Been seeing more and more evidence that mass literacy is both massively diminished compared to the 20th century and accelerating in its decline across the world, especially in relatively highly educated countries. This problem is obviously much more severe amongst the working class than others, as historically tends to be the case.
If we want the masses to get to grips with a communist understanding of the world, which requires a lot of reading and discussion of text, surely this is an issue we need to grapple with. Current political education initiatives usually bring together smaller, highly-literate (typically university educated) groups of people, which tend to remain insular and rarely seem to engage with the broader working class. I am convinced that a significant barrier to mass political education is that so many “literate” people are unable to read a simple paragraph.
How do we rectify this situation? It seems historically unique because in the past, illiterate people had no illusions about the fact that they couldn’t read and were enthusiastic about learning (at least, in general). Nowadays, I can imagine that most people would not view their literacy as something that needs to be improved, and many will even react with hostility to such a suggestion.
What’s the correct approach? Do we need to emphasise the practical rewards that those who engage with theoretical texts benefit from? Take a direct approach and offer reading comprehension sessions? Interested to hear what others think.
Women in Cuba: 20 Years Later by Margaret Randall is a great read on the Cuban Literacy campaign and a whole bunch of other programs the Revolution brought about.
I love this book! Particular highlights for me were them concretely acting on a material understanding of patriarchy. That is, patriarchy is materially the domestic enslavement of women and a key lever to break that is to socialize domestic labor which is why precious foreign reserves were used to import washing machines even as the mechanization of agriculture was pressing.
It’s really good, right! I keep meaning to read more of her work. I was blown away by the literacy campaign. The absolute scale of what they accomplished was mindblowing. Also, while it wasn’t nearly at the same scale, I found the therapy/theater hybrid work to be really interesting.
Ooh, I don’t remember that aspect. Another book I found insightful into the struggle against patriarchy and machismo was ‘Lavender and Red: Rainbow Solidarity in Defense of Cuba’ by Leslie Feinberg. It covers the struggle for gay and trans rights and particularly the humane, material response to the AIDS crisis and the public mea culpa and apology Fidel made for his earlier naive homophobia.
Awesome! Adding it to my list, thank you!