NLA Discussion: Women and Literacy COnference

[Art LaChance]

Andres,

I find that one of the outcomes of "support groups" is that they tend to
exacerbate and reinforce the negative thoughts and feelings rather than solving
problems.  I'm not sure anybody was "turned off" by the title.  I also think 
there is a lot of common ground between the sexes in adult lit and really
didn't want to take the time to deal with ONLY women's issues.
Ideally, the real meat of this conference should have been included in GA's 
recent annual literacy conference where a couple of thousand people
attended.

Art

Andres Muro wrote:

> Politically correct to whom?
>
> That is like suggesting that every time we have events that relate to
> minorities we take out the reference to the minority that we are referring to.
> Women are an oppressed group and as such they should organize multiple
> events and activities to explore the nature of that oppression and ways to
> overcome it. I presume that everyone who attended the conference and
> everyone who heard about it, clearly understood what the conference was
> going to deal with. I think that the conference, in fact, did what intended to
> do.  Those who are turned off by the title may not be ready to seriously
> engage the issues. That is not the fault of the organizers. It is more likely
> the fault of the mainstream educational system.
>
> Andres
>
> >>> <JCretella at aol.com> 02/09/99 08:55am >>>
>
> Daphne..A "gender and literacy" conference may seem more politically
> correct to some people but I think would avoid the real issues that men
> and women face the same kinds of barriers  to learning and they also face
> individual ones  A womens  Conference or a mens Workshop is perfectly
> appropriate with any local or national conference on Literacy..
>
> JCretella at aol.com