7. Primary education in rural communities: An investment in ignorance?

Summary Educational policy is not free from the transference of conventional thinking from one set of social circumstances to another, in which it may be no less inappropriate. One of the many assumptions about educational policy at the primary level and especially for the conditions of low income rural communities concerns the desirability of literacy not necessarily in and for itself but as a means to the achievement of high priority economic development goals for the local community concerned. This paper provocatively challenges arguments for the unquestioning necessity of literacy in these circumstances and points out the poverty of research on the subject that would permit definitive policy decisions.