Contextual Reading Research Articles

Hamlet and the People “Who Know Things”

Is Shakespeare universal? Is Hamlet a “strong” text that generates the same interpretation across cultural space and time, or is it a malleable text whose meaning is contingent upon variables in the encounter between text and reader and the contexts of reading? These were the kinds of questions that my students and I addressed in several courses I taught on Shakespeare over the past four years. As one might expect, our answers differed. Here, I develop and refine the argument I made and, sometimes, made incoherently: universality, whether in a writer, a text, or in criticism “is neither natural nor self-evident.” Because part of my reason for turning to Shakespeare was my dissatisfaction with contrapuntal reading as a pedagogical strategy for cultivating a “critical understanding of imperialism” in students, I conclude that we can only achieve that goal if we deploy contrapuntal reading across the literary curriculum.

Who Reads Food Labels? Selected Predictors of Consumer Interest in Front-of-Package and Back-of-Package Labels during and after the Purchase.

The paper aims to identify selected predictors of food label use to extend our knowledge about consumer behavior related to food purchases. Two types of information were examined: front-of-package (FOP) and back-of-package (BOP), and two contexts of reading labels were distinguished: during shopping and at home. Various types of potential predictors were tested, including demographic (e.g., age, gender, household size, place of living), socioeconomic (e.g., education, professional activity, income), behavioral (e.g., purchasing certain types of products), and psychographic (e.g., importance attached to various types of information) criteria. The survey was conducted with the use of the CAWI (Computer-Assisted Web Interviews) methodology in a sample of 1051 Polish consumers. Quota sampling was applied based on sex, age, education, place of living (urban vs. rural), and region. Descriptive statistics, t-tests, ANOVAs, Pearson correlation coefficients, and multiple and retrograde step regressions were applied. In retrograde step regression models, only one predictor (self-rated knowledge about nutrition healthiness) turned out to be significant for all four measures of label reading. The remaining predictors were specific to selected measures of reading labels. The importance of the information about the content of fat and that about the health effects of consuming a food product were significant predictors of three types of food label use. This study confirms the necessity to investigate reading labels in fine-grained models, adapted to different types of labels and different contexts of reading. Our results show that demographic or socioeconomic variables are not significant predictors of reading food labels for a large group of Polish consumers.

Toward Relationally Engaging Confucian Texts as Contemporary Educational Resources

Normative notions that classical Chinese texts support authoritarian practices eclipse the possibility that the texts can become contemporary educational resources. Oriented by a conception of relationality, the research engages a Foucauldian approach to writing history as genealogy to argue that the political use of the so-called Confucian texts as content for imperial Chinese civil service examinations throughout much of the last two millennia situated the texts as objects and subjects of power. More specifically, the conflation of the philosophical texts with the exam process produced an extreme context enhanced by a public’s desire for success. This context shaped the conditions of textual engagement and contributed to reductive normative textual interpretations, which had broader social implications. However, if reading contexts influence textual meaning, then changes in contexts impact interpretations of these texts. This perspective suggests that educators of varied disciplines who directly engage the texts contribute to the ongoing construction of textual meanings, providing provocative frameworks to consider contemporary phenomena.

‘Daylight upon magic’: Stained Glass and the Victorian Monarchy

This article presents stained glass as an important source of material evidence for attitudes to monarchy in Victorian Britain. It argues that expressions of veneration for Victoria by different religious constituencies were not merely instinctual and affective but considered and erudite. The ways in which different Anglican constituencies in particular marked key moments in Victoria’s reign within their churches made her person and throne a symbol for their ecclesiastical visions. The article supports its argument by offering a close, contextual reading of one such memorial, Charles Eamer Kempe’s Diamond Jubilee window (1898) in St Saviour’s, Southwark. Although nominally intended as a memorial to the long dead Prince Albert, it made only oblique reference to him. Instead, the window’s patron and the church’s rector William Thompson described the four figures depicted in its lights — Pope Gregory, King Ethelbert, Stephen Langton, and William of Wykeham — as ‘illustrating the union of <i>Church and State</i>’. Its message that the national Church had always been the indivisible ally of godly monarchs since the dawn of English history was the more powerful when read against Kempe and Thompson’s broader scheme for the redecoration of the restored St Saviour’s. Together they created a series of windows which not only interwove the English monarchy with the cosmic salvation narrative of Christianity but represented the church as a benevolent and inclusive patron of eminent writers, thinkers, and philanthropists in Southwark.

Evidential remains

This article utilises the theoretical perspectives of the forensic turn to further expand our historical understandings and interpretations of the events of the Holocaust. More specifically, it applies a theory of the materialities of dead bodies to historically reconstruct and reinterpret the death march from Buchenwald to Dachau from 7 to 28 April 1945. It focuses on dead bodies as ‘evidence’, but explores how the evidential meanings of corpses along the death-march route evolved and changed during the march itself and in the aftermath of discovery by approaching American military forces. While drawing on theories of the evidential use of dead bodies, it remains firmly grounded in empirical historical research based on archival sources. The archives at the Buchenwald Concentration Camp contain eyewitness accounts and post-war trial testimony that enable a deeply contextualised ‘microhistory’ of the geography, movements, perpetrators, victims and events along this specific death march in April and May 1945. This ‘thick description’ provides the necessary context for a theoretical reading of the changing evidential meanings of dead bodies as the death march wove its way from Buchenwald to Dachau and the war and the Holocaust drew to an end.

Contextualization Models for Community College Reading and Study Strategies: An Integrative Literature Review

ABSTRACT In recent years, contextualization has emerged as a buzzword in higher education, and, in community college developmental education contexts in particular. However, it is important to note that contextualization is more than an innovation that is specific to the current developmental education reform movement, as iterations of this concept abound. In this manuscript, we provide an in-depth analysis of the current movement toward contextualization as it has evolved over many years in college reading and study strategy contexts. We begin by providing an overview of the historical background on the construct, as well as contemporary conceptualizations of what is now referred to as contextualization. Next, we describe an extensive integrative literature review on the topic of contextualization of college reading and study strategies, including the results of that review. We close with possible contributions of this review for higher education professionals designing contextualized learning environments.

Seek the shalom of the city

This article is a missiological response to the migration and homelessness challenges, especially issues of socio-economic and political marginalisation, as experienced by foreign nationals in the City of Tshwane. The most pressing question which this article seeks to investigate is: “What action can faith communities in diaspora take to contribute towards the regeneration of their host city?” Using literature study and a contextual Bible reading of Jeremiah 29:1–7 from the lenses of both trained and ordinary readers, this article encourages faith communities in diaspora to activelyparticipate in seeking the shalom and well-being of their host city by praying and working towards urban renewal.

Adjustment of Early Aged Children with Language Disorder

The purpose of this literature review is to describe the adjustment of early aged children with language disorder. Through the ProQuest and EBSCO electronic databases with publication dates between October 2009 and October 2019, 4 relevant articles were obtained. Based on the results of the analysis, it was found that early childhood with language disorder has an unfavorable adjustment which is characterized by the presence of several problems related to adjustment, namely the discovery of behavioral and learning problems, difficult temperaments and self regulation problems. Gender and mother's education level is one of the factors that can influence language development in children. Systematic instruction using feedback can be used to teach early childhood academic and social skills with language disorder in small group settings. Book reading context is found to be able to develop vocabulary. In addition, toy play was found to produce a more balanced speech ratio than reading books. Various problems related to adjustment are experienced by early aged children with language disorders. External or environmental factors are expected to provide support for children to achieve good adjustment, especially in young children who have language disorders.

Textual and reader factors in narrative empathy: An empirical reader response study using focus groups

This article contributes new insights into the interplay between textual and reader factors in experiences of narrative empathy, or empathy with characters in narrative. It adds to the rather scarce empirical evidence on the relationships between textual devices and readers’ (non-)empathetic responses to characters. This empirical study involved stylistic-narratological analysis of short stories by Eduardo Galeano and thematic analysis of focus group discussions. The study considers empathy in relation to victims and perpetrators in narratives of persecution and torture. Methodologically, the article emphasises the value of a qualitative approach to collecting and analysing readers’ responses that is half way between naturalistic and experimental orientations. The main findings, which revolve around the interaction between certain narrative techniques and readers’ moral evaluation of characters, challenge some theoretical claims from the scholarly literature about textual effects on readers’ empathy. In so doing, the article considers empathy as a highly flexible and context-dependent phenomenon, and suggests the need for a nuanced approach that accommodates the complex interaction between textual and reader factors in the reading context. The discussion spells out the broader implications of the study for stylistic research on the role of language in bringing about effects in readers and also for narrative empathy research. These implications will be of interest to scholars conducting reception studies or reader response research in the neighbouring fields of empirical stylistics, empirical narratology, and empirical literary studies.

Exploring the Effects of Globalization on Silk Weaving Tradition of Bishnupur Region in West Bengal, India

Over the years, increasing concerns among the scholars incline to see the adverse effects of globalization. One of the major reasons for this ever-increasing concern is the gradual infiltration of market-driven production system and global capitalism among different groups of people who earn their living either as wage laborers or artisans. This effect has been most profoundly noted among those whose place is on the fringe of the national economy. Another main reason is that the states are increasingly losing their capacity to govern and to regulate in this increasingly borderless world, where resourceless artisans have become the worst sufferers both in the cultural and economic frontiers. This article attempts to examine the effect that the process of globalization has made among the silk weavers of Bishnupur region in West Bengal, India. It adopts a transformational approach and uses both contextual reading and ethnographic data collected through firsthand fieldwork among the aforesaid community. The ethnography describes the messy and unquantifiable relationship between local actors and the international process.

Proverbs 31:10–31: A contextual reading

Proverbs 31:10–31: A contextual reading

A hermeneutics of scientific practices and the concept of “text”

This paper discusses a version of the hermeneutic philosophy of science. Special focus is placed on the ways of reading theoretical objects in scientific inquiry. In implementing readable technologies, this reading succeeds in contextually visualizing the theoretical objects by means of various sorts of signs. A configuration of readable technology accomplishes a further step. The configuration textualizes the contextually produced signs. Textualizing the reading of theoretical objects interlaces the meaningful articulation and objectification of scientific domains. The horizon of possibilities for textualizing is constantly shifting in the process of normal-scientific inquiry, and the shifting horizon plays the role of a hermeneutic fore-structuring of the outcomes of textualizing. The paper explores the importance of “material hermeneutics” for the contextual reading of theoretical objects. The conclusion is drawn that the hermeneutic study of the entanglement of technological artifacts with the outcomes from reading-as-textualizing requires the introduction of ontic-ontological difference.

The Types of Publications Read by Finnish Scholars Vary with Their Purposes for Reading

A Review of:&#x0D; Late, E., Tenopir, C., Talja, S., &amp; Christian, L. (2019). Reading practices in scholarly work: From articles and books to blogs. Journal of Documentation, 75(3), 478-499. https://doi.org/10.1108/JD-11-2018-0178&#x0D; Abstract&#x0D; Objective – To closely examine the role of reading in scholarly work, with particular attention to the relationships between reading practices and characteristics of the scholars, the types of publications they read, and the context of reading.&#x0D; Design – Survey.&#x0D; Setting – Universities in Finland.&#x0D; Subjects – 528 academics (research directors/managers, professors, post doctoral researchers, doctoral students, lecturers, and researchers).&#x0D; Methods – An online survey was distributed in Finland, October-December 2016. The first part of the survey asked about scholars’ general reading practices; the second part asked about their most recent reading of two particular publications, one a journal article and the other a different publication type. In relation to these two readings, the scholars provided information about the documents read, the reading process and context, how the document was identified and obtained, and the effect of the reading on their work.&#x0D; Main Results – On average, the scholars read 59 publications per month: 20 journal articles, 3 books, 5 conference proceedings or research reports, 17 newspaper articles, 9 magazine articles, 4 blogs, and 2 non-fiction/fiction books. There was no statistically significant difference in the number of journal articles read across disciplines, but the number of books read was highest in the humanities and social sciences and lowest in the sciences and medical sciences. Frequency of reading of particular publication types also varied by work focus (research vs. teaching/administrative) and by the nature of the scholar’s research (basic vs. applied).&#x0D; The scholars were also asked about the importance of reading different publication types. Overall, scholarly journals and article compilations were rated as most important for scholarly reading. Differences in these ratings were found across disciplines, work focus, nature of the research, and scholar rank/status.&#x0D; Part 2 of the survey focused on the most recent items read by the scholars. Their reading of journal articles, scholarly books, and conference proceedings/research reports was mainly for the purpose of research and writing. Their reading of newspaper articles, magazine articles, and blogs was mainly for current awareness and continuing education. Their reading of non-fiction/fiction books was mainly for their personal interest or pleasure. None of these publication types was specifically focused on supporting the scholars’ teaching.&#x0D; Over 70 percent of the recent readings were new, rather than re-readings. Across all publication types, the scholars read at least parts of the item “with great care”. Almost half of the journal articles recently read have been or will be cited in the future; this proportion was also high for scholarly books and conference proceedings/research reports, but not for the other publication types.&#x0D; The most recently read journal articles were brought to the scholar’s attention primarily through searching; they became aware of scholarly books and conference proceedings/research reports through both searching and because another person told them about the item. Scholars mainly obtained journal articles and scholarly books from their libraries, but they also obtained articles on the Internet and scholarly books from another person.&#x0D; Forty percent of the scholars read journal articles by printing a downloaded copy, but over half read them on a computer, mobile phone, or e-reader. Over half of the scholarly books were read from published/printed copy, but 18% read the book in an electronic version. Most reading occured in the scholar’s office or lab.&#x0D; Over half the journal articles and conference proceedings/research reports read were published within the last year; just under half the scholarly books read were published within the last year. While these scholars worked in Finland, 91% of the journal articles and 73% of the scholarly books they read were published in English.&#x0D; Conclusion – The results from this study confirmed and extended findings from previous studies (e.g., Tenopir et al., 2010, 2015). They demonstrated that scholars read a variety of types of publications for a variety of purposes. However, journal articles still dominated the reading and the perceptions of importance among the various publication types, particularly for the purposes of research and writing. This paper provides a first look at scholars’ uses of the other publication types and the influence of work tasks on reading practices; further research is needed to understand these relationships more fully. In general, the disciplinary differences in reading practices found in this study mirror the different publishing practices of the disciplines and so may be affected by future evolution toward open access and social media use for scholarly communication.

Authorial Self-Fashioning in a Global Era

Abstract The authorial preface to works of fiction provides a unique space for exploration of authorial self-fashioning and author-reader mediation. This article argues that, when works of fiction are translated and new prefaces written for a new readership, these prefaces can provide extra insights into the perceptions, expectations, and constrictions of both producing and consuming literature in a global era. Recent debates on world literature have centered mainly on issues of reception and circulation, preferring to define its scope in terms of the reader and the reading context rather than by the author or production process. This study considers the changing role of authors who consciously attempt to locate themselves within this contested and reconfigured field and how they construct a persona to address a newly defined world readership. This article explores the changes throughout the twentieth century by analyzing a selection of authorial prefaces to translated editions of three influential authors: Lu Xun 魯迅 (1881–1936), Ba Jin 巴金 (1906–2005), and Yu Hua 余華 (1960–). All prolific preface writers, they each have, in different ways, in different periods, engaged with the concept of a global literary readership and marketplace and negotiated their respective places within it.

Situated incidental vocabulary acquisition: The effects of in-class and out-of-class novel reading

Abstract Researchers investigating the incidental acquisition of vocabulary through reading have often required participants to read in controlled classroom or lab environments. This method delimits reading to short texts read in one sitting and fashions an anomalous reading context (i. e. not mimicking ecologically valid extensive reading situations). To investigate whether the physical reading context affects incidental vocabulary acquisition, an empirical study was conducted with two groups of participants that read the same 36,711-token novel containing 49 target words – in-class readers (n = 48) and out-of-class readers (n = 32). Results showed reading context has a large effect on vocabulary recall and a medium effect on vocabulary recognition. Medium correlations were found between incidental acquisition and reading context as well as second language (L2) vocabulary size. Two standard three-explanatory-variable (L2 vocabulary size, reading context, reading time) multiple regressions accounted for 40% of the variance in vocabulary recall and 44.5% of the variance in vocabulary recognition. Nuanced distinctions between in-class and out-of-class readers were uncovered by analyzing responses to open-ended reflective questionnaire items about the study, novel, target vocabulary, and vocabulary learning strategies. A lens of criticality was used to discuss the findings in terms of their pedagogical and methodological implications.

Investigating metacognitive knowledge in reading comprehension: The case of Indonesian undergraduate students

Myriad studies have conveyed that metacognition is a key to successful reading comprehension in language classes. However, these studies focus on metacognitive strategies, metacognitive awareness, and metacognitive skills in ESL reading contexts. Anchored by the lack of empirical works on the EFL reading situation, this study investigated the metacognitive knowledge of Indonesian undergraduate students in their reading classes. Data were obtained through in-depth interviews with four successful and four less successful EFL students. The results of this study portrayed that successful readers encompass more metacognitive knowledge, awareness, motivation, and behavior if compared to the less successful readers. It is also evidence that students with good cognition, habit, and attitude in reading activities are more successful in their EFL reading, and their cognition, habit, and attitude serve as essential elements in constructing their metacognitive knowledge. Suggestions are also discussed at the end of this paper.

Symmetries and asymmetries in children’s peer-group reading discussions

This paper reports a research project exploring children’s peer interactions in group reading discussions where a teacher was not present as an authoritative guide. This context reflects a reality of classroom teaching where most children in the class are completing tasks independently while the teacher is working other groups. In the study, four quartets of ten year-old children in the UK and Mexico were recorded as they discussed different texts together and this paper reports the findings from their engagement with The Lost Thing by Shaun Tan. In the paper, we focus on the symmetries and asymmetries apparent in the children’s peer talk to consider how they engage together to make meaning from the text they are reading. To this end we focus on two strands of analysis related to children’s talk within their groups: (a) the function of utterances within their speech turns; and (b) the dynamics of the interaction, that is, the organisation of the talk into topical episodes. By considering these two strands of analysis, we are able to illuminate the nuances of a/symmetries in small-group reading contexts as we concentrate on how the children use language and action to influence the direction of, and contribute to, the discussions. The results find children authoritatively shifted the discussion forward into new topics using different means, and displayed evidence of high-level comprehension as they engaged with the ideas of each other. The two strands of analysis complemented each other as they illustrated not only the resources the children drew on to shift the movement of the discussion, but how their language enabled this movement forward. The results also highlighted differences in how the children perceived their goals and responsibilities within the task and groups.

定番教材（学習材）を繫ぐ古典教育（学習）:――平安時代の文学作品を例として――

定番教材（学習材）を繫ぐ古典教育（学習）:――平安時代の文学作品を例として――

Examining Parameter Invariance in a General Diagnostic Classification Model.

The present study aimed at investigating invariance of a diagnostic classification model (DCM) for reading comprehension across gender. In contrast to models with continuous traits, diagnostic classification models inform mastery of a finite set of latent attributes, e.g., vocabulary or syntax in the reading context, and allow to provide fine grained feedback to learners and instructors. The generalized deterministic, noisy “and” gate (G-DINA) model was fit to item responses of 1000 male and female individuals to a high-stakes reading comprehension test. Use of the G-DINA model allowed for minimal assumption on the relationship of latent attribute profiles and item-specific response probabilities, i.e., the G-DINA model can represent compensatory or non-compensatory relationships of latent attributes and response probabilities. Item parameters were compared across the two samples, and only a small number of item parameters were statistically different between the two groups, corroborating the result of a formal measurement invariance test based on the multigroup G-DINA model. Neither correlations between latent attributes were significantly different across the two groups, nor mastery probabilities for any of the attributes. Model selection at item level showed that from among the 18 items that required multiple attributes, 16 items picked different rules (DCMs) across the groups. While this seems to suggest that the relationship among the attributes of reading comprehension differs across the two groups, a closer inspection of the rules picked by the items showed that almost in all cases the relationships were very similar. If a compensatory DCM was suggested by the G-DINA framework for an item in the female group, a model belonging to the same family resulted for the male group.

Approaches to Teaching the Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson ed. by Mark C. Long and Sean Ross Meehan

Reviewed by: Approaches to Teaching the Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson ed. by Mark C. Long and Sean Ross Meehan Shira Wolosky Approaches to Teaching the Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, ed. Mark C. Long and Sean Ross Meehan. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, 2018. 233 pp. This volume is, as might be expected, as much about teaching as it is about Emerson—which is to say, about teaching the humanities today under what emerges as more or less severe pressure. Almost every essay opens with remarks on how difficult it is to teach Emerson, how difficult to entice or seduce students, who have other priorities, to read and engage with him at all. It is a portrait of the academy today, valiantly attempting to uphold its commitment to liberal arts. One of the claims that emerges repeatedly throughout the volume is that liberal arts are closely tied to or embodied in Emerson himself. If one is going out to battle for creative individuality, Emerson is one's sword. In a sense, the very notion of creative individuality was invented by Emerson, at least on the American scene—although a persistent effort repeatedly through the volume is to show that Emerson is not just American, not just "provincial" or New Englandy, but "transnational," globalizable, post-colonial, as well as gender- and diversity-friendly. These are the flags in the battle to make Emerson "relevant" to today's students with other, better, more pressing business to do—just as Emerson himself warned, witnessing as he did the opening salvos of American industrial, commercial materialism that he again and again targets with his scorn and warning. Many essays include pedagogical strategies, and are often invitingly suggestive of techniques one may use for teaching Emerson and other writers. The portrait of the academy as a teaching scene becomes a portrait of the classroom as constituted today, where diversity, gender transformation, challenges to what had been the traditional American self-narrative, but again, above all, economic frameworks and pressures seem to define the educational spaces. Ironically, and this too was already part of Emerson's watch, that very economic drive is intrinsic to the American self-narrative of individualism, fulfilling rather than contesting it. It was Emerson's particular anxiety (with other of his contemporary writers, including Melville, Thoreau, Dickinson, and Whitman) how to invest in the individual without reducing him (that was the gender back then) to sheer self-interest. It remains a core American challenge, one acted out in social terms [End Page 355] of privatization of interest and in political terms in indifference or hostility to larger community claims. Rarely in this volume is this central contradiction of American individualism as itself a form of American material self-interest engaged. Most essays, pursuing their main topic of how to teach—that is, get students to read—Emerson, veer towards the panegyric and apologetics. That is actually fine. Through the very varied approaches to Emerson that the volume offers, many gripping sides of his personality and work come into visibility, through a range of teaching methods, classroom strategies, and contexts for reading. These include the use of the new Collected Emerson which makes available Emerson's less familiar, unpublished, and journal writings, although there are many references and specific discussions of classic essays as well: "American Scholar" (Andrew Kopec), "Divinity School Address" (Corinne E. Blackmer) "Self-Reliance" (Wesley T. Mott), "Circles" (Nels Anchor Christensen), "Nature" (Michael P. Branch), and "Experience" (Branka Arsić). Several contributors (Ronald A. Bosco, Amy Ear-hart) discuss how these new textual studies help with access to Emerson's published essays, which are described in almost every essay as difficult, formally omitting the links between aphorisms first recorded in the journals and then lifted out into the lapidary self-citations that compose Emerson's essays. Turning to the journals is a repeatedly proposed teaching strategy, not only to see the contexts of Emerson's aphorisms but to show and to retheorize his writing as process, as acts of thinking, as fluid and exploratory and always in tension with any finished or fixed definition. This makes Emerson very contemporary and, indeed, is one of the powerful aspects...