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The effects that illiteracy has range from embarrassment to low self-esteem as well as high crime rates. Illiteracy seems to have an even more devastating effect in the lower income communities. Based on that, Johnathan Kozol wrote “The Human Cost of an Illiterate Society,” that was an article in Illiterate America (1985) to show how illiteracy lowers people’s quality of life, reduce the education, and prevents them take part in democratic society fully. Negative effects of illiteracy in America are also heavy in politics. One has to wonder how someone who cannot read or write manages to vote. In order for a person to vote or make a wise decision about who they should vote for, and one must know how to read. As Jonathan Kozol writes”: The number of illiterate adults exceeds by 16 million the entire vote cast for the winner in the 1980 presidential contest. If even one third of all illiterates could vote, and read enough and so sufficient math to vote in their self-interest, Ronald Regan would not likely have been chosen president. There is, of course, no way to know for sure” (253). Most illiterate people that do vote based on what the person looks like but not for what they know about the person and what he or she can do to help. If 60 million people in the United States cannot read, then they cannot cast a vote truly representation of their opinions.
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They cannot pay bills easily and often spend more than necessary. They also have to rely on others to know what is going on or explain things to them. Their rights are being violated as citizens because they are not fully informed; they need ask the others but some of whom are not really trustworthy. Illiterates lack the comfort of being able to even do such simple things as emergency phone numbers. In particularity, driving down a street and not knowing how to read the street sings can be scary to an illiterate person Small to big situations, such as ordering food to calling for help are all fears in the everyday life of an illiterate. The fear of not knowing, the fear of being humiliated, the fear of being insure of the rights are all sometimes more problematic than the issue at hand. Sometimes illiterates would rather suffer in silence than be humiliated by someone finding out they cannot read. Kozol uses the essay “The Human Cost of an Illiterate Society” to demonstrate the effects illiteracy has on society. He shows different examples, some of which are dramatic; to portray the dangers illiteracy poses in such simple everyday life tasks. He also explains how illiteracy can have effects on society as a whole. He feels that government has neglected this issue for too long. Kozol hopes this essay can recruit the reader into an effort to get the problem of illiteracy addressed and corrected.
Works
They cannot pay bills easily and often spend more than necessary. They also have to rely on others to know what is going on or explain things to them. Their rights are being violated as citizens because they are not fully informed; they need ask the others but some of whom are not really trustworthy. Illiterates lack the comfort of being able to even do such simple things as emergency phone numbers. In particularity, driving down a street and not knowing how to read the street sings can be scary to an illiterate person Small to big situations, such as ordering food to calling for help are all fears in the everyday life of an illiterate. The fear of not knowing, the fear of being humiliated, the fear of being insure of the rights are all sometimes more problematic than the issue at hand. Sometimes illiterates would rather suffer in silence than be humiliated by someone finding out they cannot read. Kozol uses the essay “The Human Cost of an Illiterate Society” to demonstrate the effects illiteracy has on society. He shows different examples, some of which are dramatic; to portray the dangers illiteracy poses in such simple everyday life tasks. He also explains how illiteracy can have effects on society as a whole. He feels that government has neglected this issue for too long. Kozol hopes this essay can recruit the reader into an effort to get the problem of illiteracy addressed and corrected.
Works