Advanced Essay #2- Literacy and Tolerance

I’ve always believed that reading and writing are the closest things humans will ever get to magic. They allow us to know things and people that never were. They allow us to create worlds and people and places that never happened. We can alter the course of human history with a single story. We can change the way people see the world with one book. If you need proof of this, simply look at the Harry Potter franchise. With 7 books, JK Rowling influenced billions of lives. She’s prevent countless suicides with her characters and taught us hundreds of lessons with her stories. Her books created worlds, created movies, created thousands of fans. All simply by writing something that people wanted to read.

This pleasure isn’t something that should be withheld from anyone, yet 26% of the world’s population is illiterate. This is something that can greatly affect the rest of your life. Not only does being a literate person give you social, political, and economical advantages over an illiterate person, but it can completely alter the way you think. When author Neil Gaiman spoke for the Reading Agency in London two years ago, he made it clear how important literacy is in our lives: “How many prisoners are there going to be, 15 years from now? And [scientists] found they could predict it very easily, using a pretty simple algorithm, based on asking what percentage of 10 and 11-year-olds couldn't read.” The fact that literacy can determine likely it is that you will go to prison in 15 years should completely dispel any sort of passivity surrounding this issue.

I’m lucky, in the sense that I grew up in a very literate home. I grew up with bedtime stories and parents and teachers who were constantly teaching and encouraging me to read. I went to a school that had a library full of different books. By the time I reached second grade, I was reading far above my grade level. And that talent became a passion. JK Rowling has said, “If you don’t like to read, you haven’t found the right book yet.” I was lucky that I found the right book so young.

When my second grade class reached the library on the third floor of my school, I already knew which book I wanted to check out. As Ms. Moran let us go look around the library, I made a beeline for the fantasy section. I grabbed the first copy of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone I could find. I had just seen the movie and I wanted to read the book. I ran to get my book checked out and then plopped myself down on one of the beanbags in the reading area. This was the biggest book I had ever read by myself, but I was determined to do it. I opened the book to the first page and dove in. By the time Ms. Moran came back to get us, I had finished the first chapter and had decided that I would read the entire series.

“What book did you get, Michaela?” my friend Lindsey asked me.

I smiled, “Harry Potter!”

Harry Potter quickly became my favorite series. I fell in love with the plot and the characters and the world they existed in. I began to explore the world of books, the world of magic. I read to both understand the world, and to escape it. I read to believe in magic and myself. In the words of Sherman Alexie, “I read with equal parts joy and desperation. I loved those books, but I also knew that love had only one purpose. I was trying to save myself.” When the world wasn’t there for me, my books were.

And all of the reading paid off. According to a 2014 study:

becoming engrossed in a novel enhances connectivity in the brain and improves brain function. Interestingly, reading fiction was found to improve the reader's ability to put themselves in another person’s shoes and flex the imagination in a way that is similar to the visualization of a muscle memory in sports.- (Reading Fictions Improves Brain Connectivity and Function, Psychology Today, Christopher Bergland)

This study isn’t the only one of its kind. Also in 2014, researchers from the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia in Italy found that children who read Harry Potter were far more likely to be open minded and less prejudiced to different people and cultures.

Reading provides escape and magic and the ability to connect with the people around us. Literacy provides so much more than practical advantages. Literacy, especially in young children, can completely change how you see the world and the people in it. Literacy can open your eyes to how terrible this world is, but it can also make you realize that you can change it. People who read are more likely to be more tolerant, empathetic, and open-minded. They see the world not how it is, but how it could be. For the literate, it is easier to look past difference in past, skin color, culture, and heritage. Our imagination knows no bounds and our reality is very different from that of the person who doesn’t read. For the man who doesn’t read, reality is small and boxy. It is their home and their community and their day-to-day routine. For the man who does read, reality is the whole world and every piece that works together to make it turn. Literacy is not simply a tool that humans use to further themselves; it is a key that unlocks different worlds and emotions and frees us from the cage of ignorance.