ABSTRACT
Any sociocultural identification that extends into the core values of a society and its individuals has deep historical roots. Within those Western democracies that came early to industrial and urban life, ideals about the relationship of literacy to economic progress for the nation and social advancement for the individual became tightly intertwined with industrial growth and political stability. Compulsory graded schooling, national textbooks, and a cadre of professional teachers became natural companions to factories, election processes, and an expanded market for consumer goods. As former colonies became independent nations in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, they foHowed the example of industrialized nations and hired teachers, built schools, and distributed basic texts to the young in the hope of increasing worker production and consumer interest to build the nation' s role in the world marketplace.
