They may have seen a picture on a wall, but do not know what it means. There is not much use in teaching people, using e.g. a flipchart, if they do not understand the pictures, as they will use all their energy trying to work out what is going on in the picture, rather than listen to what the extension worker is saying. In contrast to the literate communicator, the oral communicator who wants to remember an important truth, teaching or concept will clothe the treasured concept in a story that can be remembered. Stories are powerful carriers and disseminators of information among literates, but more so among illiterates. Television programmers have discovered that if you want people to sit in front of a picture tube for hours, you must tell them stories.
Television is a storytelling medium.
Most literate presenters of the gospel are unaware of the learning preference and lifestyle of oral communicators. For most literates, organizing information into outlines, lists, steps in a process and lessons to be learned increasingly becomes the preferred presentation format. An oral culture has no vehicle so neutral as a list. For most literates, to think of words as totally dissociated from writing is simply too arduous a task to undertake, even when specialized linguistic or anthropological work may demand it. The words keep coming to you in writing, no matter what you do . . .