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Anti-Empire
The SakerA bird's eye view of the vineyard
Public InquiryInterested in maladministration. Estd. 2005
Voltaire NetworkVoltaire, international edition
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Eradicating illiteracy in South America![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() BBC News has this weekend added a piece on Hugo Chavez's "revolutionary reading list" to its feature pages. It's a curious article whose timing four months after the launch of the list appears to say little and omit plenty. We are told how there are queues of people in Caracas awaiting a free copy of French 19th century author Victor Hugo's masterpiece "Les Miserables" (in Spanish translation). One happy fellow tells the local BBC chap he's seen the movie and now wants to read the book. I wonder has he ever tried to sing the songs and get on a talent competition? ![]() Emile-Antoine Bayard's illustrations for Victor Hugo & Jules Verne put the sacharin sweet in poverty. Without a doubt the policies of Venezuela under Chavez have yielded astounding resutls in the last decade. The achievement of her literacy projects are even acknowledged by her critics. But how are other states coping and is the urge and impetus to tackle illiteracy in any way to be considered a core leftist priority and moreover a general leftist triumph? Is teaching people to read and write somehow something one generally has to await to see a leftist or Boliviarian regime elected to enjoy? |