we do best! The resources we mentioned

Haidt, J. (2013) The Righteous Mind. Penguin

Hilsdon, J., Malone, C. and Syska, A. (2019) ‘Academic literacies twenty years on: a

community-sourced literature review’, Journal of Learning Development in Higher

Education, 15, pp.1−49. Available at: https://doi.org/10.47408/jldhe.v0i15.567

Kotzee, B. (2010) ‘Seven posers in the constructivist classroom’, London Review of Education, 8(2), pp.177−187. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/14748460.2010.487340

Moore, R., & Muller, J. (1999). The Discourse of “Voice” and the Problem of Knowledge and Identity in the Sociology of Education. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 20(2), 189–206. https://doi.org/10.1080/01425699995407

Sold a story: how teaching kids to read when so wrong. Podcast also available on Apple and Spotify

Dan Williams - an introduction to his ideas is available at https://danwilliamsphilosophy.com/ 

Wrigglesworth, J. (2019) ‘Pedagogical applications of academic literacies theory: a reflection and case study’, Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education, 15, pp.1−21. Available at: https://doi.org/10.47408/jldhe.v0i15.552

Young, M. (2007). Bringing knowledge back in. Routledge.

And the articles we talked about

White, S. (2024) “Resisting ideological echo chambers: if we are all critical pedagogues, how will we know we are doing LD well? ”, Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education, (32). doi: 10.47408/jldhe.vi32.1461.

White, S. and Dhillon, S. (2024) “We need to talk about AL: has academic literacies designed the pedagogy out of Learning Development? ”, Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education, (31). doi: 10.47408/jldhe.vi31.1267.