ABSTRACT
It was the rainy season and the relentless pounding on the tin roof of the small, one-room mud and stick home threatened to overwhelm the tape recorder set out between us on the small wooden table. At 7 p.m. it was already dark, with the light of a single candle illuminating only the faces of Robin and the individual speaker, while everyone else sat back from the table in shadow. It was a Friday evening and Lino, José Angel, and Celia had fulfilled their promise to come to Robin’s house in order to share their stories with Vicki about their lives as Salvadoran campesinos before and during the recent civil war. Lino and José Angel were both exhausted from working in the fields since daybreak, and Celia was suffering from a serious chest cold that had prevented her full participation in the literacy class earlier that afternoon. They all, though, were committed to taking the time to respond to Robin’s request that they share their story. They understood that speaking with Vicki was a way to get their stories about their experiences, and their understanding of the underlying issues-poverty, resistance, the brutality of war, and the strength of solidarity-out to the rest of the world.1 The topic of literacy wove itself throughout.
