Author: Caroline Faber

With the advent of social media tools, such as webblogging, social bookmaking, social writing platforms and RSS search engines, our perceptions of writing, publishing and authorship are experiencing dramatic change.  How will these changes affect values placed on quantity verses quality, public verses private works, ownership and the ability to create static self contained works?  We are in the midst of a transformation which will have significant effects on how we view writing and authorship.  In her book, Conversation and Community: The Social Web for Documentation,” Anne Gentle states that through participation in social media “where you can either contribute or motivate others to contribute, you are empowering collaborative efforts unlike any seen in the past.”  (2009, 105)  In a world of the Internet where anyone can publish and gatekeepers are few and far between, how will the effects of this transition be felt?

 Social writing platforms such as Wikis and multi-authored bookmark pages have moved value from individual work to group collaborative wisdom.  In these new forms of knowledge output, how will we see authorship and value expertise?  Wikipedia offers a collaborative outlet to knowledge demonstration and collection, but without specific gatekeepers regulating content in which “the writer can be the ‘content curator,’ someone who assembles collections based on themes.”  (Gentle, 106) 

Widely viewed and accessible, Wikis offer both closed and open formats, providing choices for creators in terms of degree of acceptable alteration. (Gentle, 2009)  Collaborative knowledge building is becoming increasingly valued as users are “drawing on the wisdom of crowds, [whereby] users contribute content to the work of others, leading to multiple-authored works whose authorship grows over time.”  (Alexander, 2009, 153)  The result of this co-authored collaborative writing is an experience not bound by physical or temporal limitations.  Anyone with basic technological know-how can create a Wiki page and author his work, as “starting a wiki-level entry is far easier than beginning an article or book.” (Alexander, 2009), and anyone with a basic technological know-how can infiltrate and alter content.  Modern social technologies may invite alterations and commentaries because the “bar to entry is lower for the average user.  A user doesn’t have to author an entire site-just proffer a chunk of content.” (Alexander, 2009, 40)

Shared knowledge online, open to micro-commentary or complete overhaul by fellow Web users, is becoming the norm.  Alexander argues that it is “probably inevitable that intellectual property holders will initiate lawsuits investigating perceived misappropriations.” (Alexander, 42)  The concept of author control is altered as self-publishers relinquish a large degree of control over their work to others who may be more or less knowledgeable on a subject and carry a varying view point on the subject matter.  Contributors in social media spaces need to be willing to restrain from complete domination and control over their writing. (Gentle, 2009)  The UBC Wiki site warns users to “note that all contributions to UBC Wiki may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here.”  If users do not wish to have the content open to scrutiny and alterations, the UBC Wiki is not the place to post work. 

Web 2.0 (also referred to as social media and widget) technologies offer choices between programs best suited for individual user needs depending on the level of openness intrinsic to the technology.  Blogging technologies can offer completely open platforms for micro-responses, Google Docs require user invitation to join in the collaborative efforts, and while “a number of wiki platforms permit users to lock down pages from the editing of others” (Alexander, 2009), most Wikis offer open editing possibilities.  Creators can decide whether or not to create an online community, a discussion group, or a folksonomy of tagging.  (Alexander, 2009)  While not all Web 2.0 technologies can be considered online communities, defined by Gentle as “a group of people with similar goals and interests connect and share information using web tools” (103), Alexander (2006) argues that “openness and micro-content combine in a larger conceptual strand…that sees users as playing more of a foundational role in information architecture” in which participants benefit from the collaboration and sharing of information. (Gentle)  Levels of openness can affect both process and product by establishing credited contributors or allowing ‘free’ contribution, where “’free’ can mean freedom rather than no cost.” (Gentle)  Despite ‘free’ access intrinsic to many social media platforms, “particular types of users are more likely to seek out online communities for information-competent, proficient performers, and expert performers… [over] novices and advanced beginners.”  (Gentle, 106)

In terms of asynchronous collaborative writing, the development time line may be short or long, with time spans ranging from days to years, or without a definitive end date.  Wikis and other open-knowledge forums have a long end date that makes monitoring more difficult.  A Wiki created one year may not be altered until the next, making up-to-date monitoring a challenge.  This issue of long verses short term asynchronous communication allows technologies such as Wikis which can be altered indefinitely, very different qualitatively from asynchronous working documents such as Google docs.  Programs such as Google Docs allow for continuous asynchronous involvement but generally are developed with an end goal in mind and abandoned as goals are completed.  Does this alter the value placed on authorship between short and longer term collaborative writing forums?  I would argue the difference is felt in the degree of control the writers can feel in their writing and production. 

Online writing has also created a new forum for publishing both in terms of quality and quantity.  Writers used to have the option of sharing, but not necessarily publishing and reaching audiences was difficult without publication capabilities.  Online writing, in the form of blogging, novels, poetry sites, and article submission has opened the doors for writers in terms of quantity.  Alexander states that “[m]any posters to social networking sites publish content for the world to see and use.  The blogosphere is a platform for millions of people to write to a global audience.” (Alexander, 2008, 153)  Technological know-how can now allow for publication beyond the relatively closed circles of the past.  Authorship venues where writers can “voice an opinion, give an honest review, and build an article or diagram or a picture or a video, perhaps by taking on a writing role [allows writers to] feel autonomous and happiness follows.”  (Gentle, 110) 

Online writing allows for self publishing which ignores the gatekeeper role of publishing houses.  What will the implications be for writers who want to pursue formal publishing methods?  Formerly, in order to have your work read by a large audience, publishing, whether self of external, was the only means to mass distribution of materials.  Web publishing now allows for mass distribution without the quality control of publishing houses but will this make formal publishing increasingly difficult and selective as the quantity of formal publishing houses diminishes and publishing standards alter?

As auto-publishing explodes on the Internet, users are finding novel ways to personalize the Web, effectively ‘writing’ themselves into the World Wide Web.  Since the onset of the Internet, search engines have moved from an emphasis on macro searching to both macro and micro searching.  Searching on the internet is becoming more personal and independent as users utilise micro search engines such as Blogpulse, Feedster, and Daypop (Alexander) which search based on users’ interests.  As search engines move from massive searches, which result in millions of hits, to micro searches, resulting in hits limited to parametres set by the user, the Internet becomes more approachable. (Golder and Huberman)  In a sense we are raising the bar of effective levels of navigational abilities where users need to have a purpose in their Web navigation.  Programs that are limited to searching blogs, or are program specific such as the soon to be released Google micro-blogging search engine, allow for more user control, directed searching, and stream-lined responses. 

To make this point clearer I will use a bookstore analogy.  In approaching a bookstore and attempting to navigate within it, a visitor is aware of categories, subcategories and alphabetization.  These systems of organization also allow for micro searching based on subject and interest within the physical structure of a bookstore.  Micro search engines allow for a similar type of searching of materials.  Users can opt to search a certain category as well as response type.  Bookstores can also differ from one another qualitatively in terms of audience, geared towards a specific audience such as children, young adults, cooks, teachers, trades people, academics, sports fans, and fantasy enthusiasts.  A fantasy enthusiast is not going to look for fantasy material within a book store based on cooking.  Micro search engines allow for a similarly controlled searches.  Book enthusiasts may enter a mega bookstore which carries a wide variety of books from nearly every genre.  Once a specific interest is established, however, the book enthusiast may choose to frequent a more specialized venue, much the same as a micro search engine user may choose to search in a very specific manner over mass broad searches offered through such search engines as Google or Yahoo. (Golder and Huberman) 

With small scale search possibilities come other forms of individualized web applications such as social bookmarking and tagging.  Where “traditionally…categorizing or indexing is either performed by an authority, such as a librarian, or else derived from the material provided by the authors of the documents…collaborative tagging is the practice of allowing anyone…to freely attach keywords or tags to content.” (Golder and Huberman, 1)  Users are able to tag sites that are of interest, creating personalized collections through such applications as del.ici.ous, and allowing users to browse information that has been categorized by others. (Golder and Huberman, 1)  Web activity becomes more focused as these programs allow users to streamline their activities through sites of interests and applicability to personal interests. (Golder and Huberman)  Social media applications such as Tweetups, are effective in “enabling people to feel related to one another.” (Gentle, 110)  Social tagging draws upon collaborative authorship as users work together to tag images, sites, blogs, and ideas in terms of applicability, personal experience and developed networks. (Golder and Huberman) 

The formerly impersonal World Wide Web is becoming more personalized, creating ownership amongst users in a way that impersonal surfing could not allow.  Micro blogging allows users to comment in limited characters, tagging allows for personalized web experiences and collaborative writing allows for knowledge building which transgresses time and physical space.  While the World Wide Web is continuously expanding, new social technologies are allowing for increased authorship through co-authorship, freedom in terms of the ability to freely voice oneself, and individual responses through collaborative experiences. (Golder and Huberman)   Changes will occur in terms of mainstream traditional forms of publishing, knowledge acquisition and authorship, but it is the Internet user who is leading the changes through technological demands and adaptation of new technologies which reflect in a practical application manner, the needs of current Internet users. 

References:

Alexander, B. (2006)  “Web 2.0: A new wave of innovation for teaching and learning?”  Retrieved from: http://www.educause.edu/EDUCAUSE+Review/EDUCAUSEReviewMagazineVolume41/Web20ANewWaveofInnovationforTe/158042

Alexander, B. (2008) “Web 2.0 and emergent multiliteracies” Retrieved from:  http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all?content=10.1080/00405840801992371

Gentle, A.  (2009)  Conversation and Community: The social web for documentation”  Retrieved from:  http://pegmulligan.com/2009/11/28/book-review-conversation-and-community-by-anne-gentle/

Golder, S., and Huberman, B.  (2005)  The structure of collaborative tagging systems.  Retrieved from: http://www.hpl.hp.com/research/idl/papers/tags/tags.pdf

Hayes, T., and Xun, G.  (2008)  The effects of computer-supported collaborative learning on students’ writing performance.  Retrieved from:  http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1599852&dl=GUIDE&coll=GUIDE&CFID=64333662&CFTOKEN=24459724

Rogers, G.  (2009) “Coming soon: Google’s micro-blogging search engine.”  Retrieved from:  http://blogs.zdnet.com/Google/?p=1450

Wikipedia: Social media.  Retrieved from:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media

Wiki:  UBC.  Accessed at:  http://wiki.ubc.ca/Main_Page

Image taken from: http://ibat.org/files/featured/techlounge3.jpg

Bolter argues that hypertext is remediating print forms, offering a dichotomous view separating print from hypertext, separated on the basis of links and imagery and arguing the benefits of imagery will supersede print.  Will hypertext overwrite print due to inherent qualities such as flexibility and relation to natural ways of processing ideas which cross cultural and linguistic lines? The reader is forced to consider which form will become dominant, print or imagery:

“Although the writer and reader may use words to describe and interpret the pictoral message, two readers of different languages could share the same system of picture writing.”  (Bolter, 2001, 59)

While he questions the effectiveness of voiceless picture writing on its own, he purports that through hypermedia we realize “a kind of picture writing, which refashions the qualities of both traditional picture writing and phonetic writing.” (58)  

Bolter argues that hypermedia and eBooks offer increased flexibility to printed books in that they do not align themselves end to end on a shelf, rather “merging into the network of the World Wide Web, the electronic book invite exploration as part of a network of texts.” (81)  Bolter asserts that books must be complete units in themselves, and despite their physical proximity to other books, they become completely separate once placed on a library shelf.  While the idea of linking books, texts and images is interesting I question the value of this approach for all types of literature. 

The issue Bolter has failed to address to this point is the reasonable applicability of image and link based hypermedia to all forms of text.  Hypertext emulates magazines and newspapers in its marriage of images to text, offering unparalleled means to further exploration of ideas and concepts through linking nodes of information that allow the reader to follow paths of links through endless pages on the World Wide Web.  In encyclopedic form, hypertext offers a flexibility for the reader to explore subjects according to personal interest and in relatively effortless ways as were required in former volume-based, shelved books while images allow readers to appreciate context with less apparent description.  This form of hypertext, however, is not necessarily the ultimate solution to all forms of text.  Qualitatively, the text offered in such forms as magazines, newspapers, and encyclopedias differs greatly from that of prose text found in fiction.

Focusing on hypertext, this form does offer increased reader control through their organization of ideas “that can arrange themselves into a kaleidoscope of hierarchical and associative patterns-each pattern meeting the needs of one class of readers on one occasion,” (Bolter, 2001, 91) this encyclopedic example ignores the needs inherent to the narrative form.  Current novels are written in a linear and arguably male organization of linear storylines, building tension, climax and denouement.  The novel form favours author centred and directed, linear exploration of print while hypertext offers reader centred, open, non-linear exploration of links which span infinite pages and represent a multitude of variations of ways to explore the same available material.

Does hypertext, which indeed offers possibilities for certain forms of text that seem to represent an extension of inherent qualities of the texts themselves, offer the best solution for all texts?  The narrative form favours a closed author centred approach to reading and exploring text.  Would hypertext, despite all its possibilities, fit in with the demands of the narrative form?  Readers explore such texts as novels by following the direction of the author.  Rather than viewing this as a negative aspect of linear based fiction, it seems more reasonable to appreciate the unique forms and qualities of various texts which arguably determine their effectiveness in various forms of textual representation.  In the 1980’s hypertext-like narratives emerged (Moulthrop, 1995), such as the Choose Your Own Adventure novels for youth which made their debut at this time.  This type of book offered a hypertext-like situation where the reader navigated through the narrative by deciding on the course of action for plot and then turning to the appropriate page in the book to pursue the decided upon storyline.  Despite this exciting innovation in reading, the Choose Your Own Adventure hypertext-like approach to reader centred fiction did not replace traditional novel forms.

If we use this example to compare such forms as magazines and newspapers, encyclopedias and novels in the advent of hypertext, we could argue that before the advent of hypertext possibilities, the simulated hypertext forms of the encyclopedia and hypertext and image based forms of the magazine and newspaper existed independent of computer based hypertext and imagery.  While computer based hypertext allows the inherent qualities of these forms to become stronger, the form reduces the importance of authorship in the important form of fiction and the novel.  Who is to be in control of the text?  Do the readers control all forms of text, including story lines?  And how would this play out?  As readers, would we accept stories that we decided on our own, through creating outcomes and producing a fragmenting of literary outcomes in a myriad of possible storyline directions?  Stuart Moulthrop suggests that such reader directed programs violate “our sense of commitment, at least to the extent that this is denied in terms of…’selfish interaction,’ or an assumption that the story really does exist to please us.” (73)  Hypertext writing seems to change the act of writing in that it forces writers to envision and created a multitude of possibilities in accordance with the demands of the readers.  The novel form then becomes “a textual space within which his fiction operates… [whereby] the reader joins in actively constructing the text by selecting a particular order of episodes at the time of reading.” (42)  Despite the fact that the author still controls the text that is read, the text is only secondary to the choices made by the reader. 

In terms of imagery, while images can carry meaning beyond descriptive possibilities, can this strength inherent to images overwrite the text in narrative?  Bolter suggests that “[b]y combining alphabetic writing with images and diagrams… designers are defining the computer as a writing space that vacillates between intuitive and abstract modes of representation….where the verbal text must…compete for the reader’s attention with a variety of pictoral elements.” (Bolter, 2001, 61)  While he admits this utilization of images falls in line with the particular material, it is important to question the blanket idea that pictoral images could replace all writing forms which utilize pure text as a medium.  The genre of the narrative novel does not necessitate simply due to its textual makeup, inclusion in the realm of hypertext and image based alterations that will occur as a result of computer based forms.  Bolter’s use of weighted words, such as “exploited,” (73) when discussing the exclusive use of text in creating and presenting prose offers a glimpse into the negative view he carries with regards to the exclusive text mediums such as that of narrative.   

Whether or not a change from “books to electronic webs carries the force of historical necessity” as suggested by Bolter and Lanham, or will simply result in a fragmentation that will create new outlets for writing is yet to be seen.  In the introduction of literacy in the era of orality, oral forms of communication were not entirely overwritten or erased.  Both oral and literary forms continued to flourish and evolve according to benefits, possibilities and limitations of each form.  In the same way, I argue that hypermedia and traditional text forms will develop and coexist as benefits, possibilities, and limitations are determined. 

While it is impossible to accurately predict the future of either hypertext of print, it seems unnecessary to assume a total and complete overwriting of one system over another.  Traditional literary narrative forms may indeed branch off to include hypertext version, but traditional narrative forms such as the novel may be best left to the print form.  Hypermedia may allow for a permanent fragmentation of narration to include hypertext literature, whereby hypertext books will become readily available in addition to traditional print forms. Imagery may allow for increased image-based literature (such as is evident in comics), but primary utilization of images reflects a varying set of possibilities, benefits, and limitations that are not equivocal to the narrative novel form.  While film seems to be the closest we have come to realizing a shift towards pure image in narration, it is important to remember the text base of most films.  Such blockbusters as the Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, or Twilight series, My Sister’s Keeper, and the Boy in the Striped Pajamas are just a few.  Just as communication branched into the areas of literacy and orality in the face of the new literacy, perhaps fiction will branch into multiple areas including, but not limited to, traditional print forms and hypertext versions in accordance with social, literary, and fiction writing demands. 

References

Bolter, J.  (2001)  Writing space: Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print [2^nd edition].  Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Eribaum. 

Bolter, J & Joyce, M  (1987)  Hypertext and creative writing.  University of North Carolina.  Accessed at: http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=317431

Moulthrop, S.  (1995)  Traveling in the breakdown lane: A principle of resistance for hypertext.  Accessed at: http://iat.ubalt.edu/moulthrop/essays/breakdown.html

The question of societal transitioning from orality to literacy and the subsequent affects upon the societies in question has been central to the readings thus far in the course.  In our Western society, we have seen a gradual change from orality to literacy from the time of the Greeks to present day. (Havelock, 1991)  While the change towards literacy has happened quite recently in comparison to the life of languages as a whole, literacy has nonetheless become inextricably linked to Western society:

            “The two, orality and literacy, are sharpened and focused against each other, yet can be seen as still interwoven in our own society.  It is a mistake to polarize these as mutually exclusive.  Their relationship is one of mutual, creative tension, one that has both a historical dimension as literate societies have emerged out of oralist ones-and a contemporary one as we seek a deeper understanding of what literacy may mean to us as it is superimposed on an orality into which we were born and which governs so much of the normal give and take of society.”  (Havelock, 1991)

First Nations’ Literary Transitioning           

 It would be erroneous to assume that literacy is as inextricably linked to all other cultures as it is ours.  Ong suggests that “of all the many thousands of languages-possibly tens of thousands-spoken in the course of human history, only around 106 have ever been committed to writing to a degree sufficient to have produced literature, and most have never been written at all.  Of the some 3000 languages spoken that exist today only some 78 have a literature.”  (Ong, 2000,  p. 7)  Many newly or semi-literate cultures exist close to or alongside literate ones, such as the First Nations groups which span North America, and more specifically, the First Nations groups of the Gitxan, Nisga’a and Shim Sham, upon whose territories I live in Northern British Columbia. 

            These groups have been thrown violently into the grasp of literacy, much unlike the European culture which “slowly moved over into the ambiance of analytic, interpretive, conceptual prose discourse.”  The First Nations groups of Northern British Columbia were introduced to literacy approximately one hundred years ago, long after writing had been well established as a Western way of life.  These peoples were forced to accept literacy and everything that went with it, such as formal schooling, as a predominant means of survival.  The youth were forced into residential schools as a means of training them to become both literate participants in society, and “westernized”, in terms of behaviours and thinking.  Whether this was based on a pre-planned conspiracy or simply misguided good intentions is not the focus here.  Rather, the question that has arisen for me repeatedly since the onset of the course is “What has been the ultimate affect on the First Nations cultures in Northern British Columbia in particular, from having been forced into the literacy agenda long after the agenda was deeply entrenched in the Western society imposing it?”

A Fundamentally Oral Culture        

    The First Nations were historically an oral culture, with oral histories and oral documentation.  As a result of the domination of the Western culture, they have been forced to incorporate the literary means of life with no historical markers to guide them on how to do so. 

Western society has embraced literacy so much that the “rhythmic word as a storage well for information slowly became obsolete.  It lost its functional relationship to society.”  (Havelock, 1991, p. 25)  The First Nations were simply thrown into this unfamiliar system which was dissimilar to their culture, which both embraces and credits the spoken word.  Eigenbrod states that for the First Nations cultures “the truth and accuracy of the spoken words is guaranteed by the personal experience of the speaker: ‘What I do not remember, I will not say.’” (Eigenbrod, p. 90) 

Despite these beliefs of their own culture, the First Nations groups find themselves having to defend their culture and territory, doing so by playing by the rules of the dominant literacy based society to the point where often from the Native perspective “literacy is associated with political power, dishonesty, and injustice.” (Eigenbrod, 90)

 

In the Delgamuuk trial, involving the Gitxan people of the Upper Skeen region, the Gitxan fought to have their oral histories recognized as viable proof of traditional land rights based on historical evidence of occupation of the territories in question.  After a long and complicated court process, the Canadian Government agreed to recognize oral histories, ruling that “oral histories can be used to prove occupancy of the land and they will be given as much weight as written records” (Where are the Children website) with a stipulation attached designating control over the decision as to whether or not the oral histories are adequate proof resting on the Government’s shoulders.  Again, despite recognizing the power and influence of oral history in the First Nations culture, the power of the literate society was ultimately imposed on the land title recognition process further solidifying the idea that “those who know how to write are in control and use their power to appropriate land that is not theirs.” (Eigenbord, p. 90)

The Struggles for First Nations Youth

While this example shows some of the struggles on a large scale, there are an abundance of smaller scale examples as well.  First Nations youth struggle in the school system where they show “over-inclusion in various special needs categories and [have] literacy rates well below provincial averages.”  (Fettes, p. 2)  They are coming to literacy based schools from a home life and culture still linked in value systems and thought patterns of an oral society.  One hundred years is simply not enough time to change over a pattern of thinking that has existed for more than 10 000 years.  (Dickason, 1992) 

First Nations cultures were those of hunter gatherer until the change of lifestyle brought on by the Europeans forced them away from their oral language patterns which were largely based on storytelling as a means of conveying history, record keeping and teaching through apprenticeship based learning.  

What happens to these students who follow a social discourse of learning as “use of silence, listening and observing versus speaking, answering questions [and] demonstrating knowledge” (Peltier, 2009, p. 3) when they are introduced to a schooling model that values and rewards the very characteristics which oppose their oral apprenticeship style of learning?  

The result is a gap between two cultures in terms of approaches to language, value of oral tradition, and ways of thinking which have been developed as a result of approaches to language.  (Ong, 2000)  Thought patterns that have been developed through the home culture oral developmental influences are suddenly put into question in the school system and seemingly need to be overwritten for academic success to occur.     

Embracing Oral Teaching Techniques to Reach First Nations Learners

Research suggests that the techniques used to engage learning in pre-literate children are similar to those used in oral based cultures and thus may be transferable to newly-literate cultures such as the First Nations of British Columbia.  Mark Fettes outlines in his paper,  Imaginative Engagement in Culturally Diverse Classrooms:  Changing Teacher Thinking and Practice within a Community-University Research Alliance, examples of the successful utilization of  an imaginative educational approach in classrooms across British Columbia noting that “students from predominantly oral cultures…may have abilities of understanding and language use that are barely tapped in pedagogies oriented to text-based literacy….Imaginative education seeks to keep children’s oral abilities, and the kinds of understanding that accompany them, alive and developing throughout the school-age years.”  (Fettes, 2005, p. 6)

Learning as a Culturally Mediated Activity

If learning is, as Vygotsky purports, a culturally mediated activity, (Lantolf, 1994) and the context of learning, oral or literary, shapes cultures as a whole, (Ong, 2000) how can we expect First Nations students to process information in the same way as students born into literacy cultures. 

The question of First Nations students’ academic success seems to be a complex issue of colliding cultures, ways of thinking, and differences in approaches and goals of learning.  Perhaps Ong is correct in asserting that literate cultures can never truly “conceive of an oral universe of communication or thought except as a variant of a literate universe”, (2000, p. 2)

However, in looking closely at the populations’ First Nations students that are not able to be successful in the literary based school system it seems necessary and timely to work within our limited frameworks of oral cultural understanding to attempt to create changes that could benefit these First Nations youth in our school systems. 

In attempting to create a link that will enable success between the two, perhaps it is true that “no bridge built out of the certainties inherent in the literate mind can lead back into the oral magma” (Illich, 199, p. 34) but the need for at minimal a basic level of understanding is becoming apparent in order to provide students coming from cross-literal-oral backgrounds the support they require.

References

 Dickason, Olive P.  (1992).  Canada’s First Nations:  A History of Founding Peoples from Earliest Times.  Retrieved from http://books.google.ca/books?hl=en&lr=&id=M5KhH8l1ldMC&oi=fnd&pg=PA9&dq=first+nations+gitksan+canada+practice&ots=MsYUCrksFf&sig=4_t59rQYwOlWjEebIrfTmOuiRbU#PPP1,M1

 Eigenbrod, R.  The Oral in the Written:  A Literature Between Two Cultures.  Accessed at http://www2.brandonu.ca/Library/cjns/15.1/Eigenbrod.pdf

Fettes, M.  (2005)  Imaginative Engagement in Culturally Diverse Classrooms:  Changing Teacher Thinking and Practice within a Communitiy-University Research Alliance.  Accesses at: http://www.csse.ca/CCGSE/docs/CCSEProceedings11Fettes.pdf

Havelock, Eric.  (1991)  The Oral-Literate Equation:  A Formula for the Modern mind.  Literacy and Orality.  Cambridge University Press, New York.  Accessed at http://books.google.ca/books?id=VKSIC5H8sd8C&dq=Literacy+and+Orality+Olson+torrance&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=roCYFGBv4d&sig=cwhmP5ig5bkPBU1lFEtKx7slyBQ&hl=en&ei=WyzJSoGhMIa0sgPM49ihBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1#v=onepage&q=&f=false

 History or Indian Residential Schools.  Assembly of First Nations.  Accessed at http://www.afn.ca/residentialschools/history.html

 Illich, I.  (1991) Oral Metalanguage.  Literacy and Orality.  Cambridge University Press, New York.  Accessed at http://books.google.ca/books?id=VKSIC5H8sd8C&dq=Literacy+and+Orality+Olson+torrance&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=roCYFGBv4d&sig=cwhmP5ig5bkPBU1lFEtKx7slyBQ&hl=en&ei=WyzJSoGhMIa0sgPM49ihBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1#v=onepage&q=&f=false

 Judgements of the Supreme Court of Canada.  (2007).  Retrieved from http://csc.lexum.umontreal.ca/en/1997/1997rcs3-1010/1997rcs3-1010.html

 Lantolf, J.  (1994)  Sociocultural Theory and Second Language Learning.  The Modern Language Journal.  78, iv.  Accessed at http://www.jstor.org/pss/328580

 Ong, W.  (2000)  Orality and Literacy.  Routledge, New York.

 Peltier, S.  (2009)  First Nations English Dialects in Young Children:  Assessment Issues and Supportive Interventions.  Encyclopedia of Language and Development.  Accessed at: http://literacyencyclopedia.ca/index.php?fa=items.show&topicId=276

 Where are the Children:  Healing the Legacy of the Residential Schools.   Accessed at http://www.wherearethechildren.ca/en/history/