Literacy, Discourse, and Liguitics or What is Literacy?

In James Paul Gee's intoduction he explores the idea that through "intergrating the psycho and soocio approaches to language from a variety of disciplines, is emerging, a field which we might call literacy studies."(525) Applied linguistics is another term sites as related to his rearch in this area stating the foundation of his work
"should not be language or literacy but social practices."(525) Conversation and discourse is a huge part of literacy according to Gee's research, because oral expression of ones ideals and social interactions are a demonstration of one's literacy level. "Discourses are ways of being in the world; they are forms of life which intergrate words, acts, values, beliefs, attitudes, and social identities as well as gestures, glances, body positions, and clothes." (526)Gee refers to discourse as an "identity kit" so naturally your literacy style is part of your discourse. Upbringing and family life are essential to our discourse, primary socialization begins at home at a very young age Gee calls this devolpment our "primary discourse". As we grow we develop other discourses, if someone comes from a home where only certain topics are addressed they may seek outside stimulation and develop "secondary discourses" to meet their needs. This is also a part of language/literacy aquisition, the understanding and application of new language is integral to human development and societies that encourage this flourish while those that don't fail. Within a given culture certain enclaves that are not establishing new disciurse may exist but those people restrict themselves and their children through this practice as new and different language is a part of man's advancement. Gee defines literacy as "the mastery of or fluent control over a secondary discourse."(529) He also states in the same passage that "literacy is always plural..." literacy having more than one meaning is a key element to lteracy studies and applied linguistics. Gee goes on to draw a line between the two and provide research to support the idea that "we are better at waht we aquire, but we consciously know more about what we have learned."(540) Undestanding that primary discourse is aquired and secondary discourse is learned explains the difficulty with defining literacy and evaluating it without taking into account the socialization of liguistics. Language is power it has been used to control people throughout time understnading how it relates to discourse and the perception of literacy style make it more clear that the command of the written word needs to accessible to all people.