Ebook: Paradigms of Learning: The Total Literacy Campaign in India

The Total Literacy Campaign (TLC), Launched in 1988, was different from other literacy programmes in that it moved decision-making out of Delhi to the districts, making the district magistrate/ collector the lynchpin of the programme. It broadened the campaign focus to include 'environment building' that involved entire populations, used innovative methods like kalajathas (cultural caravans), and appointed umbrella organization of NGOs to coordinate disparate literacy efforts across the country. The TLC has been by far the most effective strategy to deal with the problem of India's endemic illiteracy. The book provides representative snapshots of the working of the TLC, besides an analysis of the adult literacy situation in India and connected issues. Part I brings together case studies of the TLC in six districts of Ajmer, Dumka, Ernakulam, Ganjam, Nellore and Pudukkottai in the states of Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Kerela, Orissa, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu respectively. Part II discusses the results of these studies to give a comprehensive overview of the programme. Assessments of the TLC have swung between 'highly optimistic' and totally 'sceptical'. The optimists see it as a peoples movement that liberated many. The sceptics are convinced that no meaningful change can be brought about without social transformation and structural change. This book makes the point that any assessment of the TLC must take into account the programmes overall strategy, and the underlying assumptions that informed it. The studies in the volume underscore the serious problem of sustaining the gains from the literacy campaigns in the prevailing socio-economic environment of inequalities and disparities, how the absence of an environment that prompts one to read and write results in relapse to illiteracy, and how primers in unfamiliar languages describing alien situations creates retention problems for the learners. The case studies show that the TLC is not a magic wand, and that for the programme to sustain itself, regional contexts and differences must be factored into the strategy. This book represents a fresh look at the TLC, taken from the perspective of independent researchers trying to understand and evaluate not just outcomes, but also the processes and dynamics that impacted upon the programme. It combines first-hand field information with analysis and projections for the future. It will be of interest to academics, researchers, policy-makers and activists, besides the general well-informed reader.