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Illiterate America
It is startling and it is in a country that prides itself on being among the most enlightened in the world, 25 million American adults cannot read the poison warnings on a can of pesticide, a letter from their child’s teacher, or the front page of a newspaper. An additional 35 million read below the level needed to function successfully in our society. The United States ranks forty-ninth among 158 member nations of the UN in literacy, and wastes over $100 billion annually as a result. The problem is not merely an embarrassment, it is a social and economic disaster.
In Illiterate America , Jonathan Kozol, author of National Book Award-winning Death at an Early Age , addresses this national disgrace. Combining hard statistics and heartrending stories, he describes the economic and the human costs of illiteracy. Kozol analyses and condemns previous government action—and inaction—and, in a passionate call for reform, he proposes a specific program to conquer illiteracy.
One out of every three American adults cannot read this book—which is why everyone else must.
In Illiterate America , Jonathan Kozol, author of National Book Award-winning Death at an Early Age , addresses this national disgrace. Combining hard statistics and heartrending stories, he describes the economic and the human costs of illiteracy. Kozol analyses and condemns previous government action—and inaction—and, in a passionate call for reform, he proposes a specific program to conquer illiteracy.
One out of every three American adults cannot read this book—which is why everyone else must.
288 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 1985
16 people are currently reading
381 people want to read
About the author
Jonathan Kozol
49 books536 followersJonathan Kozol is a non-fiction writer, educator, and activist best known for his work towards reforming American public schools. Upon graduating from Harvard, he received a Rhodes scholarship. After returning to the United States, Kozol became a teacher in the Boston Public Schools, until he was fired for teaching a Langston Hughes poem. Kozol has held two Guggenheim Fellowships, has twice been a fellow of the Rockefeller Foundation, and has also received fellowships from the Field and Ford Foundations. Most recently, Kozol has founded and is running a non-profit called Education Action. The group is dedicated to grassroots organizing of teachers across the country who wish to push back against NCLB and the most recent Supreme Court decision on desegregation, and to help create a single, excellent, unified system of American public schools.
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August 26, 2023
The form of illiteracy of chief concern to Jonathan Kozol here is not that in which a person literally cannot read a word of written language; indeed, as Kozol points out, “In the past two decades, the number of those who cannot read at all has either diminished slightly or remained unchanged”. Rather, in Kozol’s formulation, “It is functional illiteracy which has increased…because this term is, in itself, a ‘function’ of the needs imposed upon a person by the economic and the social order” (p. 57). And the grim consequences of rising rates of functional illiteracy across the United States of America are at the heart of Kozol’s 1985 book Illiterate America.
Kozol’s work as educator and activist has always had a strong focus on human rights and civil rights. One of the key formative moments in his intellectual life may have occurred when, as a new teacher in the Boston public school system, he was fired – for teaching a poem by Langston Hughes! That experience, along with Kozol’s general observations of the dreadful conditions under which African American children in Boston were being taught, led directly to the writing of Kozol’s first book, Death at an Early Age: The Destruction of the Hearts and Minds of Negro Children in the Boston Public Schools (1967). Kozol’s passion for social justice, along with his concern for the plight of American society’s most vulnerable members, can be seen in his subsequent books, like Rachel and Her Children: Homeless Families in America (1988) and The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America (2005).
Illiterate America follows squarely in that tradition. Functional illiteracy – when a person is not able to read and write at a level that is sufficient for accomplishing the basic tasks that are necessary for productive daily living and gainful employment – increases as a rapidly technologizing society makes those basic tasks more complex. Kozol feels that the literacy programs of his time are grossly inadequate, and that the families of the functionally illiterate will face a cycle of growing dislocation and suffering as a result:
The numbers are high. They will grow somewhat worse. They will grow a lot more visible. The cost to the society will deepen. Because the parents won’t be able to defend their children against failures in the schools, nor give them preparation which might help them to defend themselves, the numbers served by present literacy programs will be more and more outbalanced by the numbers of illiterates emerging from the schools. (p. 58)
Writing in the mid-1980’s, Kozol sees the economic and social conservatism of the Reagan administration as key to the problem:
One shocking revelation of the secret fears of some of those in dominant positions speaks for those of many who are more discreet. “Spending on education should be reduced…,” a writer for the Heritage Foundation recently proposed. Workers, he said, should not be educated “beyond what the system is likely to require…” Critical competence in literacy skills – or “overeducation,” in his words – might lead to “greater discontentment and still lower productivity.” Coming from a man and institution with direct ties to the White House, these concerns cannot be viewed as so exceptional that we may casually consign them to a right-wing fringe of odious opinion. (p. 100).
Kozol proposes admirably specific ideas for reaching the functionally illiterate where they live – drawing upon the strength and the life experience of respected community leaders in economically challenged communities, forming small circles of learners, validating the intellectual strength and power that people who are functionally illiterate already possess – and I found myself wondering: to what extent have these promising ideas been put into effect in efforts to help the functionally illiterate?
As someone who loves books, I was particularly taken with a question that Kozol asks in a chapter titled “Cause for Celebration”: “What if it were possible somehow to flood the nation…with three or four hundred free and excellent and brand-new books? What if we did this, not just once, but month after month, year after year, for ten or twenty years?” (p. 149)
This prospect offers what Kozol calls “the positive incentive in availability”, as he asks, “Why not make it possible to own, right from the start, what one may someday have the option to enjoy and opportunity to understand? I should think a person would be far more likely to be eager to learn how to drive if there were a small attractive car parked out in the garage” (p. 150). I liked Kozol’s suggestion that “ownership…and proprietary pride may have some lively impact on our motivation” (p. 150), and I suspect that many of us have seen a “non-reader” friend express interest in a book because it relates to something that that friend is interested in. That metaphorical light bulb, once it is switched on, tends to stay on.
I liked how Kozol concluded with an inspiring suggestion that “Illiteracy, when widely recognized and fully understood, may represent the one important social, class, and pedagogic issue of our times on which the liberal, the radical, and the informed conservative can stand on common ground and toil, no matter with what caution and what trepidation, in a common cause that offers benefits to all” (p. 199). And I was particularly taken with his attack, in an afterword, on the “back-to-basics” approach to education that was so popular during the Reagan years:
Most of the back-to-basics rhetoric speaks not so much of “something different” as of “something more” – more homework, more examinations, longer school days, longer school semesters. It is not clear what we may hope to gain by stipulating “more” if we are speaking only of more of the same, more hours of tedium, more school days of withdrawal and resentment….When politicians offer us a quantitative answer to a qualitative problem, when they assume that more is better…it seems to me they show themselves to be the victims of the same consumer appetite that leads so many of their fellow citizens to see more value in accumulation of tin objects than in transformation of the tin to better metals. (p. 204)
Almost four decades after the publication of Illiterate America, state-administered high-stakes testing – demanded by the business community, and mandated by business-friendly state legislatures – is a fixture in every state of the Union. Those of you with high-school-age children can recount your own children’s horror stories of hearing teachers say “You need to know this, because it’s going to be on EOS [end-of-semester]” or “That’s an interesting question and a good idea, but we don’t have time for it, because I’ve got to get you ready for the HSA [High School Assessment].” It is a system that discourages innovation and critical thinking, and one that rewards the least imaginative and least independent-minded students and teachers – those, in other words, who are best at staying within the lines and doing as they are told.
And in the meantime, while school systems dutifully administer their HSA’s and EOS’s, the latest estimates are that about 18 percent of U.S. adults, or 57.4 million people, are functionally illiterate. The incidence is said to be particularly high among low-income Americans, and among members of cultural minorities. Kozol’s Illiterate America asks us today, as surely as it did 35 years ago, to reflect upon, and act upon, the proposition that this state of affairs is deeply and profoundly wrong.
Kozol’s work as educator and activist has always had a strong focus on human rights and civil rights. One of the key formative moments in his intellectual life may have occurred when, as a new teacher in the Boston public school system, he was fired – for teaching a poem by Langston Hughes! That experience, along with Kozol’s general observations of the dreadful conditions under which African American children in Boston were being taught, led directly to the writing of Kozol’s first book, Death at an Early Age: The Destruction of the Hearts and Minds of Negro Children in the Boston Public Schools (1967). Kozol’s passion for social justice, along with his concern for the plight of American society’s most vulnerable members, can be seen in his subsequent books, like Rachel and Her Children: Homeless Families in America (1988) and The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America (2005).
Illiterate America follows squarely in that tradition. Functional illiteracy – when a person is not able to read and write at a level that is sufficient for accomplishing the basic tasks that are necessary for productive daily living and gainful employment – increases as a rapidly technologizing society makes those basic tasks more complex. Kozol feels that the literacy programs of his time are grossly inadequate, and that the families of the functionally illiterate will face a cycle of growing dislocation and suffering as a result:
The numbers are high. They will grow somewhat worse. They will grow a lot more visible. The cost to the society will deepen. Because the parents won’t be able to defend their children against failures in the schools, nor give them preparation which might help them to defend themselves, the numbers served by present literacy programs will be more and more outbalanced by the numbers of illiterates emerging from the schools. (p. 58)
Writing in the mid-1980’s, Kozol sees the economic and social conservatism of the Reagan administration as key to the problem:
One shocking revelation of the secret fears of some of those in dominant positions speaks for those of many who are more discreet. “Spending on education should be reduced…,” a writer for the Heritage Foundation recently proposed. Workers, he said, should not be educated “beyond what the system is likely to require…” Critical competence in literacy skills – or “overeducation,” in his words – might lead to “greater discontentment and still lower productivity.” Coming from a man and institution with direct ties to the White House, these concerns cannot be viewed as so exceptional that we may casually consign them to a right-wing fringe of odious opinion. (p. 100).
Kozol proposes admirably specific ideas for reaching the functionally illiterate where they live – drawing upon the strength and the life experience of respected community leaders in economically challenged communities, forming small circles of learners, validating the intellectual strength and power that people who are functionally illiterate already possess – and I found myself wondering: to what extent have these promising ideas been put into effect in efforts to help the functionally illiterate?
As someone who loves books, I was particularly taken with a question that Kozol asks in a chapter titled “Cause for Celebration”: “What if it were possible somehow to flood the nation…with three or four hundred free and excellent and brand-new books? What if we did this, not just once, but month after month, year after year, for ten or twenty years?” (p. 149)
This prospect offers what Kozol calls “the positive incentive in availability”, as he asks, “Why not make it possible to own, right from the start, what one may someday have the option to enjoy and opportunity to understand? I should think a person would be far more likely to be eager to learn how to drive if there were a small attractive car parked out in the garage” (p. 150). I liked Kozol’s suggestion that “ownership…and proprietary pride may have some lively impact on our motivation” (p. 150), and I suspect that many of us have seen a “non-reader” friend express interest in a book because it relates to something that that friend is interested in. That metaphorical light bulb, once it is switched on, tends to stay on.
I liked how Kozol concluded with an inspiring suggestion that “Illiteracy, when widely recognized and fully understood, may represent the one important social, class, and pedagogic issue of our times on which the liberal, the radical, and the informed conservative can stand on common ground and toil, no matter with what caution and what trepidation, in a common cause that offers benefits to all” (p. 199). And I was particularly taken with his attack, in an afterword, on the “back-to-basics” approach to education that was so popular during the Reagan years:
Most of the back-to-basics rhetoric speaks not so much of “something different” as of “something more” – more homework, more examinations, longer school days, longer school semesters. It is not clear what we may hope to gain by stipulating “more” if we are speaking only of more of the same, more hours of tedium, more school days of withdrawal and resentment….When politicians offer us a quantitative answer to a qualitative problem, when they assume that more is better…it seems to me they show themselves to be the victims of the same consumer appetite that leads so many of their fellow citizens to see more value in accumulation of tin objects than in transformation of the tin to better metals. (p. 204)
Almost four decades after the publication of Illiterate America, state-administered high-stakes testing – demanded by the business community, and mandated by business-friendly state legislatures – is a fixture in every state of the Union. Those of you with high-school-age children can recount your own children’s horror stories of hearing teachers say “You need to know this, because it’s going to be on EOS [end-of-semester]” or “That’s an interesting question and a good idea, but we don’t have time for it, because I’ve got to get you ready for the HSA [High School Assessment].” It is a system that discourages innovation and critical thinking, and one that rewards the least imaginative and least independent-minded students and teachers – those, in other words, who are best at staying within the lines and doing as they are told.
And in the meantime, while school systems dutifully administer their HSA’s and EOS’s, the latest estimates are that about 18 percent of U.S. adults, or 57.4 million people, are functionally illiterate. The incidence is said to be particularly high among low-income Americans, and among members of cultural minorities. Kozol’s Illiterate America asks us today, as surely as it did 35 years ago, to reflect upon, and act upon, the proposition that this state of affairs is deeply and profoundly wrong.
November 4, 2024
This book was really hard to read. Part of that is because it is somewhat dated. Published in 1985, Kozol cites data that needs to be updated to have any current merit. Beyond that, the picture Kozol paints is so bleak, it is hard to continue reading in hopes that something better might turn up. Certainly, as he always does, Kozol identifies issues that become obvious once he spells them out but are certainly not obvious to politicians. For example, the solution to failing schools is not extending kids' time there. The "more of the same" plan, as he calls it, does not work. I think Kozol's weakest area is in addressing racism. While he certainly brings up institutionalized racism from the very beginning, he still ends up presenting a model where white people are teaching black people to read. This model is problematic because it is still based on the idea of the white savior who stoops down to the level of the pathetic black person who cannot save themselves. The book does clarify some issues and is even prescient at times. But once is enough-- I don't imagine I will ever read it again.
April 13, 2019
Although this book was written in 1985, the majority of his observations are true. Oppression of the spoken and written word are the ways in which most countries control the middle and lower classes.
Some of the best quotes:
Page 42
Since many corporations turn to groups like LVA to operate their programs, numbers are deceiving. Those they serve, moreover, are employable already. What they learn is only what they need to function more effectively in areas specific to the profits of the corporations.
Page 49
"They (the elite) speak of wishing to affect (not to transform) the future; but, most of all, they want to supervise that future.
Page 93
Those who are cheated cannot be expected to believe that anyone outside their ranks is likely to "deliver" freedom. Freedom is never delivered. It is never offered as a gift. Freedom is a conquest. To go on bended knee in order to request "permission" for that conquest is a pre-planned exercise in self-defeat.
Page 115
Many volunteers, moreover, are attached to certain aspects of a privilege existence which many endangered by the liberation of the powerless class of persons, who, once they have gained the needed skills, will surely seek an equal share in what is now enjoyed by those who can afford to volunteer. He discusses programs such as Americorps Vista.
It will always been an uphill battle to fight injustices for the downtrodden.
Some of the best quotes:
Page 42
Since many corporations turn to groups like LVA to operate their programs, numbers are deceiving. Those they serve, moreover, are employable already. What they learn is only what they need to function more effectively in areas specific to the profits of the corporations.
Page 49
"They (the elite) speak of wishing to affect (not to transform) the future; but, most of all, they want to supervise that future.
Page 93
Those who are cheated cannot be expected to believe that anyone outside their ranks is likely to "deliver" freedom. Freedom is never delivered. It is never offered as a gift. Freedom is a conquest. To go on bended knee in order to request "permission" for that conquest is a pre-planned exercise in self-defeat.
Page 115
Many volunteers, moreover, are attached to certain aspects of a privilege existence which many endangered by the liberation of the powerless class of persons, who, once they have gained the needed skills, will surely seek an equal share in what is now enjoyed by those who can afford to volunteer. He discusses programs such as Americorps Vista.
It will always been an uphill battle to fight injustices for the downtrodden.
February 6, 2016
This is a very good one. Not research-based but more anecdotal. Frames reading as the key to everything we associate with the American Dream and challenges America to provide that key to everyone, not just a few somebodies.
Read
July 16, 2023An impactful book in which the authors states that it is never too late to learn to read p. 61
And 61 millions adult Americans at the time this book was published were illiterate.
"American Jews, more than some other groups, must recognize the danger that exists in an illiterate underclass of unemployed and underfed and powerless poor people who have easily been tempted to seek out the scapegoats most available in time and proximate in place. HItler's success in winning mass support among not only those who felt excluded by their loss of marginal status, but also those who were the and most poorly educated strata of the German population stands as an enduring admonition. Any minority is endangered by the slightly less favored in a situation of diminished access to the civilizing impact of the written word. " p172
And 61 millions adult Americans at the time this book was published were illiterate.
"American Jews, more than some other groups, must recognize the danger that exists in an illiterate underclass of unemployed and underfed and powerless poor people who have easily been tempted to seek out the scapegoats most available in time and proximate in place. HItler's success in winning mass support among not only those who felt excluded by their loss of marginal status, but also those who were the and most poorly educated strata of the German population stands as an enduring admonition. Any minority is endangered by the slightly less favored in a situation of diminished access to the civilizing impact of the written word. " p172
March 14, 2021
Finished reading this book today and decided to find out if the situation was anywhere as dire as Kozol found it then:
"According to the National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES), 21 percent of adults in the United States (about 43 million) fall into the illiterate/functionally illiterate category. Apr 29, 2020."
As a retired ESL professor, I can attest to the high number of students who were referred to our program because they could not read or write at the level needed to perform well in their college classes. It is obvious that the problem hasn't gone away and that the Adult Basic Education program continues to fail its students.
"According to the National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES), 21 percent of adults in the United States (about 43 million) fall into the illiterate/functionally illiterate category. Apr 29, 2020."
As a retired ESL professor, I can attest to the high number of students who were referred to our program because they could not read or write at the level needed to perform well in their college classes. It is obvious that the problem hasn't gone away and that the Adult Basic Education program continues to fail its students.
April 25, 2014
Although written circa 1985, with Kozol's detailed insights into the large population of illiterate adults in America, I believe the literacy problem is just about the same in 2014. People who don't believe 1/3 of America suffers from low literacy are choosing to be blind to a problem that has not yet been adequately addressed. As an active volunteer in my local adult literacy non-profit, I know we need more volunteers locally, and better programs in other geographical areas that struggle generation after generation with the cycle of low literacy and poverty.
November 27, 2018
an important topic, but the book had the stench of being just academic masturbation of words by an American affluent since birth professor type man.
less fancy words, less telling how great you are, skip your calculations of the costs for fixing the underliteracy, oh and also would be lovely how this year compares to the mid 1980s when this was writteb
less fancy words, less telling how great you are, skip your calculations of the costs for fixing the underliteracy, oh and also would be lovely how this year compares to the mid 1980s when this was writteb
March 12, 2008
a little old, but brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. it was one of the first books i read in school, and after reading it my class tutored some adults for the GED and it was infinitely sad and rewarding. I'll never forget it.
August 7, 2009
Interesting book that I read to prepare for my new job. It seems a bit radical in the sense that Kozol claims that 1/3 of American's are illiterate (functionally, completely, or just 'moderately'). He is trying to ignite a literacy revolution in the USA.
June 21, 2023
What a pompous self serving windbag! He claims responsibility for the decisions of everyone in his life, depriving everyone from the maid to the children he didn’t teach to read of the right to their own lives.
June 29, 2007
Go and help someone learn to read.
Read
July 16, 2008This book made me angry for weeks, but reminded me why what I do is so important.
Want to read
September 2, 2008Hartwarmin storie
I cant reed either
I cant reed either
Read
October 30, 2009Kind of boring.
Read
January 15, 2010education
February 24, 2015
Good book about this problem. I was working on my library degree at the time.
November 3, 2014
Old as it is, this book is still sadly relevant.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews