ABSTRACT
The book draws upon and extends new views of literacy. It develops the field of literacy studies which has come into being in the past few years. Several studies have examined the literacy practices of individuals and groups, including people’s uses and meanings of literacy and the value it holds for them; these studies have contributed to a theory of literacy as social practice and collective resource. We will refer to some of these studies later in this chapter but will keep more detailed discussion of much of the work until the third section of the book when integrating and extending ideas about the nature of literacy.
