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Under the Direction of DONNA E. ALVERMANN) THE SOCIONATURALIST NARRATIVE: AN APPROACH TO THE BIO-ECOLOGICAL DYNAMICS OF READING AND LITERACY DEVELOPMENT by GEORGE G. HRUBY (Under the direction of DONNA E. ALVERMANN) ABSTRACT In this conceptual-manuscript hybrid dissertation, the author argues for a theoretical framework for reading and literacy education research informed by neo- naturalist trends in the social sciences, with an emphasis on current motifs in developmental psychology. Specifically, the author demonstrates that a framework intentionally located within a contextual organicist world hypothesis can complement currently competing paradigms in the reading and literacy education community by making sense of cognitive, linguistic, and sociocultural phenomena in terms of the self- organizing dynamics of living systems. This narrative avoids the reductive and deterministic accounts of sociobiology as well as the dualism and essentialism inherent in mechanistic organicist and mechanistic contextualist world hypotheses entertained by cognitive and sociocultural researchers respectively. As a narrative, it links naturalistic discourses with themes in anglophone poststructuralist epistemology. It thereby provides a means of incorporating new insights from the neurosciences, philosophy of mind, artificial intelligence, cognitive ethology, sociolinguistics, cultural and biological anthropology, dynamical systems theory, and evolutionary, ecological, and developmental psychology into theory and research in reading and literacy education. It is suggested that such a narrative can readdress questions about agency, motivation, socio-emotional development, personality, and identity in new ways for reading and literacy education theory and research. Five previously published papers touching on aspects of socionaturalism are included to demonstrate the acceptability of this narrative in peer-reviewed publications of reading and literacy. INDEX WORDS: Literacy, Reading, Socionaturalism, Socionaturalist Narrative, Development, Self-organization, Dynamical Systems, Bio-ecological, Mechanism, Contextualism, Organicism, Naturalism, Stephen Pepper, World Hypotheses, Reading Wars, Theoretical Frameworks, Philosophy of Science, Poststructural Epistemology. THE SOCIONATURALIST NARRATIVE: AN APPROACH TO THE BIO-ECOLOGICAL DYNAMICS OF READING AND LITERACY DEVELOPMENT by GEORGE G. HRUBY B.A., Syracuse University, 1976 M.Ed., The University of Georgia, 1995 A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of The University of Georgia in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements of the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY ATHENS, GEORGIA 2002 © 2002 George G. Hruby All Rights Reserved THE SOCIONATURALIST NARRATIVE: AN APPROACH TO THE BIO-ECOLOGICAL DYNAMICS OF READING AND LITERACY DEVELOPMENT by GEORGE G. HRUBY Approved: Major Professor: Donna E. Alvermann Committee: Michelle Commeyras George W. Hynd Steven A. Stahl David Reinking Electronic Version Approved: Gordhan L. Patel Dean of the Graduate School The University of Georgia August 2002 Dedicated to John Franklin Hruby, Ph.D. 1914-1993 iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Texts, including dissertations, are always collective works. Authors stand on the shoulders of giants—and sometimes sit in their laps and even stand on their toes. It’s not unknown for authors to walk all over little people, too. They are equal-opportunity social climbers. So this is to acknowledge all of those who have contributed to this exercise and thereby hoisted me to this intellectual pinnacle. In particular, I wish to thank my committee, Drs. Michelle Commeyras (for supporting my experimental form and requiring an example of professional application), George Hynd (for verifying the science and identifying unnecessary obfuscation), Steven Stahl (for keeping it focused on reading research), and David Reinking (for helpful editorial suggestions and insisting on professional standards of scholarly writing). And I especially wish to express my gratitude to my major professor, my advisor, my mentor, and my friend, Dr. Donna Alvermann. For their editorial assistance and encouragement on the manuscript chapters, I wish also to acknowledge the invaluable help of Drs. Diane Barone, Joyce Fine, Rachel Karchmer, Donald Leu, Marla Mallette, Gary Mooreman, John Readence, Raymond Russ, and Woodrow Trathen. v Also, for general encouragement and advice over the years, I wish to acknowledge Drs. Richard Allington, Carol Fry Bohlin, Ken Goodman, Jerry Harste, Ali Iran-Nejad, Michael Kamil, Reid Lyon, Dick Robinson, Betty St. Pierre, and Dennis Sumara. My fellow graduate students over the years also deserve applause, especially Malcolm Lively, Melanie Kuhn, Thomas Montgomery, Cheri Triplett, Kathleen MacDougall, Gwynne Ash, Jennifer Moon Ro, Margaret Hagood, Leslie Rush, Elizabeth Edwards, George Font, and especially Alison Heron for her insightful critiques. Lionel Lemarchand (Ph.D., French) and Bob Sawyer (Ph.D., English) fit in here somewhere, too. Some of these are now professors, others are still human beings. Finally, for their irregular support but constantly wayward inspiration, I wish to thank Michael J. Baxter, Craig Robert Smith, Eve Brandon, Molly Wagner, Kay Fascholtz, Lisa Doggett, Glynnis Haynes, Susan Walker, Shea Drescher, Bridget Booher, Zelda Stowers, Shelley Frampton, Sara Kendricks, Kelly Hart, Tony Eubanks, Chris Edwards, Steve Pugh, Joey Coley, Jackie Jasper and Tommy George, Kim Lambert, Kristin Johnson, Christine Chandler, Jim White and Queen Kim and all the folks at Harry Bissett’s, Zander and the gang at the Georgia Bar, Timmy Cantrell and the Roadhouse crew, and, of course, all the late-night denizens of downtown Athens, Georgia, to whom I hope soon to return. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................. v LIST OF FIGURES ....................................................................................................... XI CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................ 1 The Gist of Socionaturalism ................................................................ 5 An Outline of the Argument................................................................. 8 Dissertation Form............................................................................. 15 Overview of the Chapters.................................................................. 16 A Note on Some Philosophical Presuppositions................................. 22 2 A HISTORY OF THEORY IN DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY....................... 27 The Varieties of Developmental Psychology...................................... 29 The History of the Varieties of Developmental Psychology................ 31 World Hypotheses as Paradigms....................................................... 35 Examining the Three Metaphysical World Hypotheses of Developmental Psychology........................................................ 39 The Professional Impact of Explicit Worldviews................................ 44 vii 3 A HISTORY OF THEORY IN READING AND LITERACY RESEARCH................. 48 Trends in Developmental Psychology and Reading Research: A Comparison ........................................................................... 49 A History of Reading and Literacy Theoretical Frames..................... 53 Historical Meta-analyses of Reading Models, Theories, and Paradigms........................................................... 59 Limits of Historical Meta-analyses.................................................... 63 Conceptual Meta-analyses of Reading Models, Theories, and Paradigms........................................................... 64 Between Dichotomy and Multiplicity................................................. 67 A Pepperian Analysis of Reading and Literacy Educational Research Theory........................................................................ 72 Cognitive Factors in Reading: Mechanistic Organicist Frameworks ......................................... 74 Sociocultural Factors in Reading: Mechanistic Contextualist Frameworks ..................................... 77 Unexplored Factors in Reading: Contextual Organicist Frameworks ........................................... 78 viii 4 ON SOCIONATURALISM ............................................................................ 80 Socionaturalism and the Investigation of Adolescent Literacy Development.............................................. 82 Science as Narrative ......................................................................... 86 Caveat Recap.................................................................................... 92 Would We Recognize a Paradigm Shift If We Saw One?.................... 93 Ecophilia, Biophobia......................................................................... 96 Transaction....................................................................................... 97 Emergence ...................................................................................... 100 Second Recap.................................................................................. 104 The Nature, if not the Meaning, of Life............................................ 105 5 COGNITION AND THE MIND..................................................................... 107 6 THE BIOFUNCTIONAL THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE AND ECOLOGICALLY INFORMED EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH ..................................................... 114 7 SOCIOLOGICAL, POSTMODERN, AND NEW REALISM PERSPECTIVES
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