Interested reader or uninterested dissembler?: the identities constructed by upper primary aged dyslexic pupils during silent reading sessions

Abstract

AbstractThis article discusses the identities that may be constructed by upper primary aged pupils during silent reading sessions. The findings presented are taken from a 2‐year ethnographic case study, which investigated how four dyslexic pupils, aged 10–11 (Y5–6), coped with the classroom reading they encountered at a large primary school in northern England. The theoretical aim was to integrate the psychological concept of dyslexia with a socio‐cultural view of literacy development and an analytic framework was developed using symbolic interactionist theory. Here ideas on presentation of self, formulated by Erving Goffman, are introduced and his notion of impression management is used as a lens through which to discuss what happened when the pupils were put in the position of having no choice but to engage with texts that were too difficult for them to read independently. I focus on the silent reading sessions that were a regular feature of their Literacy lessons and introduce a typology of reader identities. Evidence from systematic observations, supplemented with that from narrative observations and interview transcripts, is used to illustrate the four types ‐ interested reader, uninterested reader, interested dissembler and uninterested dissembler– and the implications for literacy development are drawn out.