Reading Of Literary Texts Research Articles

Literature and Understanding: The Value of a Close Reading of Literary Texts

Detailed, precise and ridden with excellent examples, Jon Phelan’s Literature and Understanding: The Value of a Close Reading of Literary Texts is an inviting and inspiring book that seeks to establish a novel account of the cognitive value of literature. It does this by providing a variety of arguments supporting the educative, cognitive and moral value of literature. Phelan positions himself within the literary cognitivist camp and joins the minority within it who argue that it is through literary devices, and not through its fictional dimension, that literature gives us knowledge. As he claims in the first chapter, philosophers are all too quick to run literature and fiction together, making it unclear how precisely the learning takes place, attributing the cognitive impact of fiction to the literary dimension of a work and vice versa. To overcome this problem, Phelan establishes a category of literary fiction, taking inspiration from Ken Walton’s (1970) notion of categories of art (each with its own set of standard features) and Stacie Friend’s (2012) account of fiction as a genre. As he sees it, literary fiction includes those works that exhibit the standard features of literature and of fiction.

Problem aspects in teaching Tatar literature

The article discusses the key trends in the school course of literary education, identifies problematic aspects in the teaching of Tatar literature in educational institutions with the Tatar language of instruction. The relevance of the study is determined by the insufficiently studied problematic aspects in the teaching of Tatar literature in general educational institutions with instruction in the Tatar language, and, therefore, the need to analyze sample syllabuses for Tatar literature in this aspect. The scientific novelty is determined by the fact that in the course of our study, firstly, attention is focused on the main principles, on which two groups of authors based their programs, built according to concentric and chronological principles, underlying the current teaching of Tatar literature; secondly, problematic aspects are identified in teaching Tatar literature. As a result of the study, it is argued that the main problem in teaching Tatar literature is the knowledge of the theoretical foundations for students to learn the creative path of a particular writer and the literary process as a whole; to this end, students need to know the system of theoretical terms and concepts, the criteria for analyzing a literary text and artistic phenomena. The second urgent problem concerning the algorithm of Tatar literature learning at school is related to the study of the history of verbal art. The third important problem is the problem of motivation for reading literary texts, since reading a literary text is an important component in the school course of literary education.

Teaching Ecological Awareness Through Literature: A Case Study of Ghassan Kanafani’s Returning to Haifa

Theories like Feminism, Marxism and Post-colonialism work on the contextualization of literature. Exponents of these theories promote the employment of such approaches in the field of education in order to raise the students’ awareness towards social and political issues, and help them inculcate and develop the skill of critical reading of literary texts. In the 1990s, a new approach evolved in the domain of literary studies that called for the same task but from a different perspective, i.e. Ecocriticism. Hence, taking Ecocriticism as a theoretical framework, the paper in hand has discussed Ghassan Kanafani’s novella Returning to Haifa with a special focus on the use of nature and environment with their various meanings and connotations in the novella. The paper’s main objective is to contribute in the promotion of Ecocriticism as a tool for critical reading. It also aimed at raising students’ awareness of environmental crises, particularly those caused by conflicts and wars. The paper has postulated that Ecological awareness would help students to gain better understanding of the consequences of conflicts and to be more cautious in their treatment of the environment around them. After the analysis of Kanafani’s novella, the researcher found that the author attempted to convey messages to the readers through his treatment of nature. Most of these messages lament the loss of the natural elements as well as the human intuitive nature due to wars and conflicts that result in displacement of people and hence the destruction of environment and imbalance in the ecosystem.

Inter-imperiality: Vying Empires, Gendered Labor, and the Literary Arts of Alliance

Inter-imperiality: Vying Empires, Gendered Labor, and the Literary Arts of Alliance

PROMOTING EFL STUDENTS ENTREPRENEURSHIP ENTHUSIASM: USING PROJECT-BASED LEARNING IN EXTENSIVE READING ACTIVITIES

This article discusses how Extensive Reading (ER) activities promote English as a Foreign Language (EFL) college students’ entrepreneurship enthusiasm by giving the chance to the individual student to select the topic to be read based on the most interesting one in his/her life. As ER is defined as pleasure reading, most of the previous research reports promoting ER activities for EFL students deal mostly with reading literary texts. For EFL college students, however, ER should not focus on reading literary texts, but also on the academic and popular ones. They need to be able to read a wide range of academic and popular texts for school task demands and for their prospective work purpose. They should be encouraged to read other types of texts other than literary one—which can improve their entrepreneurship enthusiasm. The method used in this study is classroom action research by implementing Project Based Learning (PBL) in two cycles. The results of this study showed that in the first cycle the students were able to read everything about the most interesting thing in their life guided by the mind map usage, made papers of reading reports based on both printed and digital resources, made the slides of oral report contained project plan of entrepreneurship products or services. In the second cycle the students were able to complete the project in form of portfolio contained the complete plan of entrepreneurship products and/or services. It is concluded that the implementing of PBL can promote EFL students’ entrepreneurship enthusiasm.

On reading and literariness: The (im)possibility of literary theory

This paper analyses how readings of literary texts by Jacques Derrida and Gilles Deleuze can contribute to the research of literariness in the field of literary theory. Furthermore, the paper elaborates how such radical changes in the understanding of literariness simultaneously affect the (im)possibility of literary theory. In other words, an attempt will be made to argue that it is possible to re-evaluate the objectives and the purpose of a theoretical approach to a literary text based on the legacy of the two philosophers.

Literárne žánre ako didaktický problém v procese vyučovania v rámci nižšieho sekundárneho vzdelávania

The main subject of our paper is the problem of didactic grasping of literary genres in the process of literary education at the lower secondary level. Pupils gradually encounter genological terms within of literary education and acquire basic knowledge about the types of literary genres and their genre codes. Through the designed activities, we pursue the adoption of these hard-to-grasp, abstract, genre codes and their features through experiential learning during the educational process. In the activities, we provide the pupil with concrete tasks, with the help of which they become familiar with the necessary knowledge and with the aesthetic component. By proposing activities, in this paper we try to deal with the didactic problem of teaching genre codes without forcing and preserving the artistic-aesthetic reading of literary texts.

Gender Discourse – Representation of Ideas about the Distribution of Gender Roles

The relevance of the study is conditioned by the insufficient level of investigation of gender discourse, in particular, in translation studies, understanding the feminine and masculine aspects when analysing the content of the text through the use of linguistic tools and techniques. The purpose of the study is a comparative analysis of two translations at the level of phonetic, morphological, grammatical, syntactic, and stylistic means, analysis of translation strategy in such aspects as the accuracy (adequacy) of reproduction of folk realia, the use of emotional and evaluative vocabulary, metaphorical and aphoristic thinking, the use of techniques of foreignization and domestication of language resources. The main method is a theoretical approach to understanding the concepts of gender, gender stereotypes, cultural turn, postcolonial development of literature and feminist discourse, and a comparative linguistic analysis of the linguistic tools used in both translations. This paper focuses on the intralingual and extralingual means of gender identity, reveals the main aspects of the study of masculine and feminine discourse through the use of various mechanisms at the language level to convey national realia, and examines the key aspects of the communication strategy of male and female translators. The materials presented in this paper would facilitate further research of gender issues in the context of the modern reading of literary texts, analysis of world influences on cultural space and language adaptation of translation with the selection of full and incomplete correspondences, and understanding the possibilities of a particular national language to reproduce the content and form of a literary work made in the original.

Littérature francophone de migration et d’exil – quelle approche de lecture pour développer les compétences interculturelles en FLE ?

This article discusses the reading of francophone literature aimed at developing (inter)cultural competence in the language classroom. The distinction of the three approaches: experiential, literary and discursive, has made it possible to grasp the mechanisms and resources that the corresponding modes of reading literary texts are likely to mobilize and transform in the learner. This theoretical framework was applied to the analysis of learners’ opinions written after the reading of Fatou Diome’s Le ventre de l’Atlantique. From the perspective of the development of (inter)cultural competences, the analysis made it possible to see, among other things, how the learners understand the culture represented in the book.

OPPOSITION AS PRINCIPLE OF STRUCTURING AND INTERPRETING ALITERARY TEXT

The article considers a text of verbal art from the perspectives of linguo-stylistics and linguo-didactics. Teaching reading is the underlying condition in language education, including teaching foreign languages. Reading literary texts both in the original and in an abridged form forms cultural maturity, and contributes to increasing language competence. Evaluation of its linguistic properties and artistic message is determined by understanding basic mechanisms of its structuring, namely, opposition. The author analyzes this principle of structuring a literary text as a research method on the example of English language novels written by E. Litman (‘The Last Chicken in America’ и ‘Mannequin Girl’) which belong to the category of contact, or translingual literature. Description of text structure through the set of dichotomies is the interpretation mechanism applicable to teaching practice.

:Infectious Liberty: Biopolitics between Romanticism and Liberalism

:<i>Infectious Liberty: Biopolitics between Romanticism and Liberalism</i>

ROMAN-ESSAY BY V. MIKHAILOV «ONE BETWEEN HEAVEN AND EARTH ...» IN THE CONTEXT OF RECEPTIVE AESTHETICS

Philology as a social institution for ensuring communication plays an important role in modern society and in the modern educational space. The present article deals with the problem of studying the writer's creative personality from the standpoint of writer's reception as one of the trends in the development of the classical heritage of Russian culture and its modern interpretation, the definition of historical and cultural experience, as well as the function of influencing the modern reader. Of particular interest is the author's view of the creative personality, the literary tradition. The authors of the article pay attention to the disclosure of the role of the reader, analyze the motivation, reader's interest and the appearance of the reader, who acts as a recipient, on the one hand, and as an interpreter of a literary text, on the other. The emphasis is on the study of the novel-essay of the Kazakh writer, poet and publicist V. Mikhailov about M. Lermontov – «One between heaven and earth ...» in the context of its assessment by modern Russian literary critics. This kind of study has not been undertaken before, which may indicate the novelty of the research material.&#x0D; A comparative approach to the study of Russian literature, Russian prose of Kazakhstan, among other things, contributes to a new reading of literary texts from the point of view of the opposition «one's own» – «alien» in the context of the dialogue of cultures. For the basis the research takes the concept of receptive aesthetics as a dialogue between the text and the reader. Receptive aesthetics is aimed at studying reader's literary experience. The neoclassical model of scientific research is based on a special type of scientific rationality, on the possible synthesis of diverse cognitive practices. Reading a work of art is to study the comprehension of the meaning inherent in a particular text. Many new facts forgotten in the 20th century are introduced into scientific circulation by V. Mikhailov about the image of M. Lermontov and his image is revealed as of an artistic genius, a herald and harbinger of many events. It was concluded that his works are of interest to the contemporary readers as well. The meaning of an artistic (including poetic) text is concretized in a dialogue with the reader.

Soji Cole’s Embers and its implications for critical thinking and development

Reading literary texts help us develop critical thinking skills, but this fact is taken for granted in literary education by both teachers and students alike and this is the problem projected by the paper. Critical thinking itself trains our minds toward solving a problem and the ability to solve the problems that life presents is the key to success, according to Robert Harris. The objective of this paper is to show that with literary texts, readers and students can be taught to think critically. To demonstrate this, Bobkina and Stefanova’s four-stage model, Situated Practice Stage, The Overt Instruction Stage, The Critical Framing Stage, and Transformed Practice Stage, of using fiction to teach critical thinking were used. It was concluded that the human mind or brain uses the simulation effect as in computers to orientate itself to social realities as reflected in literary texts and that as a result, literary texts are very effective in cultivating critical thinking skills in us.

Can literary reading and writing improve pharmacists’ medication counselling? A feasibility study of pharmacists’ efforts to achieve competence in narrative medicine

Background: Narrative medicine is an innovative approach where empathetic skills are nurtured through close reading of literary texts and creative writing. The aim of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of a course in narrative medicine for pharmacists. Methods: A 2-day course of narrative medicine was offered to community and hospital pharmacists. Feasibility was assessed using focus group interviews, participant observation, and a questionnaire. Pharmacists’ self-reported level of empathy was also assessed. Results: Eight pharmacists participated in the course. They found participation acceptable, even though some of the sessions required a personal investment far from their routines. The pharmacists were generally satisfied with the course and found it helpful in their daily patient communication. There was no significant change in the pharmacists’ level of empathy. Conclusion: A course in narrative medicine has the potential to improve pharmacist communication with patients but needs further testing, including patient-reported outcomes.

포스트 코로나 시대의 국내 영문학교육: 트릴링의 문학교육관을 중심으로

This paper tries to apply Lionel Trilling’s liberal views on literary education, which characterize his later thought, to the practice of English literary teaching in higher education in the post-Covid Korean society. Trilling argues that literary teachers must help (undergraduate) students dialectically form their own selves through and against the subversive modernist texts. The reading of literary text, especially that of the novels, contributes to the formation of an autonomous self by cultivating moral realism, liberal imagination and egalitarian and pluralistic fellow-feeling that is required in democratic society. This formation of an autonomous self has a vital importance in that it is linked to the formation of autonomous individual selves equipped with realism, flexibility, respect for diversity and democratic fellow-feeling in this post-Covid society rapidly polarizing into individual selfishness and collective madness. Likewise, teachers of English literature in higher education of today can contribute to the formation of autonomous individual selves compatible with the modern liberal society by fully foregrounding the subversiveness of social constructivism in critical theories, encouraging and respecting the students’ own judgment resulting from their wrestling with those subversive texts and directing their attention, especially in their teaching of the novels, to the protagonist’s struggle and fortitude, to the characters’ moral judgments and different, autonomous and equivalent fates.

Close Reading: Making Sense in Robert Frost’s Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

Close reading opens the way to comprehend a text critically, which provides surface and underlying meanings. It systematises a thoughtful reading with social interaction based on textual evidences and concludes to a proposition and argumentation. It enables the reader to observe the text and contextualize the meanings and ideas derived from it in the practical sphere of life as well. College students study to learn reading strategies and skills. The purpose of this paper is to present a sample of close reading in Robert Frost’s poem, “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” This paper has used qualitative descriptive method to qualify the essence of close reading in the poem. This research paper has described the stages of close reading to unravel the general understanding and underlying pattern of Frost’s poem. This paper becomes more useful to teachers and advanced readers to read literary and non-literary texts effectively. The activities discussed in this paper stimulate them to read other texts closely. It broadens the horizon of understanding after dealing with very careful and precise details that evoke the insights of knowledge. This dynamics of reading, in this way, enriches the critical faculty of readers.

Fostering Motivation and Adopting Learner-centred Teaching Strategy Through EFL Literature Circles- the case of a tertiary level, Algeria

AbstractThis paper examines and reports on an EFL literature course design and instruction. The researcher believed that EFL Literature Circles instruction in practice is an issue worthy of concern. A new teaching plan was designed to motivate students in practising reading literary texts and implementing activities. The plan consisted of assigning learners with various reading activities to literary genres that were done in groups and presented in the classroom. Qualitative and quantitative methods were used in this study. Based on the data obtained from classroom observations, students’ classroom presentations, focus group interview; students’ response to a questionnaire and a post-questionnaire of (30 students), the researcher found out that students developed a fairly high degree of motivation towards practising literary reading. The results of the study also indicated that the students were motivated; the course was conducive to students’ language awareness and acquisition and contributed to students’ literary growth. Learning literature through literature circles gave more freedom to learners to take risks, learn by themselves and profit from their mates without resorting to teachers in most cases. (184 words)

A Semiotic Approach to the Reading of Literary Texts in EFL Classes* **

Semiotic reading is a process approach developed in three steps to the reading of literary texts in language classes. The consecutive steps are said to be (1) reading within the text for the sense, (2) reading upon the text for the value and (3) reading against the text for the critique. In order to collect the data needed for the study a vast reading of the literature in the field concerned has been done and in class application of the approach has been administered accordingly. A control group and an experimental group were formed of the 4th grade students of the Police Academy, who were all upper intermediate in their study of English as a foreign language. Since the participants were the cadets qualified enough to be officers ready to work in their field using English, they were all considered eligible, and therefore they were selected exclusively for the study. The data were analyzed and interpreted to come up with a sound conclusion to see to what extent the thesis statement of the study and the results reached overlapped. T-test was used and the results were displayed in tables indicating the frequency each item of both comprehension questions and interpretations questions received. When the answers both of the groups gave to the comprehension questions were compared, it was observed that there was a statistically significant difference between the groups. However, when the answers both of the groups gave to the interpretation questions were compared, it was realized that there was a highly significant difference between the groups concerned. The differences that appeared indicated that the hypothesis of the thesis was correct and that semiotic reading approach was applicable to the reading of literary texts in EFL settings has been proven.

Increasing English Reading Comprehension Through Literary Text Extensive Reading Program

The research objective is to improve reading comprehension skills through an extensive program of reading literary texts. It used a mixed method. Research participants are 5th-semester students who receive extensive reading (2) courses in the 2020-2021 academic year at Universitas Bina Sarana Informatika Jakarta as many as 70 students. There are two data used in this study, namely 1) qualitative data taken using a questionnaire. Qualitative data were analyzed using transcribed and encoded, organized, categorized, and taking concluding. 2) Quantitative data were taken from the pre-test and post-test. The test data were analyzed using a t-test. The results of the study show that overall an extensive reading program with literary texts has an impact on improving English reading comprehension. Students also have a positive perception of the extensive reading program because they can build interest in reading and reading habits

Responsible Reading: Children’s Literature and Social Justice

In high accountability cultures, primary phase literacy education tends to focus on improving children’s test scores. Driven by each country’s performance in international league tables, this results in narrow, predominantly skills-based programmes designed to address attainment gaps. While scores may have been enhanced in recent years, there is little evidence that policy directives have positioned literacy in the lives of learners in ways that have become meaningful for them or been transferred into ways of thinking that promote social equity. Indeed, teaching practices that exacerbate the challenges for those young people who are already disadvantaged by circumstance have become more prevalent. Teachers, therefore, have an ethical responsibility to redress this through their teaching. This paper argues that literature is core to more equitable literacy development. As not all reading practices are equal, developing literacy education for a more socially just society needs to challenge the dominant pedagogic hegemony. Literature has the potential to spark the kind of mindful disruption necessary to shift standardised paradigms of thought, so literacy education should have children’s literature at its heart. By examining the value of literature through a set of complementary lenses, this paper seeks to reveal its affordances in young people’s lives. Then, through commentary taken from a pair of vignettes drawn from professional learning contexts, we illuminate shifts in teacher perception gained through scaffolded introduction to reading literary texts. The insights teachers gained reveal reconceptualisation of reading and the role of literature in primary education. This has the potential to redirect their future classroom practice. Consequently, we propose that for teachers to be adept at improving literacy outcomes through productive adoption and use of literary texts, they need: an aesthetic appreciation and knowledge of children’s literature; personal experience with reading such literature as social practice; and pedagogic insight into how to use literature to teach literacy and develop volitional readers. We call this knowledge set the additive trio, noting that no ‘step’ or understanding is sufficient on its own, and that together they can enable the development of Reading Teachers who work with literature to advance the social justice agenda.