Literacy and Child Development in a Contemporary African Society

Abstract In this article, I propose a theoretical framework for understanding relations between literacy and child development: The literacy practices of a community map the cognitive affordances of script onto particular speech varieties in a sociocultural system. This leads to developmental goals and optimizing technologies situated in enabling institutional contexts. In many parts of Africa, institutionalized public basic schooling historically was imposed by Christian missionaries and sustained by colonial administration. Contemporary systems remain deeply infused with Western cultural hegemony. Most research on children’s literacy in Zambia has focused on individual literacy as a set of measurable competencies that can be assessed independently of context, construing language variety or instructional input as extraneous variables. A more integrated focus on literacy as a socially distributed practice in the context of a multilingual African society highlights cooperative learning and flexible communication across language boundaries. I suggest implications for bilingual education policy and planning for progressive social change.