Gee! He must be right

Gee addresses several aspects of what he calls "discourse" (later: Discourse--with a capital D) to suggest that one does not truly belong to a discourse until one becomes the discourse through acculturation. He calls this his "identity kit," which involves social networks and media within a social network. I think that Gee has a good perspective, here. Again, with Gee, we see that theorists attempt to stratify concepts of literacy and literacy acquisition into distinct categories, which do not contain any crossover. I think that this is a counterproductive approach to theory on literacy; however, I do believe that it is necessary to address when talking about the ways in which one acquires literacy. My understanding is that there are multiple literacies, not just one sense of literacy. To say, like Gee does, that one cannot belong to more than one group effectively is absurd. There is no such thing as Mushfaking. There is, I would agree, a level of apprenticeship--as there is in everything.

Barton gives us a sense of this breakdown and the ways in which it is seen. I thank him for his pyramid structure, but I would have liked for him to more clearly define "register."