Reading Across Worlds: Transnational Book Groups and the Reception of Difference

by J. Procter, B. Benwell

Overview

Combining sustained empirical analysis of reading group conversations with four case studies of classic and contemporary novels: Things Fall Apart, White Teeth, Brick Lane and Small Island, this book pursues what can be gained through a comparative approach to reading and readerships.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781349446650
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan UK
Publication date:	01/01/2015
Series:	New Directions in Book History
Edition description:	1st ed. 2015
Pages:	274
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

About the Author

James Procter is a Reader in the School of English at Newcastle University, UK. His publications include Writing Black Britain (2000), Dwelling Places (2003), Stuart Hall (2004), and (with Benwell and Robinson) co-editor of Postcolonial Audiences (2012).

Bethan Benwell is a Senior Lecturer in the Division of Literature and Languages at the University of Stirling, UK. She has published widely on discursive approaches to identity, including those of readers. Her publications include Masculinity and Men's Lifestyle Magazines (2003) and (with Stokoe) Discourse and Identity (2006) and (with Procter and Robinson) co-editor of Postcolonial Audiences (2012).

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations Acknowledgements Transcription Key Notes on Book Groups 1. Introduction 2. Professional and Lay Readers 3. Remote Reading 4. Reading and Realism 5. Reading in the Literary Market Place 6. Reading as a Social Practice – Race Talk Appendices Endnotes Bibliography Index

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“Procter's talents as a postcolonial literary scholar combine with Benwell's as a discourse and conversation analyst to produce an interdisciplinary dream-team for a study of this type. ... a text that … brilliantly challenges and expands the field of postcolonial literary studies to include the perspectives of readers.” (Stephanie Newell, Yale University, USA)

“Among the thorniest challenges in the seething subject area of book history is how meaningfully to account for the mercurial act of reading. Who reads what, when, where and how, and what do they make of their reading? These questions are especially pertinent in today's world in which diverse texts by authors from a plethora of backgrounds encounter a multiplicity of readers, who may possess much - or very little - experience of the worlds being described. By concentrating on the vocal reactions to a swathe of post-colonial texts by participants in book clubs, Procter and Benwell by-pass the over-confident generalizations of the theorists, and present in their place a panorama of active and meaningful response. On the cusp of several sub-disciplines - response theory, post-colonial studies, cultural demography - the result is as exhilarating as it is revealing. Book history will never be quite the same again.” (Professor Robert Fraser, Open University, UK)

“What a good read! Or is that because I'm an academic reader? A book that crosses so many important boundaries, including lay and professional readers, readership across national, social and cultural boundaries, genres, and ethnicities. An exemplary interdisciplinary study especially for those in literary, postcolonial and discourse studies.” (Geoff Hall, Professor and Head of English, University of Nottingham, UK)

“This is an exemplary study of how discussion of books provides an opportunity for people to negotiate and articulate their own perspectives on class, race, and community. It shows categorically that empirical approaches to studying reading behaviour - assuming what readers say is self-evidently meaningful - are of limited use, and that the assumption that professional and non-professional readers behave significantly differently is to be seriously queried as well. It should be an essential resource for the study of reading practices.” (Sarah Brouillette, Carleton University, Canada)

Editorial Reviews

"Among the thorniest challenges in the seething subject area of book history is how meaningfully to account for the mercurial act of reading. Who reads what, when, where and how, and what do they make of their reading? These questions are especially pertinent in today's world in which diverse texts by authors from a plethora of backgrounds encounter a multiplicity of readers, who may possess much - or very little - experience of the worlds being described. By concentrating on the vocal reactions to a swathe of post-colonial texts by participants in book clubs, Procter and Benwell by-pass the over-confident generalizations of the theorists, and present in their place a panorama of active and meaningful response. On the cusp of several sub-disciplines - response theory, post-colonial studies, cultural demography - the result is as exhilarating as it is revealing. Book history will never be quite the same again." - Professor Robert Fraser, Open University, UK

"What a good read! Or is that because I'm an academic reader? A book that crosses so many important boundaries, including lay and professional readers, readership across national, social and cultural boundaries, genres, and ethnicities. An exemplary interdisciplinary study especially for those in literary, postcolonial and discourse studies." - Geoff Hall, Professor and Head of English, University of Nottingham, UK

"This is an exemplary study of how discussion of books provides an opportunity for people to negotiate and articulate their own perspectives on class, race, and community. It shows categorically that empirical approaches to studying reading behaviour - assuming what readers say is self-evidently meaningful - are of limited use, and that the assumption that professional and non-professional readers behave significantly differently is to be seriously queried as well. It should be an essential resource for the study of reading practices." - Sarah Brouillette, Carleton University, Canada

From the Publisher