Promoting reading 1
Chapter 6. Social reading Today there is a tenden
cy in research as well as reading promotion practice to emphasise the social dimension of reading. The book Social readers: promoting reading in the 21st century by American school librarian and researcher Leslie B. Preddy (2010) clearly illustrates this trend. Preddy talks about reading promotion’s three Rs: Reading, Role models and Relationships. According to Preddy, to develop readers, you need time for reading; reading role models in the home, school or elsewhere; and socialisation through reader relationships. Reading has not traditionally been perceived as a group activity, but for a generation where social interaction is continuous, reading also needs to become social, she argues. To generate reading motivation and improve attitudes to reading, schools and libraries ought to be working to establish a habit among children and young people of sharing their reading experiences. Young people will become engaged by literature if they get to talk about it. In a sense, reading is always social. In recent decades, research surrounding the actual process of learning to read has come to stress the importance of the social and cultural context within which all reading development occurs. The rise of the notion of literacy is testimony to this in particular. Literacy understood in its expanded meaning is the ability, not only to read and write, but also to understand and use a variety of other symbol systems within a culture. In reader-oriented literature theory, the term interpretive communities is used to refer to a group of readers whose ideals, norms and interpretation conventions determine the understanding of a literary text (Fish 1980). The practice of reading, from basic learning to read to advanced interpretation, in many ways can be regarded as a social practice. In addition, all “reading habits” – including reading alone in the privacy of one’s home – are socially produced and conditional on a “social infrastructure”, which includes, for example, the material conditions necessary for book production, the education of readers, and the existence of libraries. In itself, the image of the lone, private reader can be regarded as a social construct that romanticises the individual and isolated author or reader (Fuller & Sedo 2013). How, what, and why we read is determined in a social context. Nevertheless, there is a strong perception of reading as a solitary occupation. American sociologist Elizabeth Long (2003) spoke about a “cultural hegemony of the solitary reader”. A reader is often portrayed as someone who withdraws into a private sphere to become part of a world that others do not share in. However, there are indications suggesting that the image of the isolated reader is not dominating reading culture in the same way as previously. Book conversations, book circles, shared reading tips and digital discussion forums – all of these can be interpreted as a component of a reading culture where ‘the end of the book is just the beginning’, to borrow a phrase from Nina Frid (2012). An example of social reading on a large scale is the Mass Reading Event (MSE), such as TV and radio broadcast book clubs. Another example of MSE is reading promotion initiatives which aim to gather together readers in a city or region or a whole country concerning a book 68