Julie Steinberg

October 17, 2014

C&T 5037
Literacy Analysis Paper

Documenting My Own Literacies:

What is literacy and who is literate at Whole Foods?

One of the most prominent ideas related to literacy is its relationship to identity.
In his article, What is Literacy? Gee discusses discourse as an identity kit and the
idea of literacy through acquisition as opposed to, or balanced with, literacy through
learning (Gee). In the article, What we mean by multiple literacies, Bloome and Enciso
further examined such places and spaces where literacy occurs and relates to identity. We
interact with literacy in all kinds of spaces in our everyday lives, in and outside of home
and school. If then we are to understand a place, we have to understand the diverse
literacy practices that enable and constrain its economic, social, cultural, political, and
educational life and reciprocally we have to understand these places as complex
activities and movements through place and time (Bloome & Enciso). As we recognize
multiple literacies across spaces, we have to understand relationships among people and
texts and participation in shaping literacies becomes even more important than acquiring
literacies (Bloome & Enciso). Multiple places involve multiple complex literacy
activities, in which culture and identity matter and literacy is shaped.
I have begun to examine the meaning of multiple literacies in my own life,
across the spaces and places that I go. There are places where identity shapes how I am
literate, and how I may participate in certain events. Whole Foods is one such a place
where identities are being created, lived, and are shaping what literacy is and who is

literate in the space. As I shop at Whole Foods, I am using different funds of knowledge
than when I am at home, school, or other places, and I am becoming aware that what is
privileged in these settings helps shape the identity I may have there.
When some may think of Whole Foods, they might just think of grocery
shopping. Just grab your list and off you go to do the weekly chore. But behind the
crowded aisles and the various Organic, Vegan, and Gluten-Free labels, there is
much more to uncover about the experience as a literacy event. As I shopped again this
week I thought about the identity kit one seems to need to participate at Whole Foods.
Who is privileged at Whole Foods, who can participate, and why? I have found that
Whole Foods as a literacy event can bring up powerful discussions of culture, power,
privilege and identity.
When considering Whole Foods as a literacy event, I thought about it in relation
to Carringtons discussion of consumer culture and consumer culture texts in the
article, Im in a bad mood. Lets go shopping (Carrington). Carrington discusses
children engaging in consumer culture through toys, but I found the texts in Whole
Foods to also demonstrate consumer culture text, as she explains, These texts [of
consumer culture] rely heavily on a direct connection to the world outside the text
(Carrington) Carrington continues, to be literate in relation to these texts requires
different sets of skills and knowledge (Carrington). To be literate at Whole Foods
requires a particular set of skills and knowledge.
The visible elements within Whole Foods as a literacy event do make it seem like
every other grocery store which are literacy events within themselves. However, it is
the non-visible components of practices within Whole Foods that bring culture, identity,

privilege and power into play. Who counts as literate at Whole Foods? Perhaps healthconscious people who read through labels, eying ingredients and accepting of the high
price tag? Perhaps people who are on the bandwagon to eat more whole grains or Non
GMO products? Or maybe people who have access to the knowledge behind Whole
Foods philosophy. Through the labels on these products, health, and healthy is being
communicated as eating organic, natural, whole, and non-genetically modified foods.
On their website, Whole Foods ensures that the farmers and traders they work
with were paid fair prices and wages, work in safe conditions, protect the environment
and receive community development funds to empower and improve their communities.
But the prices at Whole Foods are high comparatively, which creates a structure of power
and privilege. The farmers that provide the whole, fair, and high quality foods for
Whole Foods may have to shop elsewhere, at more affordable grocery stores that may
sacrifice the same wholeness, fairness, and quality. If you can shop here, you can care
about these issues and qualities of your food and products. You can be part of the culture,
and be a Whole Foods shopper.
In the pasta aisle, I picked up a box of organic macaroni and cheese and examined
it. It is 365 Everyday Value brand and sits next to the same brand, non-organic version,
which costs a dollar less. According to the Whole Foods website, 365 Value products
can fill your pantry without emptying your pocketbook. While addressing the issue of
cost, an invisible element that exists is the box of generic macaroni and cheese at the
more affordable grocery store, that might be less whole, but costs half the price. On the
box are many words and phrases that go along with the organic, 365 brand: Taste (the
difference), Pure (goodness), Enjoy (with confidence), (highest) Quality, and Great Food

(no compromises). The box also says, Best ingredients, Pure organic goodness,
USDA organic, Vegetarian, and Product of USA. These visible elements represent
many invisible identities. The messages assume the shopper puts quality before cost, and
that pure goodness means organic and perhaps made in the USA. Identities are
privileged, for example, the vegetarian is valued and literate here, as well as those who
can pay the extra cost for organic.
Whole Foods distinctiveness as whole, organic, natural, and healthy also helps
transform a setting. Whole Foods can invisibly make a neighborhood nicer to people
who can identify with this culture. This idea of Whole Foods and a culture and identity
as well as a sign of status, safety, or wholesomeness, requires funds of knowledge that
support the Whole Foods culture.
When leaving Whole Foods, I noticed a sign. It said, Were glad to help you
carry your bags to the curb. Just ask a Team Member, with We like to help you in big
bold letters above the sign, and the Whole Foods logo stamped beneath the message.
Again, visibly, the message says we like to help you and were glad to help you, that
is, if you share the privileged, Whole Foods shopper identity, you can afford to shop here,
and you have bought enough that you need help carrying it out of the store. You also can
read English and feel empowered enough to ask for this help. The Team Member is
being paid a little less than twelve dollars an hour, which is a little less than a pound of
made in store turkey. While a generous and kind offer, the shopper is in fact
participating in a power paradigm in such an interaction.
For those that identify with the Whole Foods culture, the participants, setting,
artifacts, and activities the textof shopping at Whole Foods has become natural.

Yet many factors, including advertisements, magazines, health blogs, and social networks
of healthy people and healthy talk have helped to create this discourse of Whole
Foods. Willis discusses literacy as a social and cultural construct, and quotes that it must
be linked historically to configurations of knowledge and power (Willis). The questions
that unpack literacy at Whole Foods come down to: What is literacy at Whole Foods?
And who is literate at Whole Foods? Whole Foods is full of literacy events of which we
can be aware, in the on-going process of understanding how culture, identity, and power
are embedded in the places and spaces we, and our students, cross all the time.
In her article, Carrington challenges us to think of literacy in a broader context,
which she calls glocalized literacy, bringing to our attention the wide variety texts from
which we can meaning. Literacy events inside Whole Foods are an example of the texts
from which we can make meaning, differently depending on our privilege, cultures, and
identities. Carrington urges us as teachers, to consider how the idea of glocalized
literacy would equip children with the necessary cultural and social literacies to
navigate successfully through knowledge and power scapes.
In Historical Considerations, Willis reminds us that, as teachers, we can work
with these broader definitions of literacy and purposes for literacy that respect differences
within culture and identities. She urges us that now is the time to dismantle and
deconstruct definitions and purposes of literacy (Willis). Willis states, there is no
singular history of literacy, nor is there a singular definition of literacy and whether
literacy is acquired (Gee) or shaped, (Bloome & Enciso), I have found that all these ideas
surrounding literacy relate to three main themes: power, culture and identity, just as
literacy events across everyday spaces do. As teachers, our awareness and mindfulness of

all considerations around literacy and the identities our students live will help us to be
part of the ongoing process of deconstructing and reconstructing the definition of literacy,
being aware of how our students bring their own identities, culture, and privileges, or
lack there of, to their experiences and their learning.