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January 17, 2009

How are Americans Doing Reading Literature?

Plenty of bloggers and news articles have been a-buzz about the National Endowment for the Arts recently released report “Reading on the Rise: A New Chapter in American Literacy.” Of the many articles I have read on the results of this report I enjoyed author Ann Patchett's article in the Wall Street Journal the most.

Entitled "The Triumph of the Readers: The Markets May be Down, but Fiction is on the Rise," Ms. Patchett uses the NEA report as an excuse to give testimony to her love of reading and the joys of the library. There are many wonderful parts of this article to quote but probably my favorite is when Patchett compares herself to rifle-toting Charlton Heston (see this video), saying, "I'm more of the Charlton Heston school: you'll get my paperback of "One Hundred Years of Solitude" away from me when you pry it out of my cold, dead hands." You go, girl!

Patchett also tries to stress that it doesn't matter "what you read. It's that you read." She claims bad books are a "gateway drug." At least they get you reading so that eventually you may try higher quality books and become hooked by their powerful ability to quickly take you into new worlds and new experiences.

Richard Katzev, in his blog Marks in the Margin is skeptical about the NEA reports definition of a literate reader. To qualify as having read literature during 2008 all one had to do was answer yes to the following question:

During the past 12 months, did you read any a) novels or short stores; b) poetry; or c) plays?

Katzev writes, "Does it make any sense to group together a reader of a single poem with a reader of Anna Karenina or Moby Dick or both of them and then some?" Sounds like he's trying to play culture police with this comment and I think he's totally missing the point of the survey. This same question has been asked on all four reports; 1982, 1992, 2002, and 2008. It is a statistic. It isn't a judgment call. You have to start somewhere. Perhaps he has been in the Ivory Tower of academia too long to understand that not all Americans are literature majors or even public policy researchers or psychology professors. Go easy on the little guys!

The main point the NEA report tries to make is that the reading of literature (based on the, albeit narrow definition defined by the question stated above) is up, especially among those between the ages of 18 and 24. Data has been compiled by the U.S. Census Bureau every few years since 1982 and there has been a steady decline in the number of literature reading Americans ever since, that is until this latest 2008 data, which has shown some encouraging rises in most age categories, among both men and women and among all racial categories polled. Any downward trends that occurred are so small as to be statistically insignificant. It's too early to guess if this increase in readers will continue into future surveys conducted. Statistics still have a way to go before they equal the percentage of Americans reading literature at the same rate as in when this study was started in 1982. With the rise of the Internet, types of reading have changed. We're not just reading books anymore. Public domain fiction is widespread over the Internet. Perhaps it will be harder and harder to compare reading statistics from 1982 to reading statistics of the future. Still this is a hopeful report and and makes me want to sit down by the fireplace and pick up one of the many novels around my house, waiting to be read. Read anything good lately?

Posted by swortman at 01:13 PM | Comments (1)

January 16, 2009

Should Librarians Encourage or Discourage Students' Use of the Internet for Research?

In the Library with the Lead Pipe recently had a great posting and discussion challenging how the average instruction librarian treats using the Internet for research. I should say in this instance that by the Internet I mean anything that can found online and used without having to purchase the information. In her posting In Praise of the Internet: Shifting Focus and Engaging Critical Thinking Skills, Blogger Ellie Collier of Austin Community College, Austin, TX suggests that instead of teaching students that the Internet is a poor resource we instead teach them to think for themselves.

I have always thought it was too easy and in fact quite pompous of instruction librarians to bring out the old fake web site examples, like Dihydrogen Monoxide (a.k.a. water)to fake students out and make them think they must be pretty gullible. That may have worked in the early days of the Internet but browsers and searching have been around long enough for us to realize there is not only a bunch of bad stuff out there. There is most likely an even greater amount of good stuff available over the Internet, where research is concerned.

Academic librarians, always concerned about being taken seriously and having credibility with their students and professors jeopardize that credibility, according to Collier by, "Condemning the Internet as a wasteland or a dangerous minefield when this is not the students’ personal experience".

The ALA/ACRL listserv had a brief discussion about this very topic this last week. One member recommended encouraging faculty to take off points when grading student projects if they use Internet resources. I suggested instead that faculty require students to justify why they chose a particular Internet resource and why it was important to the topic they covered in their paper. We all know students use Wikipedia and Google for finding information. Shoot, I use them! Let's make them savvy consumers of Internet information and help them to make sure they're getting the best information possible.

Posted by swortman at 03:16 PM | Comments (0)