Book review on New (digital) literacies

Lankshear, C. and Knobel, M. (2006) New Literacies: Everyday Practices & Classroom Learning, 2^nd edition, Berkshire: McGraw Hill

 Summary

In the (revised) second edition of their widely acclaimed book New Literacies: Everyday Practices & Classroom Learning Colin Lankshear and Michele Knobel explore the impact of the massive growth of electronic information and communication technologies on the practice and concept of literacy to then discuss its implications for formal instruction. The authors’ contribution—as reflected in the tripartite organization of their book—is at once ethnographic, conceptual, and programmatic. From an insider (or emic) perspective they thoroughly account, on the one hand, for the ‘digital’ or technical novelty of the multiple new ‘post-typographic’ forms of texts, text production and dissemination afforded by the rise of the Internet and its associated technologies. On the other hand, (on the shoulders of former New Literacy Studies scholar) they further develop the concept of ‘new literacies’ locating novelty in the unprecedented forms of texts and text production afforded by the new technologies—the new ‘technical stuff’—as well as in the new collaborative, participatory and distributive paradigm—the new ‘ethos stuff’— underlying current ways of producing and exchanging texts. Lastly, they explore the insights that the study of young people’s out-of-school literacy practices might yield for classroom learning. New literacies, according to Lankshear and Knobel, are attached to a new logic of social interaction, a drastically new mindset about the world centered on the values of collaboration, participation, distributed expertise, and—most importantly—relatedness (not information!). These new literacies are being strongly embraced by young people outside of school and yet largely ignored by educational systems. New Literacies’ potential contribution to formal instruction can be vast yet it remains subject, the argument goes, to educators’ deep understanding, value and experience of the new paradigm. Their work attempts to contribute to such understanding by describing, classifying and analyzing the nature and possible educational impact of new online and digitally-mediated literacy practices.