This paper draws on the experience in Guinea, Sierra Leone and South Sudan, to explore how the methodology and modalities of community based participatory literacy can interrelate and combine with those of conflict resolution and peacebuilding. The paper considers how transformative models of literacy, such as those of Freire, REFLECT, the ActionAid literacy programme, and "New Literacy Studies", along with the self-expression and creative writing these generate, can contribute to the processes of forgiveness, reconciliation and reconstruction. It argues that adult literacy programmes constitute an important element in post-conflict reconstruction.