Literacy and You

At the ripe old age of twenty, I have been exposed to many a “sponsor of literacy”. If I were to consider my primary sponsors, I would have to say that mine would be various levels of schools (of course), Church, and my family.

Obviously, high school strives to expose us to a certain variety of literacy. This includes poetry, plays, and certain novels that they want us to read and comprehend. The literacy they provide to us is tightly restricted, as per what they feel is ok for teenagers to read about. As you get into college there is obviously a much wider exposure to virtually any and all literacy. This time around, the instructors typically choose texts that will expose you to different and new ways of thinking.

Church is in a similar vein to school in how it handles literacy, though with a much narrower range of exposure. In my own experience with Catechism classes when I was young, the literacy you are exposed to is (obviously) only the Bible. They don’t really strive to expose you to anything else, but are intent that you have your facts straight on what they do teach to you.

My family has been by far the most dynamic of my literacy sponsors. Naturally, when I was very young they were careful about what I was exposed to and had access to. As I grew and matured my parents were increasingly less restrictive about what I was allowed to read, watch, etc. In this way, they exposed me to arguably the largest amount of literacy by sheer virtue of progressively allowing me more freedom as I grew up.

Any of these sponsors on their own would probably be far from adequate access, but together they contribute to a great deal of my own acquired literacy and knowledge.