It is helpful, when attempting to understand literacy, to differentiate between having specific literacies and being literate. Literacy, for example, has extrinsic, not intrinsic value that accumulates only as a companion to the process of becoming literate. Being literate is the result of what one does with the literacies that one has, and this in turn reflects value back onto literacy. As an analogy, if I learn five languages but have nothing interesting to express (write, speak) or do (think, translate, travel) with any one of them, then the value of that language acquisition is nil. The value increases, though, alongside my application of the languages. Literacy has reflected value.
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