Remote And Poor Rural Minority Communities, Adult Literacy Education Research

This paper is based on the case study of the adult literacy education of Lahu nationality, one of 55 ethnic groups in China, that is mainly distributed over Lancang country, Yunnan provinces. The paper, by means of educational anthropography, by the clue of histoty-present-future, studies the problems of adult literacy education in the remote and poverty-stricken areas.The paper consists of five parts: Above-said action, Chapter One to Four.In above-said action, the author introduces the reason why she choose the adult literacy education as her research, the adult literacy education course in China, the importance, purpose and theoretical framework of the study.Chapter One reports the fieldwork in remote and poverty Lahu areas. The data collected show that through anti-illiteracy education the rate of illiteracy is only 5.8% in 2000. But during the field-work, the author found the person who became a literacy by anti-illiteracy is not a real literacy. In fact, a great large number of "functional illiteracy" is cultured by the anti-illiteracy education in the remote and poor mountain areas. The functional illiteracy know a few words, but he can not read papers; know some numbers, but can not count; has not the ability to get information which is necessary in the modern society.Chapter Two focus on the reasons of backward anti-illiteracy education in Lahu mountain areas. The author found the reasons in two sides, one is the Lahu traditional culture and education. In history, Lahu nationality only had language without script. They transmit their culture by oral. Before the founding of the P.R.China, the mountain areas had not school education. The family and community education is a kind of ancient education. There are some realistic factors also restrained the development of the anti-illiteracy. Such as economical condition, lacking of teachers and education managers, the limited of Lahu script and so on.Chapter Three consists of three sections. The first section goes into the development of Lahu community in the future. The author indicates theanti-poverty process will be the development tendency. An ideal education model should not only benefit to people development, but also improve community economic level. So the author points out the traditional anti-illiteracy should change into the functional anti-illiteracy and gives some specific ways to carry out the functional anti-illiteracy. In the functional anti-illiteracy, not only make the people successfully goes into the modern social and economic life, but also keep the Lahu traditional culture.In Chapter Four, at first I introduce some new concepts of the functional anti-illiteracy. Then I offer some successful modes in China and other countries and give some suggestions.