Background

It is important to generate information on indigenous community literacy practices among different cultural groups in Nepal. Such information should be documented and disseminated so as to formulate new policies and bring changes in different aspects of literacy activities like training, material development, monitoring, teaching-learning methods, supervision, etc. In this respect, an ethnographic approach can help a lot as a learning method and tool to identify indigenous literacy practices of different cultural groups.

Nepal is a country of multiple dimensions in terms of caste, ethnicity, language, religion, ecology, society and culture. Nepal’s population mainly consists of two major groups: Mongoloid and Caucasian. Under these two groups there are 103 different caste and ethnic groups. Such diversity demands pluralistic approaches when developing plans, strategies, policies and programs. The “free-size literacy” currently being implemented by government and many other institutions is not matching the cultural diversity and socio-culturally embedded literacy context of different peoples and cultural groups. The teaching methods promoted in this connection has always been top-down, from educated to illiterate. It has never intended to have some understanding or study of locally practiced indigenous literacy.

Retrospect view of literacy practices

There is a need to record all available information regarding people practicing literacy in their day-to-day life, even if they are illiterate. We know that even without being literate, people are capable of managing their everyday literacy needs. We need to find out how they do so. What are the literacy tools and methods developed by the so-called rural illiterate community? If literacy is tied to the power structures of society, where do we stand?
In many villages illiterate people use tallying and their own indigenous so-called “Place Value System”. Nepalese villages are full of many more magical literacy practices. It would be interesting to know all these local types of literacy practices, which people have integrated with their socio-cultural practices, and to find out if people have developed some new methodologies to meet the needs of modern literacy.

In Nepal the literate group consists of caste and ethnic groups like Marwady, Kayastha, Thakali, Bahun (Tarai and Hill), Newar, Rajput and Bangali. The literacy rate of six groups (Marwady, Kayastha, Thakali, Bahun, Newar) is much higher than the national literacy rate of 54 percent. Socio-economic and cultural factors have been instrumental for increasing the literacy rate of these groups. The Marwady, Thakali, Newar and some Hilly and Tarai Bahun (highest caste) are involved in business, which involves transactions of money. It is inevitable that someone involved in business should be literate, and business families promote education inside as well as outside the family. Traditionally, the Kayastha, Bahun and Bangali are involved in educational activities (reading, writing, accounting, teaching and record keeping) in educated and uneducated Nepali societies. In the context of Nepalese society, these groups have been considered educated groups. Similarly, it is also necessary for Rajputs, who are considered the warrior class of the Tarai, to be literate because it helps them keep their ruler status. Their kinship relations with India are another strong factor behind their better educational status. In Marwady and Rajput communities, the dowry system has also contributed to increasing the importance of literacy. The higher the education: the higher the rate of dowry. Those who are highly educated or hold titles like doctor and engineer will get higher amounts in dowry.

Social, cultural and economic needs have thus been the prime movers in making these groups literate. Literacy is a process for these groups. An in-depth analysis or comprehensive research into the literacy culture of these groups will help us identify family and social ideas or practices that increase the literacy rate in general. Whether or not literacy is a social need of illiterate groups, generalization may not be logical and justified. For a literate group, literacy is always a necessary asset to maintain their group position and prestige in society. Conversely, literacy is neither unnecessary nor urgent for the illiterate groups. They live by hard labor and although literacy is a social necessity, from the utility and priority point of view, it is not an important life skill for them.

Anthropology and Literacy

The importance and need of literacy for different cultural groups are quite diverse. The meaning of literacy for the literate groups mentioned above and for illiterate groups like Chepang, Mushahar, Danuwar, Majhi and many more is quite different. Similarly, the mobile indigenous groups have given a different meaning to literacy. They may also have different practices that may not match with mainstream literacy. Developing this type of information is only possible through an ethnographic approach. A quantitative approach or research may miss many social and cultural aspects that are important to make literacy functioning and continuing for a long period of time.

Ethnography is characterized by first hand study of a small community or other group. This method has come to be almost synonymous with participant observation, which can be said to be its principal tool. Participant observation advocates extended periods of fieldwork in which the observer attempts to immerse him-/herself in the daily life of the people studied, thus minimizing the interfering effect of his/her presence and permitting a full appreciation of the cultural meanings and social structure of the group. The ethnographers of literacy study should conduct in-depth qualitative studies of everyday literacy and of the literacy programs that have been developed and executed to enhance literacy skill among the rural mass.

Ethnographic research on literacy in general begins with cultural definitions of what constitute reading and writing practices, and proceeds to describe a plurality of literacies. The plurality of literacy practices refers not just to each cultural group’s shared reading and writing practices, but also to the differential distribution of literacy practices within cultural groups. Most ethnographies of literacy demonstrate the ways in which literacy practices divide members of a culture in their access to activities, power and social relationships rather than generalize about all members of a culture. Thus, in brief, ethnography of literacy is the description of the complex interrelationship between literacy and cultural practices.

Implementation of different literacy methods

Due to its vast diversities, we can say that Nepal is always a fertile ground to test and implement innovative ideas in the field of literacy. Accordingly, the national literacy program in Nepal has been exposed to many methods from its very beginning. The program started with the traditional way of teaching, the Barnamala, i.e. using the phonetic method, from around 1946. As a learning method, rote learning or memorization was given emphasis.
Individuals and institutions then started to search for a new method which could accelerate the learning process of adults. This search innovated in 1951 a typical learning method which depicts objects familiar to learners and similar to the structure of individual alphabet characters. The structure of the alphabets was associated with the structure of the objects. One can say that an association method was applied here.

At the beginning of the 1970s, a third literacy method was introduced. This technique divides all the consonants and vowel letters into fourteen different groups based on the similarity of structure of the letters and initiates a learning process group-wise. This method had the capacity to impart literacy skill in a very short period of time. It also provides information on and addresses the daily needs of adults by incorporating a functional education component.

All the methods mentioned above gave emphasis to the technology of literacy and to reading and writing simply and quickly. Initiation and implementation of new methods, however, continued in the field of literacy in Nepal.

At the beginning of the 1980s, a new learning approach to adult literacy was introduced. This concept was based on the learning principle propounded by Paulo Freire. The key to the Frerian concept learning process is known as “Concentization” and is associated with the “key word literacy method” developed by Dr. Frank Laubach. The government primer popularly known as Naya Goreto is designed on the Frerian approach.

After the use of Naya Goreto for more than a decade, another new literacy approach, REFLECT (Regenerated Frerian Literacy through Community Technique), appeared in Nepal in 1994. This is the second largest literacy program now. Reflect is another modification of or added dimension to the Frerian approach. In the Reflect program, learners develop learning materials for themselves. Materials contain local information and knowledge of the local community. Discussion or learning is thus centered on the needs of the local people. They use maps, calendars, matrixes, diagrams, etc. rather than expert made materials like Naya Goreto, and they conduct participatory classes.

The development agendas of Nepali Reflect are different from those of the traditional literacy program; they are progressive and revolutionary. Reflect aims at the poor, the Dalits (oppressed) and women. It is integrated with poverty alleviation, self-help, sustainability, literacy, self-sufficiency, empowerment, awareness and issues of social change and development. The importance of Reflect is increasing day by day, not least because Reflect is necessary for facilitation of a democratic political system, for enhancing the general development process and for meeting the expectations of people. It has the capacity to coordinate these aspects and is also suitable to Nepal’s diverse geographical landscapes, languages, multi socio-cultural reality and economy.
Before Reflect, there were two other literacy programs under the names of Whole Language and Language Experience Approach. Language Experience Approach was introduced with some modification suitable to Nepal. The implementers were of the view that these two programs are suitable for the multi socio-cultural reality of Nepal. The approaches are suitable in some areas and will be a success in homogenous groups where one mother tongue is dominant.

Ethnographic approach in literacy

Ethnographic approach is rather a new concept in literacy. Nepal has many cultural groups under the names of indigenous/ethnic and minority groups. We need to look at things from their cultural perspective. Many of the cultural groups are living as pre-literate societies. Therefore, introduction of culturally embedded literacy would definitely work. The ethnographic approach to literacy does not just consist of a set of “uniform technical skills” to be imparted to those lacking them, but is rather opining that there is multiple literacy in the communities and that literacy practices are socially embedded - the indigenous model.

Literacy programs need to take account of such shifts and critiques if they are to handle complex communicative needs. In this context, the reading and writing practices of literacy are only one part of what people are going to have to learn in order to be ‘literate’ in the future.

Looking more closely at village life in the light of people’s behavior, their communication style and oral literacy practices, it seems that not only is there actually a lot of literacy going on, but also that there are quite different practices associated with literacy. In an ethnographic approach, one first asks about what local literacy practices exist and to whom they relate. This alternative, ideological model of literacy offers a more culturally sensitive view of literacy practices as they vary from one context to another. It posits that literacy is a social practice, not simply a technical and neutral skill. The ways in which people address reading and writing are rooted in conceptions of knowledge, identity, being. Literacy, in this sense, is always contested, both its meanings and its practices, hence particular versions of it are always “ideological”, they are always rooted in a particular world-view and a desire for that view of literacy to dominate and marginalize others.

The arguments about social literacy suggest that “engaging with literacy is always a social act”. The ways in which teachers and their students interact is already a social practice that affects the literacy being learned, the ideas about literacy held by the participants – especially the new learners – and their position in relations of power. It is not valid to suggest that literacy can be given neutrally and that its ‘social’ effects are experienced only afterwards. When conceptualizing literacy as a social and cultural construction, it is no longer inherent in the individual, but resides rather in his or her transaction with socially and culturally fluid surroundings. A member of an ethnic minority group may be seen as lacking literacy skills in terms of the dominant group’s language and culture, but may be quite literate in the context of his or her own group. From this perspective, cultural differences between literacy venue and home can become significant barriers in the acquisition of literacy by members of ethnic minority groups.

The socio-cultural approach brings to the fore the idea that literacy acquisition is a primary vehicle for transmitting shared values and beliefs of significance in the community. In the case of ethnic minorities, the process of cultural transmission can be used to enrich a learner’s links to the group of origin, to the dominant group, or both; literacy education can be seen to be a major vehicle for socialization and for the development of cultural identity. In the case of subordinated groups, literacy programs that focus only on functional literacy and neglect culture are unlikely to succeed. Attempts to increase literacy among members of ethnic minorities must attend at once to issues of culture and power rather than simply to technical issues of reading and writing.

Conclusion

Literacy practices thus increasingly became subject of direct ethnographic study in their culturally differentiated, rather than generalized, manifestations. Ethnographic research within social settings has illuminated people’s actual activities and symbols associated with reading or writing, rather than resting satisfied with a monolithic or reified concept of literacy.

Ethnographic studies explore the range of varied patterns through which people actually read or write, sometimes with particular attention to the differential ways that the practices of reading and / or writing work out for different categories of people and with particular attention to questions of access, control, and power.
The issue here is that the apparently universal process of teaching, reading and writing is a highly problematic discourse. Recent critiques stress the arguably self-interested, ethnocentric, or at best confused assumptions underlying this myth and its function in the current social order. A similar perspective has considered literacy’s role or ideology – as defined by the powerful – in colonialism, development, education and social divisions, leading to the labelling of recent work under this head as the ideological model of literacy. Literacy practices and symbols are here commonly analysed as agents of control, though of course this analysis varies according to cultural context, and politically emancipatory as well as repressive uses can be studied. Most work on these issues assumes that power relations and ideological assumptions ultimately shape the practices of literacy, not by technology, but by social patterns.

Prakash Singh Adhikari is a non-formal education expert and Chairperson of Innovative Forum for Community Development, Nepal

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