The English Subject Centre has set up a number of innovative projects to enhance the subject. These include work to monitor and broaden the ‘English’ curriculum, to foster widening participation, to promote literacy, to spread good practice in creative writing courses, and to develop effective virtual learning environments. We want to add another topic to this list — one which takes us back to some very basic questions about the subject, the teaching environment, and the unwritten assumptions which circulate between students and lecturers.
What do students of English read? What do they read ‘for pleasure’, and what do they expect to read as part of an English degree? This is partly a question about the types — the genres, authors, subject matters — of reading, but it is also, to put it crudely, a question of how much.
Anecdotal evidence from colleagues across a range of institutions (new universities and old) suggests that a significant number of students are reading less (fewer texts, shorter texts, less demanding texts) than we might expect, and less than they may need to participate fully and to succeed — in the broadest sense — in higher education. We start from the premise that this issue has been exercising teachers in the field for some time. It raises a number of questions and speculations which we hope to pursue with colleagues through the English Subject Centre. How important is reading to the undergraduate study of English? Should its function and centrality be newly and explicitly stated? Do we need to redefine and defend the importance of reading, as such, in the course of an English degree? Is the ability and inclination to read an attribute which we have taken for granted till now, and is it necessary to support and/or monitor it?
If ‘resistance to reading’ turns out to be an issue of subject-specific concern, then other questions follow. Is it the case, as some anecdotal evidence suggests, that students in other fields (History, Women’s Studies, for example) view reading as a primary means of gaining information and thus accept the demands of time and effort which it requires? Why do a number of students in the ‘English’ degree express concern over the reading requirements of their courses? Is it the role of lecturers to make clear at an early stage the amount, the type, and above all, the purpose of reading? Do we need to make our expectations and commitments more clear?
Have changes in GCSE and A/S Level courses influenced students’ habits and expectations as regards reading? Are ‘widening participation’ strategies an issue here, in terms of the need for renewed clarity in setting down our assumptions? What effects might modularisation have had on students’ reading practices? Some colleagues suggest that students who take specialist options are, in general, more committed in their reading, and more successful in terms of assessed outcomes. Does this offer a way forward, or is it capitulation to the market?
Our project does not represent the ‘Angry of Tunbridge Wells’ school of enquiry. It is not premised on assumptions about ‘the youth of today’. Indeed, it recognises that if there is found to be a falling-off in some students’ commitment to reading in higher education, this may not mean that they read less, but, for example, that they may be reading different things. Are our interests as academics in the field of literature diverging from those which students bring to the dialogue? Should we be offering more creative choices and agendas here?
Certainly, there is an argument that, to an as yet undefined extent, reading habits and expectations are shifting in our field. Our aim would be to evaluate this argument constructively, initially by sharing experiences through the English Subject Centre’s interactive messageboard on its website: http://www.english.ltsn.ac.uk/discussion/index.htm. We would like to invite contributions from colleagues setting out their views on the reading habits of students, and on the factors which encourage and inhibit reading. We would also hope to start a discussion on successful strategies which colleagues may have used in this area.
