Response to Szwed Precis

Response to Szwed Precis
It is an interesting concept that literacy can be defined by a grander scope of what people read, that people read media everywhere, that reading is still proactive in the forms such as signs, magazines, internet, game screens, and other nontraditional forms of "educational" media. It is implied that this is natural separation from the white Anglo-Saxon cultural ideals of what education should be due to the increase of other ethnic groups in the educational system. I disagree with this position. It infers that other groups are incapable of appreciating classic works. Also it is not just non-white groups who are dissatisfied with reading the classic works, all groups seem to be equally disinterested. Race is not the culprit and neither is culture, at least not totally. However, many of the concerns about this hurdle could be over come by redefining our culture from a multiracial one to an American culture. By finding or creating a common unified ideal of culture and using the new culture to redefine our educational system we could better narrow what types of educational media to produce and study. The difficulty here, besides the glaring question of who decides what this brave new world will look like, is that communication systems are growing. If the production of transportation and communications keep advancing the way they are, the need to change our cultural definitions in education will soon need to be changed again to meet a word culture mentality to meet the needs of an ever shrinking world.
In addition, reading is less sought after as other forms of media are developed and pursued, not just by the youth of America but also the adults. TV, Movies, and music are now the preferred entertainment of the masses. Some educators have fought this, but the inclination of most people is to do things the easy way, making this proverbially, kicking against the pricks. This madia should be embraced and we should incorporate reading to coincide with the use of multimedia resources.