Martin & Rose "Attempting To Construe A Sliver Of Equality" With Their Readers

Martin & Rose (2007: 303):

This is a huge research area; but one point we can make is that writing is not an option available to everyone in South African or Australian society since it depends on some form of institutionalised learning, and illiteracy is found in both societies. 

Beyond this, the modes of writing Tutu and Mandela control depend on a tertiary education and apprenticeship into one or more professions. And only a minority of South Africans or Australians can read discourse of this kind, let alone compose it as eloquently as we have witnessed here. So we have dealt mainly with discourses of power in our analyses. 

There are lesser voices too, of course. But Helena speaks courtesy [sic] of those more powerful than her (the SABC and Bishop Tutu) and Lingiari’s Indigenous Australian voice has always been projected to the wider world through the transcriptions of non-Indigenous academic scribes and political activists. 

If you have read this far in our book then you are reciprocating in ways to which certainly Lingiari, and probably Helena did not have access — whether you actually ever get around to responding directly to David and Jim or not. And note that by first-naming ourselves we are attempting to construe a sliver of equality that might make responding possible.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is manifestly untrue. A significant majority of Australians, at least, have literacy skills far beyond those required to read the writings of Tutu and Mandela.

[2] This is manifestly untrue. As her text demonstrates, the woman identified as 'Helena' is a literate South African from a relatively privileged background.

[3] As a reader, it is indeed an honour and a privilege to be offered a "sliver of equality" by authors as far up the power hierarchies as 'David' and 'Jim'.