Mere Literacy Research Articles

Aiding Reflective Navigation in a Dynamic Information Landscape: A Challenge for Educational Psychology

Open access to information is now a universal phenomenon thanks to rapid technological developments across the globe. This open and universal access to information is a key value of democratic societies because, in principle, it supports well-informed decision-making on individual, local, and global matters. In practice, however, without appropriate readiness for navigation in a dynamic information landscape, such access to information can become a threat to public health, safety, and economy, as the COVID-19 pandemic has shown. In the past, this readiness was often conceptualized in terms of adequate literacy levels, but the contemporarily observed highest-ever literacy levels have not immunized our societies against the risks of misinformation. Therefore, in this Perspective, we argue that democratization of access to information endows citizens with new responsibilities, and second, these responsibilities demand readiness that cannot be reduced to mere literacy levels. In fact, this readiness builds on individual adequate literacy skills, but also requires rational thinking and awareness of own information processing. We gather evidence from developmental, educational, and cognitive psychology to show how these aspects of readiness could be improved through education interventions, and how they may be related to healthy work-home balance and self-efficacy. All these components of education are critical to responsible global citizenship and will determine the future direction of our societies.

Gandhi’s Contribution to Education

Mahatma Gandhiji was an extremely open-minded seeker of truth. This quality gives Gandhiji a unique dimension which can attract the new generation. Education is for life, life in its entire and then education through life. Gandhiji philosophy of non-violence has great relevance in current scenario.Such philosophy of life helped him in developing his philosophy of Education which can be the true source of inspiration for the present system of education. Gandhiji’s Basic Principles of Education includes: i)From 7 to 14 years of age, education of each child should be free, compulsory and universal. ii)The medium of instruction should be mother-tongue. iii) Mere literacy cannot be equated with education. Education should employ some craft as a medium of education so that the child gains economic self - reliance for his life. iv) Education should develop human values in the child. v)Education should create useful, responsible and dynamic citizens. By education all the hidden powers of child should develop according to the community of which he is an integral part. vi)Education should achieve the harmonious development of child's body, mind, heart and soul. The inspiration of Mahatma Gandhi, we have adopted Basic Education as the pattern of national education. The distinctive feature of education that it makes productive work is the main basis of the whole educative process. Gandhiji thought that education should be provided to mothers, and they could provide education to children effectively. He stressed upon the education of women, for the development of nation depends upon women. Education is vital for the effectiveness of both strategies. For this to happen, education has to go beyond the warehousing of information to a celebration of awareness, which is best facilitated through education for peace. Gandhiji by sponsoring the New Education made the Indian educational system.

THE GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF GOOD GOVERNANCE IN THE MIND OF RAJA ALI HAJI

This brief writing tried to challenge the old thinking that led everyone to the Raja Ali Haji figure as a literary and cultured man in the 19th century of the Malay Kingdom of Riau-Lingga. Whereas he was a multidisciplinary of science, who also included the politics, government, and constitutional law. His expertise on that subject was inseparably based on his experience as a kingdom adviser. As well as two books that specifically containing a law thought that are Muqaddimah fi Intizam and Tsamarat Al-Muhimmah. This study uses a normative juridical approach with the quality of research is analytic descriptive. The studies explain that: First, the legitimacy of Raja Ali Haji as a jurist, among other things: Gurindam Dua Belas is not a mere literacy work, it also includes the idea of contitutional law; the kingdom adviser; and review of his books. Second¸the general principles that are included in Muqaddima fi-Intizam and Tsamarat al-Muhimmah include the principle of consensus, the principle of prudence, the principle of juctice, the principle of unfairness, the principle of professionality, the principle of accountability, the principle of legality, the principle of public interest, and the principle of not mixing authority.

Rhetoric and scientific disclosure. A proposal for the web of biotechnology companies

Rhetoric as a theory of argumentation and persuasion specially relates to a specific way of approaching scientific disclosure, which is no longer regarded as mere literacy, but as a dialogue. Such a change involves the active participation of society in making decisions on the course of science. With this framework, we believe that companies such as biotechnology whose activity arouses philias and phobias among the public — which can make its becoming — must take an active role in these talks. On the approach we have selected a sample consisting of biotech SMEs settled in four technology parks in Andalusia. We have analyzed the texts of the homepages of the 29 SMEs; because we understand that these stories themselves and not intermediated, let us know if you consider citizenship as audience interest at which he first step in making the disclosure the axis of its corporate communication. The answer is no.

Reading Comprehension Through the Didactic Prism

Reading and comprehension are critical intellectual skills which have to be mastered for any worthwhile academic engagement. However, the tendency to equate mere literacy to these skills has led many people to take the skills for granted. This paper addresses the issue of reading comprehension through a painstaking methodical exploration of the technicalities involved to aid a mastery of the art. It does so with practical examples which are useful for self-teaching on the part of learners.

Concentration in Indian Newspaper Industry and Democratic participation- A Readership based Approach

India is the world’s largest democracy and therefore diverse views assume vital importance. The uniqueness of the Indian newspaper industry requires readership-based concentration measures than the circulation-based approach. This paper reveals substantial concentration in Indian newspaper industry and provides evidence for negative relationship between market size and concentration. It argues that concentration in newspaper market explains the democratic participation in terms of voter turnouts in India than mere literacy levels. Moreover, the paper calls to learn from the dangers and promises of Chomskyan and Schumpeterian concepts.

Ruminations on Evaluation in the Mahila Samakhya Programme

This article examines the challenges of evaluating Mahila Samakhya (MS), a government sponsored programme for the empowerment and education of poor women. The programme has no fixed targets and aims at enabling such women to go beyond mere literacy and engage in a learning process that facilitates their collective agency and action to question and overcome deep-seated gender barriers. The article explores the issue of evaluation at several levels—negotiating with donors on evaluation parameters and methods, developing qualitative evaluation parameters and also at the conceptual domain of what or who needs to be evaluated especially in programmes that aim at challenging and transforming both gender and social inequity and inequality. The article also comments on the changing external context with its strong emphasis on measurable outcomes and quantitative measures of assessment and its implications for programmes such as MS, where the struggle is to ensure that the processes of empowerment that are often intangible are not overlooked.

Media Literacy and Television Criticism

This article argues that the concept of media literacy is strengthened when it is understood as media criticism. After briefly tracing the development from concerns about television in the early 1950s to the Aspen Institute’s 1992 call for media literacy, the article overviews several types of television criticism to illustrate how criticism embraces and moves beyond mere literacy to provide a vehicle for citizen empowerment and engagement. The conclusion reflects on the ethical impulse in media criticism and on how moral engagement with television by literate and critical citizens can serve to democratize public sphere policy debates over communication in the public sphere.

Infant mortality in the Indian slums: case studies of Calcutta metropolis and Raipur city.

This study was conducted to examine the levels of infant mortality, its causes and determinants, and its differentials in selected slums of Calcutta Metropolis and Raipur in India. Data were gathered through interview of 2142 mothers who had experienced a live birth and/or death of an infant within the year prior to the survey. The study found that although the infant mortality rate (IMR) in the slums was quite high, it was lower compared to rural India. The study¿s finding underlines the importance of "urban residence" as a primary controlling factor of infant mortality. IMR was 1.5 times higher in the slums of Calcutta than in Raipur, indicating that infant death is far worse in the metropolis than in smaller cities. Although a number of individual-, household-, and slum-level factors played an explanatory role in infant mortality, differences in neighborhood environment contributed most significantly to the infant mortality differentials in the two slums. This study also found that mere literacy or low level of education is not an effective depressant of infant mortality.

Infant mortality in the Indian slums: case studies of Calcutta Metropolis and Raipur City

Based on data collected through interview of 2142 mothers who had experienced live births and/or infant deaths within one year preceding the date of survey in selected slums of Calcutta Metropolis and Raipur City, this study attempts to elucidate and explain the levels, differentials, causes and determinants of infant mortality in the Indian slums. The infant mortality rate (IMR) in the slums was found to be quite high but lower than that in rural India, underlining the importance of ‘urban residence’ as a major controlling factor of infant mortality. The IMR in the slums of Calcutta was about one and a half times that in the slums of Raipur, suggesting that slum infant mortality is far worse in metropolises than in smaller cities. A number of individual-level, household-level and slum-level determinants were examined, and all played some explanatory role, but the differences in neighbourhood environment contributed most substantially to the infant mortality differential between the slums of Calcutta and Raipur. The study also reveals that mere literacy or low educational level is not an effective depressant of infant mortality. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Educating New Mothers: Women and the Enlightenment in Russia

“We do not want them to be prudes or coquettes, but amiable and able to raise their children and take care of their homes.” Letter of Catherine II to Voltaire, n.d. “They will be good Russian wives, caring mothers, and zealous homemakers.” St. Petersburg Gazette, no. 45, 1773 “…The intention and end of the education of girls [is] to make them good homemakers, faithful wives, and trustworthy mothers, …” Arrangement of studies in the Society of noble and common girls in accordance with the public schools of Russia, issued by the Commission on Public Schools, 1783 In Russia during the era of Catherine II (1762–1796), women's education was advocated as a means to reform family, social and civic life. Fenelon's Traite de l'education des Filles (1686) and his didactic novel, Les Aventures de Telemaque, carried this argument to Russia where it was reinforced by the ideas of the Enlightenment. In a society with substantial prejudice against mere literacy for women, this position represents a progressive call for expanded educational opportunities for girls. The message was interpreted in this fashion by its European and Russian proponents who presumed that they were acting in accordance with reason and nature. But the restraints inherent in this domestic orientation make it as much a campaign against excessive emancipation as a plea to remove women from complete ignorance. In this essay, I explore this limited advocacy from the Russian perspective. This ambivalence is demonstrable throughout the reign of Catherine II and at different social levels, though most attention was focused on the nobility for whom the Society for the Education of Noble Girls (the Smol'nyi Institute) was founded.

The Growth of an Educated Class

HERE will be many besides the present writer who consider the provision of higher education in the Colonies one of the most urgent tasks to be pursued in our generation, prior in importance, as ideally it should be prior in time, to the provision of democratic forms of selfgovernment. Mere literacy, if upon examination it can be found that there is any measurable substance of meaning in the term 'mere literacy', is not enough; a nation can be truly self-governing in the modern world only when its citizens can conduct for themselves the various technical and professional tasks which life in the modern world demands, that is to say only when it includes a sufficiently large class of highly educated and experienced persons. Experts can, of course, be hired-at the market price-in any society, and no society is so advanced that it will not occasionally need to employ an 'expatriate' foreigner with some rare qualification. In the human sense, an under-developed society might be defined as one in which there are not enough well-educated persons to manage its affairs without habitually employing a numerous class of experts from outside. But it would be a grossly insufficient analysis of the problem of higher education to describe it as the provision of external teachers on loan until a class of home-trained teachers can arise. Higher education confined within national limits is but a barren growth and, in a world where international co-operation is necessary for mere survival, cross-fertilization between universities is essential to enlightened progress. In nothing has the Commonwealth been more active and useful than in the exchange of teachers and research workers among its universities, and to conceive these exchanges as a passing phase of the 'colonial' period would be narrowminded indeed.

Over-population as a World Problem

Sir John Megaw's expediences in India have impressed on his mind the need for a sustained effort to replace the natural checks on population, such as disease, famine and war, by arrangements that will involve less suffering and less inefficiency of the survivors (Occasional Papers, No. 1. British Social Hygiene Council, London. 6d.). He is deeply appreciative of Malthus, whom he defends against some current misjudgments. He shows that the efforts to raise standards of living above misery in Porto Rico, and in India, have largely failed because the birth-rate, or rather the survival-rate of infants, in several cases has gone up. In Porto Rico production of sugar in 1928 was nine times that of 1899, and in the same period literacy went up from 15 to 60 per cent of the population. Yet, under-feeding and general misery remain characteristic, with a birth-rate still of 40 per thousand but a death-rate reduced from 27·1 to about 20·6. The population in 1940 was nearly 1,900,000 and is now more than 2,000,000 on 3,423 square miles. The future of such a community is full of problems unless the birth-rate declines. India's increase of nearly 5,000,000 a year is even more formidable, because the problem is on such a large scale. The bibliography at the end of the pamphlet is not a very good one. Prof. A. V. Hill contributes a useful preface to the pamphlet and hopes that education carried far beyond mere literacy may help.

The Pioneer Fringe

W x tE have reached the stage of a five-dimension world. To the three classical dimensions of space we now add a fourth dimension of time and a fifth dimension of quality. From the earliest days of civilization to the present, quality has been the counsel of perfection. Only the occasional philosopher promulgated the truth that it is better not to know how to do a thing than to know how to do it badly. With the growth of democracies in the modern era we have had for the first time whole communities of men raised to a level of education and control over material power that enabled them to believe themselves to be at least moderately critical of the quality of their cultural world. Not only have whole masses of men here and there been raised above the level of mere literacy: they have acquired high speed and organized knowledge. The effect has been felt upon the edge of settlement everywhere, upon all the frontiers of the world. In some it has pushed the pioneer forward into new lands; in others it has drawn millions off the land and gathered them into the cities. City growth is a world wide phenomenon. The statesmen of every country deplore it. It is attacked by commissions and councils and legislatures and foundations, and still it continues, irresistible as an elemental force of nature. It is on the edge of the inhabited lands that we have long seen most clearly the challenge of mankind to nature. Now in increas ing degree man asks questions that nature alone cannot answer, for the questions have to do with the quality of culture that he may enjoy or endure and this is a matter of economic law no less than of nature and human spirit. In the face of the great natural difficulties that the pioneer belts of the world exhibit man is asking what is the quality of the life that the pioneer must lead. It is a new question in pioneering. It is asked in every pioneer region, Canadian Northwest, Rhodesia, West Australia, where white men lead in settlement. It is hard to think of a phenomenon more extraordinary in the civilized world of today than the rival ideas now working in men's minds: the one leading a man to undertake settlement in the undeveloped or poorly developed pioneer belts of the world, the other drawing him toward his own