Writing literacy narratives

What's a literacy narrative?

by Emily Wierszewski

Each of us has a unique literacy history, a history that is intimately tied to our culture and community. Our histories are full of people, texts, and events that influence the kinds of literacies we value and practice. When writers use stories from their lives to describe and reflect on their unique histories as readers and writers, they’re writing in a genre called a literacy narrative. As renowned literacy scholar Cynthia Selfe specifies, literacy narratives are “stories about when, how, where, and why, and under what circumstances people read and/or write...Everyone has a literacy narrative.”

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