Part of the difficulty is that the participatory paradigm is grounded in a utopian vision of an "emancipated" pedagogy, reflecting Paulo Freire's founding influence. For the politics of literacy education in the United States, the emancipatory vision fails to adequately reflect the actual historical conditions in which the lives of most literacy students are embedded. Rather than "transformational," in any profound structural sense, the overwhelming majority of adult literacy learners seek more mainstream goals of inclusion. Linda Ziegahn identifies "self-improvement, family responsibilities, diversion, literacy development, community/church involvement, launching economic need, educational advancement, and the urging of others""(Ziegahn, 1992, p. 33) as major sources of adult literacy learning motivation. She (1992) also points to "the desire to understand, see results and apply knowledge, respond to a challenge, and pass on knowledge" (p. 47) as other major objectives. These findings parallel those of Eberle and Robinson (1980) in Vermont and my own study of motivation at the Bob Steele Reading Center (Demetrion, 1994).

A reasonable conclusion that can be drawn from such studies is that the vast majority of adult literacy learners seek learning experiences that have some visible impact on their lives. My personal experience as a literacy program director leads me to believe that learners often seek such knowledge through the direct instruction of a knowledgeable instructor who will teach them how to read and write. At the same time, many learners seek to participate actively in learning, but within a secure instructional and program structure that lends stability to their emerging efforts.