Read and Response for March 30th

“Reading Games: Strategies for Reading Scholarly Sources” by Karen Rosenberg               
“Even though it may seem like a solitary, isolated activity, when you read a scholarly work, you are participating in a conversation.”

            I thought this quote was very interesting because it puts reading in a perspective that I’ve never really heard before.  It says that reading is like a conversation which in my eyes I never looked at it that way.  I just thought it was just you reading what the author had to say without getting any feedback about your thoughts.  However, in the article they talk about how the author uses common issues and problems that everyone could face to relate with their readers and that these issues and problems should be further discussed, say with classmates or teachers.  The writing provides you with an outlook on an issue or problem and it is your job to take what the writer says and develop your own perspective by discussing it with others.  The articles also made a big emphasis on ways to read more academically difficult text.  The author explained how splitting the reading into parts in order to break it down so it is better understood.  For example, the author stresses the importance on establishing who the desired audience is, as well as taking a closer look at the title to give you an idea of how to read the writing, and lastly establishing the main argument or idea of the story.  This quote best explains the ideas in this reading.

“Instead of passively reading the text from start to finish, my suggestions encourage you to pull the reading into its constituent parts—the abstract, the introduction, the section headings, conclusion, etc.—and read them unevenly and out of order to look for the holy grail of the main argument (Bunn 219).”

Read and Response for March 30th

“How To Read Like A Writer” by Mike Bunn (p. 74)

“In 1940, a famous poet and critic named Allen Tate discussed two different ways of reading:  There are many ways to read, but generally speaking there are two ways. They correspond to the two ways in which we maybe interested in a piece of architecture. If the building has Corinthian columns, we can trace the origin and development of Corinthian columns; we are interested as historians. But if we are interested as architects, we may or may not know about the history of the Corinthian style; we must, however, know all about the construction of the building, down to the last nail or peg in the beams. We have got to know this if we are going to put up buildings ourselves. (506)”

I thought that this passage was important because it is a great metaphor for what the whole article is trying to get across.  The author’s purpose in this article is to stress the importance and the differences between normal reading and reading like a writer.  When reading like a normal reading we are only concerned with the information provided and what we learn from the reading.  Reading like a writer takes more of an architect’s point of view.  Reading like a writer involves more concentration on the actual words being used in context to the whole story.  Tate makes the comparison of reading to constructing a building and that we must know every piece that goes into the construction of the building for us to be successful in building our own.  Basically making the comparison that when we are reading like a writer, we focus on the words used in the text and the effects they have on the reader.  Going word for word and examining the way it is used the story as a whole gives us a better understanding of the way the author wrote the story and gives us guidelines for our own stories.

I believe that reading is a huge part of writing because they go hand and hand.  To become a good writer you must have read a lot because reading other peoples works is what gives you inspiration for your own writing.  Seeing how other authors used words in their text and their effects on the reader, possibly being yourself, helps you decide whether you want those same effects in your writing.  There is no possible way that someone could not be able to read but still was a good writer and vice versa.  This is evident by this quote from Charles Moran.

“When we read like writers we understand and participate in the writing. We see the choices the writer has made, and we see how the writer has coped with the consequences of those choices (Bunn 75).