Literacy ethics: Defence against a technology of literacy for the military

Abstract

This short paper is part of a symposium on technological literacy in the journal, Curriculum Perspectives. It traces the birth of computerized technologies to Cold War north America, and argues that recent developments in curricular reform—such as those of the Aerospace Studies Senior Syllabus developed in Queensland through a public private partnership with Boeing Incorporated—promote functionalist models of literacy education. Following an outline of this school-industry initiative, it argues that literacy educators in particular need to think about a literacy ethics. Such ethical agency would place the onus on policy makers, administrators, industry representatives, and educators to examine the costs of attaining personal, political and professional aspirations and strategies in and through governance measures, and to consider what is co-opted or compromised in the desire to obtain those ends.