Reviews "The Legacies of Literacy: Continuities and Contradictions in Western Culture and Society" (Harvey G. Graff). Discusses the historical role of literacy education as a tool for liberation, emphasizing the viewpoints of Plato and Freire. (FMW)

Reviews the work of Penina Muhando, a Tanzanian playwright whose plays are available only in Kiswahili. Synopsizes nine plays and analyzes the use and development of sex and gender roles in her characters to illustrate the problems of sexual and political oppression. (FMW)

Reviews a book that overviews the history of rural England and the factors that contributed to the decline of England's rural communities. One hundred years later in rural America, similar factors and pervasive cultural assumptions about rural ignorance are related to the shifting of political and economic power away from rural communities. (LP)

Mike Davis's book presents a history and current sociology of Los Angeles from a socialist perspective, arguing that inequalities in the distribution of power and wealth underlie the area's serious, growing problems: ethnic fear and discrimination, social disinvestment and withdrawal by the "haves," and an epidemic of youth violence. (SV)

Pepi Leistyna's book "Presence of Mind" discusses how schools of education deter teachers from understanding the world's complex political, historical, social, and economic realities. Educators must develop what C. Wright Mills called the "sociological imagination." Developing critical consciousness and varied, multicultural…

Reviews a book on the politics of educational change in Nicaragua, 1979-93. Following the revolution, the Sandinistas drastically revised curriculum and methods of instruction. However, when they lost political power, education in Nicaragua became contested terrain marked by fierce ideological debates, eventually rendering educational reform a…