The Reading of Bethany: A Case Study of an Adolescent Reader

Abstract

Bethany can read. It was not always so. Bethany is seventeen, blond, blue-eyed, a senior at a local high school, bright, and articulate. She takes three classes during the day, three classes in night school, and works a part-time job. She says, plan on graduating, so I can go to college. You need college to get ahead. Bethany is a recovering alcoholic and drug addict. She has just celebrated her first year of sobriety; she has been alcoholand drug-free for one year. Now Bethany's favorite book is the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous (1976, New York: AA World Services). She likes to read How It Works, (5860) because tells me how to live, and page 449 because need to learn to accept, she said. When I sit down to read the Big Book, I want to know how to get out of the situation that I'm in. Occasionally I will read just for fun or to escape, but I really don't have much time. Bethany was drunk for the first time when she was ten. She tried drugs at eleven. She says, started young. Drinking really didn't catch up with her in middle school, but it did by high school. In middle school Bethany was a straight A student, but she feels that her addiction kicked in by the time she entered high school. Her addiction interfered with her learning process. Bethany believes that her emotional and intellectual growth just stopped.