A Place for Critical Literacy

The critical literacy classroom is characterized by an emphasis on students' voices and on dialogue as a tool with which students reflect on and construct meanings from texts and discourses. Is it appropriate, however, to teach critical literacy in settings such as penal institutions where student voices are deliberately discouraged and silenced? Despite the challenges involved in implementing critical literacy practices in both traditional and alternative schools, critical literacy has a place in all classrooms, but is particularly appropriate for adult inmate students struggling to understand their own marginalized status both within the institution itself and in society. The critical literacy teacher must find a balance between respecting the institution's rules and procedures and protecting the school and its students from domination by the institution. This balance is necessary if inmate students are to gain experience with a wide variety of diverse and competing perspectives that is required to foster critical consciousness and self-awareness.