This paper has argued that literacy concerns the historically and culturally
conditioned relationship among three processes, no one of which is sufficient alone: (i) the
symbolic and material representation of knowledge, culture and values; (ii) the diffusion of
interpretative skills and abilities across a (stratified) population; and (iii) the institutional,
especially, the state management of the power that access to and skilled use of knowledge
brings to those who are ‘literate