Proxies and perplexities: What is the current state of adult (il)literacy in South Africa?

Abstract

This article provides a detailed analysis of the data from a range of official sources that have been used to enumerate the number of people who can be described as totally or functionally illiterate and estimates whether illiteracy in South Africa can be reduced in the foreseeable future. The study examines the use of years of schooling (conventionally now set at Grade 7) as the proxy indicator of a person being functionally literate by the main sources, the General Population Censuses of 1996, 2001, and 2011 and the annual General Household Surveys and shows that these sources give somewhat contradictory and discordant estimates of the rate at which there is gradual decline of illiteracy in South Africa. Other indicators based on self reporting, also used in the Census and General Housing Surveys, show that a large number of adult South Africans have difficulty in reading, writing and calculating with numbers. The study also shows that the data presented by these surveys about participation in literacy and adult basic education and training classes is inaccurate. Note is made that currently South Africa does not make use of any means of direct testing of adult literacy. The article concludes with an exploration on whether South Africa is able to reach the goal of halving illiteracy by 2015. The target of such a reduction is necessarily based on what the baseline number of illiterates is as well as decision on whether full function literacy must be obtained or a merely a basic level of alphabetisation. Through a detailed estimation of the results of the Kha Ri Gude adult literacy campaign since 2008 a finding is made that the halving of illiteracy will be made, but only at the most basic level, and that attaining full functional literacy for all South Africans remains a major task.