Revista Portuguesa de Educação
ISSN 0871-9187
CASTANHEIRA, Maria Lucia; GREEN, Judith L. DIXON, Carol N.. Literacy practices in classrooms: examining literate actions as socially constructed. []. , 20, 2, pp.7-38. ISSN 0871-9187.
In this article, we argue that literacy is not a universal process that has the same meaning for everybody. Rather, literacy is understood as a dynamic process in which the meaning of literate action is locally and continuously redefined by participants of a social group. To support this argument, we examine how a common understanding of literacy was established by participants in a classroom. Adopting an interactional ethnographic approach, we analyze how students and teacher define conditions for reading, writing and discussing texts, during a summer course. Based on this analysis, we raise theoretical and methodological issues to be considered when developing research on school literacy practices.
: Literacy; Discourse analysis; Classroom interaction.