Abstract:

The purpose of this research is to find out illiterate women’s reasons for non-participation in literacy courses and factors behind these reasons (social and cultural background). In this context, sub-problems of the research are: (1) What are demographic characteristics of illiterate women in Turkey? (2) What are the reasons of these women’s for non-participation in literacy courses and what are the factors behind these reasons? (3) Does the need of literacy skill change according to the settlement? In the research, both quantitative and qualitative methods were used. Statistical data show that illiteracy intensifies in female population in terms of gender; in elderly population in terms of age and in rural area in terms of settlement. Besides, women indicated factors such as child care and home responsibilities, age and age-related reasons, fear of failure, work-related reasons and disapproval of kith and kin as reasons for non-participation in literacy courses. Of course, these reasons women mentioned are important, but when considering background on which these reasons based, patriarchal social structure, nature of oral culture surrounding daily life and flow not demanding literacy became prominent. Considering settlement, home responsibilities were mostly indicated by women living in the village; child care was mostly indicated by women living in the squatter settlement and the city center.

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