Purpose: The purpose of this conceptual paper is to challenge the introduction and implementation of policy mandates that threaten to reduce democratic, creative and responsive literacy pedagogies and practices in the early years. It draws on affect theory as a means to expand theorisations of literacy teaching and learning with approaches that…

Innovation is a ubiquitous term, and its use to promote neoliberal values such as competition, efficiency and its privileging of technology driven initiatives has been critiqued by educational researchers, including adult literacy researchers. This article argues that innovation in adult literacy (and perhaps in education generally) is a concept…

In response to increasing global environmental precarity, this chapter considers what kinds of literacies will be most relevant for young children, for the future they are likely to inherit. Setting out the problematics of human exceptionalism and "time as progress" that education in general and literacy in particular tend to get caught…

In recent years, there has been a special interest in promoting literacy learning in early childhood education programs. It is presumed that teaching literacy early can ensure better literacy outcomes in later years. Currently, in a renewed effort to improve children's literacy learning through science of reading supported practices, most states…

The role of knowledge and reading comprehension has seen a recent explosion of attention from researchers, journalists, and policy advocates. Much of this discourse describes knowledge in neutral terms such as knowledge of "the world". That knowledge of the world, however, is woven into the fabric of the gendered world we live in and its…

Globally, literacy can be conceived of in different ways. Two perspectives that have influenced adult literacy policy internationally are the economic functionalist and the sociocultural. In Aotearoa New Zealand, Maori educators have repeatedly advanced a matauranga Maori perspective of literacy. This perspective has parallels with the embodied,…

This article critically examines the life trajectory of Jean Daniel Revel, an immigrant who arrived on the coast of the River Plate during the 19th century. Revel played a pivotal role in the formation of the first Waldensian colony outside the European continent. Through a comprehensive analysis of Revel's diary, epistles, and other historical…

In the 1960s and 1970s, mass campaigns were the dominant model of adult literacy provision, especially in countries of the Global South. After a long absence, there is now a revival of international interest in this model. This paper looks back on the earlier history of mass campaigns and the geopolitical reasons for their rejection, to help make…

This paper, drawing on Margaret Meek Spencer's work, considers the value of reflecting on literacy histories, whether of children, teachers, authors or academics. Margaret argued that teachers need to be open to literacy as lived, and to look, listen and learn about literacies that develop "without" direct instruction and stretch beyond…

Using our re-readings of Margaret Meek Spencer's work and career, we connect her scholarship to our mapping of contemporary changes in knowledge and our investigations of so-called "knowers": those mobilising knowledge to underpin and control professionals' enactment of policy in primary school literacy. Working from the theoretical…

Purpose: This short article takes the play and passion of children's literacy as its focal point. Rather than orienting reading and writing around what should be taught or how children should respond and understand written text, in this short reflective essay we aim to explore the play and passion inherent in children's literacy practices. We do…

The process of determining whether a source of information is relevant is multidimensional, dynamic, and subjective. This essay puts information science scholarship on relevance, including the process and nature of making relevance judgments, in conversation with models of teaching and learning information literacy. Teaching librarians are…

Purpose: This article explores the literary work of a teacher and activist, Yi O-Deok, as a lens to approach historically and culturally embedded notions of humanization in education in Korea. Anchored in the ethos of "Asia as Method," this study offers a unique perspective that exemplifies the importance of the local sociocultural…

Through a consideration of literacies in theory and international policy, this article pushes at the edges of existing frameworks of functional and sociocultural literacies. In critique of existing policy directives, the author explores an approach to literacy that engages in the affective and posthuman relationality of human and environment and…

Purpose: Literacy research exploring multimodal composition and justice-oriented children's literature each have rich landscapes and histories. This paper aims to add to both of these bodies of scholarship through the emerging assemblage of Studio F, a fifth-grade classroom. The authors share poststructural analytic encounters with attention to…