Women and Literacy: Promises and Constraints

Nelly P. Stromquist

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 1992, vol. 520, issue 1, 54-65

Abstract: In almost every country, illiteracy rates are higher among women than among men. This gender disparity can be explained in terms of (1) the sexual division of labor that assigns women many domestic tasks, especially, among poor and rural families, time-consuming chores, and (2) men's control of women's sexuality, which creates both physical and psychological constraints in women's lives. Research has identified various benefits of literacy for women, such as better maternal behaviors regarding child health and child rearing, and effective family planning. Although women could use literacy to increase their access to new knowledge, most literacy programs do not encourage this because their curricula are still designed along sexually stereotyped lines that emphasize women's roles as mothers and household managers. This article argues that these messages do not convey emancipatory knowledge and may solidify values and attitudes that cause women to accept current gender relations rather than to question them.

Date: 1992
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002716292520001008 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:anname:v:520:y:1992:i:1:p:54-65

DOI: 10.1177/0002716292520001008

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().