The Role Of Literacy In The Bondwoman's Narrative

Literacy is often taken for granted by those who have attained it. It seems inseparable from all other parts of life. So many small parts of a daily routine have the necessity of this education ingrained into them. For instance, reading street signs or a map. Illiteracy is not just a small annoyance when obtaining directions, however. The key to oppressing any group of people is by depriving them of education and literature. Women and minorities have been oppressed since the beginning of time. They have no way to combat this oppression without proper education, which is exactly why those in power strategically deprive them of it. The root of all oppression is through the denial of education, including the deprival of literacy and one cannot
This novel is an example of keeping the victims of slavery illiterate in order to keep them stagnant, and unable to escape or fight their oppression. It is important to note that literacy is one of the basic building blocks of education. Without knowing how to read it was very difficult, if not impossible, to learn math, science, or history. Without this knowledge of the world you were limited to what you could see. For instance, if you have grown up on a plantation, that is your whole world. This was dangerous because it provided slaveowners a way to further control the slaves; they were less likely to attempt to escape or revolt because they were uneducated. “Most people have heard the phrase ‘knowledge is power.’ Slave owners certainly understood the concept. And since their goal was to render slaves powerless and portray themselves as all powerful, prohibiting slaves from gaining knowledge was critically important. Recognizing that slaves’ ignorance was a valuable control mechanism, many slave owners strictly enforced illiteracy (Paige, Witty & Rod
Fatima Gailani, head of Afghanistan’s Red Cross sees the importance of educating the women to gain freedom. “Educate us because whatever I see today, the misery in this country, and I mean it with all my heart, that it is because we are illiterate. We don't know; we don't know our rights because we are not aware.” This is another important part of how illiteracy oppresses people; without the skills to read, you don’t know what your rights are. Banning books is an ongoing problem. According to people for the American Way, between 1990 and 2000, there were 6,364 challenged books reported to or recorded by the Office for Intellectual Freedom. Recently the Tucson-Unified School District banned all “ethnic” literature from their schools. Including all Mexican-American works and even The Tempest, this school district is shaping young minds without diversity in mind. They are also not including the history of oppression minorities have faced in the U.S., and as we all know if you don’t learn from history it is doomed to repeat