The Hirsch list of needed knowledge E.D. Hirsch says every literate American should have at least some knowledge of most of the 4,500 terms included in his book Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know. The following are among the items he includes. Definitions are on page E-4. 1. Asymmetry 2. The Beatles 3. Bone to pick 4. Willa Cather 5. Dracula 6. Expressionism 7. Fort Worth, Texas 8. Homeostasis 9. 1939-1945 10. Vulgate Bible

When Nightline host Ted Koppel refers to the tactics of the Internal Revenue Service as "Kafkaesque," he makes the assumption that the majority of his late-night viewers have at least a passing familiarity with the works of Franz Kafka.

But how many people have been exposed to the works of the Austrian- Czech author whose books became synonymous with the bizarre and irrational taken as commonplace?

Not nearly enough, contends E.D. Hirsch Jr., an English professor at the University of Virginia. Hirsch lists Kafka as one of those writers every educated American should know, but probably doesn't.

In his book Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know (Houghton Mifflin Co., 1987) Hirsch argues that the nation's alarming rate of functional illiteracy stems from a fundamental lack of common knowledge needed to read newspapers, communicate effectively with others and comprehend Koppel. He argues that reading relies as much on knowledge as it does on recognizing words.

He defines cultural literacy as that broad band of common knowledge between what everyone knows (like how many fingers are on the human hand) and what only a few people know (like how to program a computer).

The problem, says Hirsch, is that students are taught to read as if it were an isolated skill independent of its context.

"We are learning to decode and how to identify words, but we aren't learning how to understand what we are reading," said Hirsch in a telephone interview.

For everything that is written or spoken, there is much more that is implied or assumed. It is that necessary second layer of background information that is missing from the minds of too many Americans, Hirsch says. "The skill of literacy is not an abstract skill. It is learning how to understand what we are reading," said Hirsch. "It is different for every different piece we read. Each piece requires different background information."

The result of emphasizing reading as a skill independent of its content is a nation deficient in a basic knowledge that should be shared by all who graduate from high school. It produces high school students who don't know where Mexico City is; community college students who never heard of Ulysses S. Grant or Robert E. Lee; business-school graduates who can't write a comprehensible memo.

Hirsch's criticism of how reading is taught is well-founded, said William R. Powell, professor of education at the University of Florida and an authority on reading education.

"We have fractionalized the reading curriculum to the point of near infinity. We aren't teaching youngsters to sit down and read continuously and conceptually. What we are doing is hitting them with stop-and-go reading: Hurry up and read this little paragraph and pick it apart," said Powell. "It is time to get back to the whole natural function that reading is."

Hirsch blames an educational system that offers a "cafeteria- style" curriculum for students to choose from for the lack of widespread cultural literacy. The public schools offer too many non- academic electives and not enough required courses that deal with the basic knowledge an educated person should have, Hirsch contends. His chief complaint is there are too many classes on subjects like "human relations," while the study of history has been minimized by its conversion into "social studies."

He also argues that by grouping students according to ability, kids are given very different educations even within the same school. Gifted students receive the cultural knowledge that enables them to go on to college or to read The New York Times. Average students are sent along a track that provides a less academic education. Below- average students are directed toward vocational classes.

"What I object to is giving kids in one track traditional literate material and giving kids in another track Dick and Jane," said Hirsch. "I feel very strongly that everyone should be acquainted with the information you need to be literate. As long as a child is within the normal range of abilities, there is no reason in the world they can't absorb the information they need to have."

But Powell says that the fracturing of public school education into different educations for different students is more the product of today's society than of any single educational philosophy as Hirsch contends.

"Society is fractionalized and specialized. Society is cafeteria- style, and the schools reflect that," said Powell. "Hirsch might like to have it the way it was 50 years ago, but it isn't like that anymore."

Hirsch's approach to the problem of illiteracy is markedly different from the standard arguments that Johnny can't read because he isn't being taught phonics or because he watches too much television. In fact, Hirsch argues that television is important in transmitting the information that a culturally literate person needs to know.

"Television is just a convenient scapegoat for a fundamental mistake schools have been making," Hirsch said. "Television has an acculturative effect. It helps with language and helps introduce children into the culture. If you have high-level material coming over TV, there is no difference between reading and watching television."

While Hirsch concedes that cultural literacy is derived from many sources including peers, parents and television, he believes the schools are the only institution capable of providing the majority of Americans with a shared common background of knowledge. Everyone who graduates from high school should have received a similar education in science, literature, history and geography, says Hirsch.

His call for a common core curriculum for all students runs counter to the philosophy that public education should be tailored to the needs of each student, say some educators.

"I don't believe we should try to impose the same subjects on everybody," said Tom Fillmer, professor of education at the University of Florida. "It is almost like trying to say we're going to make every kid 5 feet, 10 inches tall when they graduate from high school."

Others take exception to Hirsch's contention that public schools did a better job a hundred years ago in teaching immigrants than they currently do with native-born Americans. His idea that somewhere along the line American education took a wrong turn is wrongheaded, said Michael James, director of Project Literacy in San Francisco.

"He is perpetuating the mythology that we were doing something better than we are now. We were not doing a better job then. Society was more fractionalized and more caste-oriented when he was growing up," said James.

More people are receiving a high school education in America today than in the past of segregated schools and high dropout rates, Hirsch's critics argue. Instead of simply echoing the common cry for the return to educational basics, Hirsch has compiled a list of what those basics should include. With the help of two fellow University of Virginia colleagues, Hirsch came up with 4,500 names, dates, places and phrases with which every culturally literate person should have some familiarity.

His intent is to refine the list and attach thumbnail definitions to the words to create a cultural literacy dictionary that could become a guide for textbook publishers and those in charge of school curricula.

It is Hirsch's list, rather than his argument about the root cause of illiteracy, that has drawn the most criticism. The list shows little or no regard for the present influences on American culture from Hispanic and Asian immigrants, said Margaret Early, an education professor at the University of Florida.

"One of the things that troubles me about his theory is the fact he is running counter to our concern for cultural diversity," said Early. "His argument is a perfectly good one that comprehension does indeed depend on what you already know. But I would use that as an argument that we should not limit our students' experience to Western civilization alone."

Early also fears that a cultural literacy dictionary could easily be misused as a textbook itself, instead of a general guide for classroom curriculum: "I would be horrified if it became the basis for teachers to teach a cultural literacy word list."

Powell also argues that any dictionary captures the past, rather than reflects the present: "If you put out a cultural dictionary, it will contain the cultural artifacts of the 1970s instead of the 1980s."

But it is E.D. Hirsch's contention that Americans have become too emamored with the transitory pop culture of the present and educational trendiness rather than with the enduring knowledge of the past.

"By tailoring education to what seems to be relevant now, we create a people who have information that becomes totally irrelevant to their activities in society," he said. "To be relevant, you have to have this cultural literacy background."