Derided theory a headline act
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Written by terrypratchettbooks.org
Friday, 29 July 2005 |
Cath Hart
(The Australian)
A POSTMODERN seminar on the "ambiguous meanings of funny books for children" was the keynote address at the most recent professional development seminar for Queensland teachers despite moves by the state's Education Department to rein in the influence of the approach on the state syllabus.
Organisers said about 120 members of the English Teachers Association of Queensland met in May for the seminar on a "critical approach to humour in contemporary children's literature".
"Split reactions to Andy Griffiths' The Bad Book highlight the ambiguous meanings of funny books for children," said the precis for the address by Suzanne Eggins from the University of NSW.
"When Griffiths writes about Little Willy setting fire to the cat, is he inciting young readers to acts of cruelty? Or is he simply writing nonsense that `allows us to think the unthinkable and to entertain the impossible', as Griffiths claimed in an interview."
The Weekend Australian on Saturday revealed that critical literacy -- a postmodernist theory that there is no objective truth -- had infiltrated secondary English curriculums around the country.
Erica McWilliam, from the Queensland University of Technology's school of education, said "the pleasure of the text" was "eerily missing from postmodern approaches".
"At its worst, it could be the politicisation of reading," she said. "At its best it could be an opening to a very political world."
Professor McWilliam said the dominant philosophy of professional associations could influence curriculums.
"Senior English curriculum, in particular, seems to have been very closely linked to professional development programs by the English teachers association," she said.
Teachers in Queensland have a great degree of autonomy when devising English programs because the state does not have a centralised external senior examination.
English Teachers Association of Queensland president Garry Collins conceded parents might be alarmed at the influence of critical literacy in the professional development seminar.
"That might be so," Mr Collins said. "That's because Education Queensland doesn't invest as much money in professional development as it should."
He said critical literacy was an essential part of a young person's education but conceded the approach might have been taken too far.
"It's a matter of balance," he said. "It may well be that in some schools around the state and the country perhaps an unbalanced approach exists which is placing too much emphasis on critical literacy. But English programs that have no emphasis on critical literacy aren't implementing their programs properly."
He said it was an essential element for people operating in the text-rich world.
PLEASE EXPLAIN
"This presentation will offer a critical exploration of the preferences for different humorous techniques realised in some popular children's fiction.
"In differentiating between the 'bum-fart' humour of (Andy) Griffiths, the'realist inversion' humour of Morris Gleitzman and the more sophisticated 'metafictive/heteroglossic' humour of Terry Pratchett, Dr Suzanne Eggins will suggest that we see writers either positioning the child reader to accommodate to existing social structures, or offering the child awareness of the semiotics of language and culture and some tools to participate as an active social agent."
- A summary of the keynote address for the English Teacher Association of Queensland professional development seminar on May 21 this year
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Document AUSTLN0020050727e17s0003t
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