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[CCBC-Net] Hidden Adult/manipulation
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From: Perry Nodelman <perry_nodelman>
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 2009 11:22:31 -0500
On 21-Jul-09, at 7:44 AM, Kathy Johnson wrote:
> But isn't one of the beauties of reading that the reader creates
> their own version of the book, one that does not necessarily mesh
> with the writer's intention, or with any shadow text the book may
> contain?
On 21-Jul-09, at 8:41 AM, ellen mctyre wrote:
> Wordless books, pictures and storylines up for interpretation by
> both children as well as adults.
On 21-Jul-09, at 8:21 AM, Claudia Pearson wrote:
> But perhaps children, especially very young children, "read" books
> in ways
> we have forgotten as adults.
All true, of course. As I said, I'm more focussed on the readers and readings texts imply than on how they might actually be read by different individuals. Perhaps that makes me just a tad cynical about the extent to which most of us of any age actually do escape the intentions books or films have on us or have experiences vastly different from the ones authors hope we'll have. I'm not saying we all don't respond differently--we obviously do. But I'm suspecting that we tend to share more sense of what exactly it is we''re responding to than our current ideologies in favour of the freedom to read and understand as we want would imply. I.e.: everyone agrees Harry Potter is a boy wizard in a magical world like and unlike our own and having dark encounters with evil people and rewarding ones with good ones, etc., etc., etc., before they start arguing about whether it's inherently racist or not. Few people read it as a text about, say, an elephant losing it all on the stock market. And if the words do communicate so much of the same ideas to different people, then who's to say that ideologies and such aren't being conveyed widely, too? Especially when what we do so often share in our response is a sense of how events in fiction become meaningful enough to let us know we've experienced something we call a story.
Perry
_____________ Perry Nodelman http://pernodel.wordpress.com/
Book Trailers: The Hidden Adult: Defining Children's Literature http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3t7JAfPQeA The Ghosthunters2: The Curse of the Evening Eye http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qapDE1Kwnis The Ghosthunters I: The Proof that Ghosts Exist http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sw0ow7oQV7k
Received on Wed 22 Jul 2009 11:22:31 AM CDT
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 2009 11:22:31 -0500
On 21-Jul-09, at 7:44 AM, Kathy Johnson wrote:
> But isn't one of the beauties of reading that the reader creates
> their own version of the book, one that does not necessarily mesh
> with the writer's intention, or with any shadow text the book may
> contain?
On 21-Jul-09, at 8:41 AM, ellen mctyre wrote:
> Wordless books, pictures and storylines up for interpretation by
> both children as well as adults.
On 21-Jul-09, at 8:21 AM, Claudia Pearson wrote:
> But perhaps children, especially very young children, "read" books
> in ways
> we have forgotten as adults.
All true, of course. As I said, I'm more focussed on the readers and readings texts imply than on how they might actually be read by different individuals. Perhaps that makes me just a tad cynical about the extent to which most of us of any age actually do escape the intentions books or films have on us or have experiences vastly different from the ones authors hope we'll have. I'm not saying we all don't respond differently--we obviously do. But I'm suspecting that we tend to share more sense of what exactly it is we''re responding to than our current ideologies in favour of the freedom to read and understand as we want would imply. I.e.: everyone agrees Harry Potter is a boy wizard in a magical world like and unlike our own and having dark encounters with evil people and rewarding ones with good ones, etc., etc., etc., before they start arguing about whether it's inherently racist or not. Few people read it as a text about, say, an elephant losing it all on the stock market. And if the words do communicate so much of the same ideas to different people, then who's to say that ideologies and such aren't being conveyed widely, too? Especially when what we do so often share in our response is a sense of how events in fiction become meaningful enough to let us know we've experienced something we call a story.
Perry
_____________ Perry Nodelman http://pernodel.wordpress.com/
Book Trailers: The Hidden Adult: Defining Children's Literature http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3t7JAfPQeA The Ghosthunters2: The Curse of the Evening Eye http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qapDE1Kwnis The Ghosthunters I: The Proof that Ghosts Exist http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sw0ow7oQV7k
Received on Wed 22 Jul 2009 11:22:31 AM CDT
