Close to Home - Juan Guerra

Guerra, Juan C. Close to Home: Oral an Literate Practices in a Transnational Mexicano Community. New York: Teachers College Press, 1998.


Guerra traces literacy practices among transnational Mexicanos with ties to Chicago and Rancho Verde in Mexico.  He points to the importance of not just communicative "contact zones" a la Pratt, but "home fronts."  In chapter 3, he outlines four major metaphors for literacy based on a review of the literature from literacy studies.  These include literacy as entity, literacy as self, literacy as institution, and literacy as practice.  While he acknowledges that each of these metaphors grant different insight into literacy, he sees the fourth metaphor of literacy as practice as able to encompass the other three. By demonstrating the sophisticated literacy and genre practices in oral and written mode his research population engages in, Guerra points to the need for literacy education and policy to  acknowledge local/transnational funds of knowledge and that researchers should spread information about different cultural practices, not appropriate them.