Windows on information literacy worlds: Generic, situated and transformative perspectives

Mandy Lupton and Christine Bruce

Since the early 1990s, information literacy has emerged as a research agenda and an area of curriculum practice in formal education throughout Western, technologized societies such as the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the Nordic countries and Australia. Information literacy has typically been seen as searching for, locating, evaluating, selecting, organizing and using information (Bundy 2004a). However, contemporary understandings based on empirical research link information literacy closely with the idea of using information to learn (Limberg 2000; Bruce 2008; Lupton 2004, 2008).

Information literacy incorporates the use of a range of sources and stimuli, including visual, aural, affective and embodied information. For example, information literacy not only encompasses activities such as finding and using information for completing assignments or planning a holiday, but it also encompasses a firefighter 'reading' and 'speaking' a fire (Lloyd &Somerville 2006), an Indigenous Australian 'learning the language of the animals' (Mengel 2007) and a Canadian Inuit 'reading' the ice (Campbell 2004).

Some see information literacy as a separate literacy, while others see it as belonging to a literacy continuum (Boyce 1999, 2004). The term 'literacy' implies something fundamental and foundational. Information literacy is one of a number of literacies that have been acknowledged as an outcome of advances in information and communication technologies and the ubiquitous nature of this technology in Western societies (Cope & Kalantzis 2000b). Literacy scholars and practitioners have recognized information literacy as a 'new basic' literacy (Australian Council for Adult Literacy 2004).

In this chapter, we examine information literacy as a literacy and we present the information literacy discourse as mirroring the wider literacy discourse. We ask 'what does it mean to see information literacy as a literacy?' To investigate this question, we examine literacy models and perspectives. As a result of doing so, we devise a model for information literacy that incorporates the literacy perspectives. The model applies not only to information literacy in higher education, but also to information literacy as a widely applicable social construct. The model we devise makes it possible to position the widening range of conceptual, empirical and practical contributions to information literacy within a broad theoretical framework.

This chapter is presented as three parts. Part 1 ('Literacy models and perspectives'), analyzes the literacy literature for the key paradigms through which the literacy discourse is operationalized and explains how the Generic, Situated and Transformative (GeST) windows for information literacy were developed. Part 2 ('The GeST windows') proposes our new model which identifies three perspectives on literacy and reframes them as the information literacy GeST windows. Part 3 ('GeST in practice') uses examples of higher education practice to show how the GeST windows can reveal the ways in which information literacy is enacted in curriculum. This part also provides recommendations for how curriculum can be designed to incorporate the windows.

Part 1 Literacy models and perspectives

Varying perspectives on literacy have been identified and discussed by a number of authors. Some have posited their own theories (Luke & Freebody 1999; Green 1988), while others have presented inductively derived models. Table 1.1 presents a selected chronology of literacy models that compares their essential characteristics. These characteristics can be associated with three different perspectives, which reveal literacy as:

Table 1.1

Selected literacy models and perspectives

1. a set of generic skills (behavioural);

2. situated in social practices (sociocultural); and

3. transformative, for oneself and for society (critical).

In Part 2 of this chapter, we will reframe the generic (behavioural), situated (sociocultural) and transformative (critical) perspectives of literacy as the GeST model for information literacy education. 'Generic' captures the functional literacy perspective of information literacy and places it within the generic skills discourse; 'Situated' captures the sociocultural elements of information literacy with an authentic (professional, disciplinary) learning focus; and 'Transformative' captures the critical focus with more of an emphasis on the emancipatory nature of information literacy for the individual and society.

What does it mean to see literacy from the generic, situated and transformative perspectives? The generic perspective portrays literacy as 'functional' or 'basic' (Endres 2001, p. 401). In this perspective, literacy is regarded as a discrete set of skills to be learned by individuals. Literacy is not only the ability to read and write in order to decode labels and signs, to fill in forms and to read the newspaper, but also includes the ability to use information and communications technology such as the Internet for email, for finding information and for everyday transactions such as online banking. In the generic perspective, literacy is neutral, objective, text- based, apolitical, reproductive, standardized and universal. It is linked with worker productivity and a nation's economic development (Street 1984; Searle 1999). In vocational and higher education this perspective is seen in competency- based and generic skills curricula.

By contrast, the basis of a situated perspective is that literacy is fundamentally a social act, making literacy practices social practices. In this perspective, literacy is contextual, authentic, collaborative and participatory. Literacy involves individuals and groups making decisions, making meaning and solving personal, work, family and community problems. It is subjective, as what constitutes literacy practices will vary with the context and be different for each person and social group. In the situated perspective, there is not one single literacy, but many 'literacies' or 'multiliteracies', with multimodel dimensions including linguistic, visual, audio, gestural and spatial (Cope & Kalantzis 2000a).

The transformative perspective goes beyond sociocultural practices by being concerned with emancipatory processes and outcomes. The basis of a transformative perspective is that to be literate is for individuals and groups to be empowered to challenge the status quo and to effect social change. Within this view, literacy can be considered as critical, consciousness- raising, subjective, political, empowering and liberating (Freire 1970; Luke 2000; Powell, Chambers Cantrell & Adams 2001; Endres 2001).

Relationships between the perspectives

Table 1.1 is arranged to reveal the similarities between existing literacy models as incorporating the generic, situated or transformative perspectives. How do the models differ? Each model presents the relationships between the generic, situated and transformative perspectives differently. These relationships are presented variously as: 1) separate, 2) opposing, 3) inclusive, and 4) as a continuum of literacy education practices. For example, Larson and Marsh (2005, p. 15) see the theories they present as a continuum. Street (1984) presents his model as binary and opposing. Green (1988) sees his model as intermeshed (interdependent), while Luke and Freebody (1999) see their 'four resources' model as a 'family of practices'. Some authors do not address the relationship between the perspectives in the models they present, so we assume they see them as distinct and separate (for example, Lytle & Wolfe 1989; Searle 1999; Papen 2005).

The presentation of the relationship between the perspectives in each of the models as separate, opposing, inclusive and as a continuum has profound implications for literacy education. For example, in Australia (and elsewhere) a debate is raging currently about how best to teach literacy in schools (Gannon & Sawyer 2007). The two models discussed are phonics and whole language, which are presented as distinct and opposing, rather than inclusive or as a continuum.

In order to address the binary and opposing nature of the literacy debate, we propose that literacy perspectives are more constructively seen as inclusive and hierarchical. For example, to take the perspectives of Lytle and Wolfe outlined in Table 1.1, to experience literacy as 'tasks', one would need to apply basic skills in everyday life. To experience literacy as 'practices', one would need to see that there are a range of contextual practices within which to apply skills and knowledge. To experience literacy as 'critical reflection', one would need to reflect upon the experience of applying skills and knowledge, and upon...