Vivian Gadsden
Biography
Vivian Gadsden is Director of the National Center on Fathers and Families (NCOFF) and Associate Professor of Education at the University of Pennsylvania. From 1990 through 1996, Dr. Gadsden also served as Associate Director of the National Center on Adult Literacy at the University of Pennsylvania. She received her doctorate in developmental psychology and education with a specialty in policy from the University of Michigan. Dr. Gadsden's research focuses on family development and literacy across the life-span and within multiple cultures, primarily African American, Latino, and American Indian families, and families living in poverty. Her work examines the nature of persistence and consequences of intergenerational learning within families and explores issues of race, class, and gender within the home, school and social contexts. Dr. Gadsden's current research projects are: (1) a multigenerational study of 25 African American families, (2) a parent-child Head Start project with African American and Puerto Rican families, and (3) a project with adolescent and young mothers and fathers. Dr. Gadsden has published several articles and book chapters on issues related to families, literacy, and culture and is currently completing two book-length volumes: (1) a single authored work from her multigenerational study and (2) a co-edited volume, entitled In Our Father's Image, In Our Mother's Heart: Life Notes on Families, Race, and Gender. A third volume, co-edited with Daniel Wagner, Literacy among African American Youth: Issues in Learning, Teaching, and Schooling, was published in 1995 as part of the literacy series by Hampton Press. Her work has appeared as book chapters and as articles in journals such as Theory into Practice, for which she edited a special issue entitled "Literacy and the African-American Learner: The Struggle between Access and Denial."
SLTP Presentations
Family Culture & Literacy: Parents & Children Learning Together (S11)
INTERNATIONAL LITERACY
INSTITUTE