Wiping Out Illiteracy

Last year I wrote about a major reading initiative in the post, Promoting Literacy by Putting It in World-Crisis-Solving Perspective. 

I recommend all readers, writers, and publishers absorb that post for one important reason:

“Illiteracy affects over 757 million people worldwide and has an impact on global development. Although it is a largely invisible issue, the repercussions of this can be seen in everyday struggles such as poverty, gender inequality, and access to basic civil rights.”

BTW, 757 million people is about 1 in 10 folks who can’t read…

So…

Apart from encouraging you to Donate, I’ll wrap this up with two videos from them:

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Promoting Literacy by Putting It in World-Crisis-Solving Perspective

The title of this post is certainly a mouthful (and, mindful…). 

I was alerted to this initiative on the Co.Create site with their article, “Alphabet Of Illiteracy” Highlights How Reading Can Help Save The World.

An excerpt:

“An A to Z list of world problems that could be eased by being able to read is at the heart of a campaign launched in the U.K….an international initiative to raise public awareness and support for efforts to combat illiteracy.”

Another:

“But what immediately struck us was a near total lack of awareness. Ask people to name the world’s top problems and they are far more likely to mention others, like hunger. Yet scratch the surface, and illiteracy is a factor in them all.”

One more:

“The idea was to exploit the power of juxtaposition, according to art director Julia Ferrier. The appeal of a pictorial alphabet lay in the power of contrasting the simplicity of a children’s ABC-style of approach with the stark reality of the global problems illiteracy feeds.”

So, the actual initiative is called Project Literacy.

Among its many international Partner Organizations is one I’ve written about here a number of times—WorldReader.

And, the Alphabet of Illiteracy is an Extremely Powerful Concept…

One final excerpt:

“Illiteracy affects over 757 million people worldwide and has an impact on global development. Although it is a largely invisible issue, the repercussions of this can be seen in everyday struggles such as poverty, gender inequality, and access to basic civil rights.”

Naturally, there’s a petition you can sign to support literacy.

And, a video to drive it home…

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If you don’t see a way to comment (or, “reply”) after this post, try up there at the top right…
Read Some Strange Fantasies
Grab A Free Novel…
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For Private Comments or Questions, Email: amzolt {at} gmail {dot} com

Can A Rant Be Beautiful?

The beginning of a comment I left on a blog post: “I feel your angst because I’ve felt that angst; and, even though I finally have answers, my angst has merely turned into bleeding grief for our Human Family.” The post, Wasteful, is a beautiful rant about modern incompetence and poverty. It reminded me of my novel, Notes from An Alien, which was written out of that bleeding grief and might help a few folks find ways of coping with the rampant insanity choking our world.

Cheryl Ives wrote the post and, after what I consider a beautiful rant about how modern incompetence is dangerously expensive, she lays out these four points:

1) Poverty is too expensive. It’s dragging us down and must not be permitted to grow or remain at the same rate
2) Poverty is so expensive because we grossly mismanage our resources
3) In the long run, it’s cheaper to do the right thing
4) Society is currently too immature to focus on the long run with any sustained momentum

While all four points are beautiful to me, I want to focus on what Cheryl says Society is too immature to focus on.

The Long Run…

Notes from An Alien attempts to instill a sense of the Long Run by following eight generations of a family involved in helping their Worlds rise from war, greed, and poverty to enduring peace.

The Long Run on Earth has involved Humanity in the gargantuan effort of unifying itself at successive levels of complexity–family, tribe, city state, nation, and, now, the whole globe.

Notes from An Alien shows a civilization from another star system learning from their Long Run. Humanity is on the verge of a consummate transformation that will bring its Long Run into focus and, finally, bring Peace and Tranquility to our Global Family.

Cheryl also says: “At the core is my heartfelt belief that humans could … have the capacity to ensure that every life on the planet has shelter, food, water, clean air, some measure of security, and the ability to implement hygiene. It’s not an adequate goal but still pie-in-the-sky enough to be going on with.

“That we haven’t already achieved this provides simply another example of how badly things are done.”

So, the ultimate beauty of this rant is that Cheryl is one of the people doing something to help humanity. In case you’re new to this blog, I also featured her in the post, An “Open Source” Novel ??, that talks about a very unifying literary project :-)
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