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Book Review: Electronic Literacies: Language, Culture, and Power in Online Education

One of the primary questions teachers often ask of research is, “Do the results tell me how to help my students?” If teachers only think of generalizability when reading Electronic Literacies, they are being a bit short-sighted. It seems rather obvious that the cultures of four Hawaiian classrooms may not be representative of those of most classrooms in the continental United States, but that really is not the point. Mark Warschauer, in his book Electronic Literacies: Language, Culture, and Power in Online Education, is primarily concerned with investigating the changes in the nature of reading and writing in classrooms brought on by technology, issues of equity, and the resulting experiences for culturally and linguistically diverse learners. The more important question to ask, then, probably should be, “Can this book give me some insight into the possible effects of technology on my students’ reading and writing?” We think the answer to that question is, “Yes!” In Electronic Literacies, Warschauer provides a brief historical review of the evolution of technology and the control of ideas in literacy in order to better understand issues of power and language in four online classrooms. The result is an informative and interesting discussion from a post-modern perspective. Quoting Cuban [1] and others, he describes literacy of the past as that which imitates correct texts. Students were expected to copy writing and memorize portions of the cannon of literature. Though Dewey’s ideas of educative experience, reflection, and inquiry surfaced briefly in the twentieth century [2], most educators have chosen to ignore Dewey’s learner-centered curriculum ideas. Instead, they seem to pursue more technocratic models that teach students survival literacy that enhances economic goals. As a way to shake up our comfort with current literacy practices, Warschaur helps the reader understand how silly some of the past concerns about previous evolutions in literacy were by reflecting on the development of literacy enabled in part by the discovery of J. EDUCATIONAL COMPUTING RESEARCH, Vol. 24(2) 205–211, 2001