Disciplinary Literacy : Theorising the Specialized Use of Language and other Modes in University Teaching and Learning

• In this presentation I use the work of Basil Bernstein (Bernstein, 1990, 1999, 2000) to discuss the role of disciplinary differences in university teaching and learning.  Drawing from my own work on the theme of disciplinary literacy (Airey, 2012, 2013; Airey & Linder, 2008, 2011) I argue that all university lecturers are teachers of disciplinary literacy—even in monolingual settings. I define disciplinary literacy as appropriate participation in the communicative practices of the discipline (Airey, 2011a, 2011b)and suggest that disciplinary literacy is developed for three specific sites (academy, workplace and society). I will illustrate the multilingual and multimodal nature of disciplinary literacy with empirical evidence from a comparative study of the disciplinary literacy goals of Swedish and South African physics lecturers (Linder, Airey, Mayaba, & Webb, 2014). Finally, I will conclude by demonstrating how two of Bernstein’s dichotomies: disciplinary knowledge structures (hierarchical vs horizontal) and disciplinary classification (singular vs region) can be used together with the disciplinary literacy triangle to better understand the literacy goals of particular disciplines.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Utbildningsvetenskap -- Didaktik (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Educational Sciences -- Didactics (hsv//eng)

HUMANIORA  -- Språk och litteratur -- Jämförande språkvetenskap och allmän lingvistik (hsv//swe)

HUMANITIES  -- Languages and Literature -- General Language Studies and Linguistics (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Disciplinary literacy

University teaching

Fysik med inriktning mot fysikens didaktik

Physics with specialization in Physics Education

Publikations- och innehållstyp

vet (ämneskategori)

kon (ämneskategori)