‘Do androids dream of electric sheep?’ Isomorphic relations in reading science fiction

1992 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 79-99 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Stockwell

A principle of isomorphism is identified as a feature of the reception of texts in the reading process. Principally a mapping of elements or domains, this can be seen to underlie the textual features of explicit surface metaphors, implied metaphors, metaphoric readings of texts, perceived co-operation and coherence. The latter two levels are less obvious examples of isomorphic phenomena, and a model is adapted and developed to explain the pattern-matching involved in resolving meaning from a reading of a text. This resolution of meaning is seen as an effortful activity on the part of the reader, which is balanced against the likely pay-off in terms of satisfaction gained from the reading. The theoretical perspective of reader reception is supported by practical reader-response experiments on science fictional texts. The results of these are reported in terms of the isomorphic procedures already outlined. It is observed that the characteristics of readers determine readings as much as the characteristics of texts.

2017 ◽  
Vol 18 ◽  
pp. 69-97
Author(s):  
Meta Grosman

Entertainment and the process of reading are two spheres of human activity which have kept Professor Harding's interest for more than forty years. Time and again he would focus his attention on them: studying the nature of these activities, their relation to other human activities, their impact upon the individual and their role in society as a whole, and examining individual features of the reading process, analysing various misconceived notions about the nature and position of these activities in human life and investigating the possibilities of improving the capacity to respond to art at a more practiced level. In this way - approaching the problems of entertainment and reader response from different points of view and elaborating various details and aspects over several decades - his sustained efforts to penetrate into these activities have resul.ted in an important body of knowledge encompassing a far-reaching concept of entertainment and of reading built upon a well-balanced account of them as integral human activities, and of their wider social relevance.


1994 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 190-205
Author(s):  
Ingrid Rosa Kitzberger

AbstractThis paper presents three intertextual readings of John 13:1-20 and/or Luke 7:36-50, starting from a feminist hermeneutic. The focus is on reader response, i.e., on the reading-process as an experience, on the effects texts have on a reader (Stanley Fish), and on the response to the response—the reflection on the reading-process. Intertextuality as applied in this paper comprises two aspects: intertextuality as a relationship between written texts, activated by a reader, and intertextuality as a dialogue between written texts and the reader as text (referring to her/his life-experience). John 13:1-20 is read intertextually by a first reader who is female, critical and informed, i.e., a woman in the Johannine community who is familiar


2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 176-223
Author(s):  
Mohammed Ibrahim Elshafey

Khafāʾ al-maʿnā (‘obscurity of meaning’) is a distinctive characteristic of Qur’anic rhetoric that helps the Qur’an convey its intended message. It grips the attention of its readers, regardless of time or place, and should be considered an integral element of Qur’anic iʿjāz (‘inimitability’). This study divides khafāʾ al-maʿnā into three linguistic categories: lexical, morphologic, and syntactic, and these categories will be explored through three research questions and thirteen research points. The paper will examine reader response to the Qur’anic text found in various works of tafsīr from differing historical periods. The objective is not to assess the accuracy of the mufassirs’ interpretations, but to objectively explore the influence that khafāʾ al-maʿnā has on the reading process. This study uses the term ‘Qur’anic rhetoric’ in order to distinguish between ‘Qur’anic rhetoric’ and ‘Qur’anic text’. This differentiation is based on the idea that the meaning of the literal ‘textual’ verses of the Qur’an is clear, and does not involve any obscurity of meaning (and, moreover, the interpretation of these verses has been clarified by Muḥammad). However the ‘rhetorical’ verses invite the Qur’an’s readers, in their respective times and places, to read, contemplate, and reflect on them, and to attempt to uncover the hidden meanings that can be found by exploring their linguistic context.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lynne Tatlock ◽  
Matt Erlin ◽  
Douglas Knox ◽  
Stephen Pentecost

Readers are never merely passive recipients of textual messages. One of the most powerful insights of reader-response theory in the 1970s and 1980s is that the meaning of a text never resides entirely within the artifact itself. Commentators from Carlo Ginzberg ("aggressive originality"), to Jauss ("horizon of expectations"), to Fish ("interpretive communities"), and Radway ("Reading is not Eating") have long-since established that readers are creators of meaning. To quote Tony Bennett, meaning "is not a thing that texts can have, but is something that can only be produced, and always differently, within the reading formations that regulate the encounters between texts and readers." Yet even as it challenges the very idea that texts exist independently of readers and their institutional and social contexts, Bennett's concept of a "reading formation" also reminds us that there are socio-historically determined limits to creative appropriation. For Bennett, text, context, and reader constitute an inseparable unity; every reading situation is shaped by "discursive and intertextual determinations that organize and animate the practice of reading. . . ." A rich and nuanced account of the complex balance between social determination and autonomy therefore requires a combination of methods, both a consideration of textual features and investigation of book-historical, ideological, institutional, and social pressures.


2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alice Bell ◽  
Astrid Ensslin ◽  
Isabelle Van der Bom ◽  
Jen Smith

In this article, we profile an empirically grounded, cognitive approach to immersion in digital fiction by combining text-driven stylistic analysis with insights from theories of cognition and reader-response research. We offer a new analytical method for immersive features in digital fiction by developing deictic shift theory for the affordances of digital media. We also provide empirically substantiated insights to show how immersion is experienced cognitively by using Andy Campbell and Judi Alston’s (2015) digital fiction piece WALLPAPER as a case study. We add ‘interactional deixis’ and ‘audible deixis’ to Stockwell’s (2002) model to account for the multimodal nature of immersion in digital fiction. We also show how extra-textual features can contribute to immersion and thus propose that they should be accounted for when analysing immersion across media. We conclude that the analytical framework and reader response protocol that we develop here can be adapted for application to texts across media.


2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 3
Author(s):  
Karen Sue Patrick Knutsen

AbstractThis article addresses the metacognitive skills of pre-service ESL teachers in terms of their future role as reading teachers for intermediate and advanced pupils. Reading is a basic skill in all subjects in the Norwegian National Curriculum and involves engaging in texts, understanding, applying and reflecting on what is read – activities requiring higher level thinking. My research questions are: 1) How can “narrative transportation theory” (Gerrig, 1993) help pre-service ESL teachers understand the psychological reading process? and 2) How can insight into this theory motivate them to become better reading teachers, able to faciliate deep learning through literature? I use Julie Bertagna’s science fiction trilogy (Exodus 2002; Zenith 2007; Aurora 2011) to illustrate how narrative transportation works, highlighting the literary qualities that trigger pleasurable reading through immersion into the storyworld. This choice is based on Sections 1.5 and 2.5.3 in the new “Overarching section – values and principles for mandatory education” (2017) of the national curriculum, which instructs schools to teach pupils about their responsibility in contributing to an ecologically sustainable world order. The trilogy thematizes climate change and can affect behavior and attitudes toward this issue positively; it activates a wide spectrum of emotions, facilitating persuasion. Teachers must, however, remember that reading for pleasure is not enough; they must use metacognitve reading strategies in their teaching of literature to ensure deep learning and reach curricular goals.  Keywords: teenage literature, narrative transportation theory, metacogniton, metacognitive reading strategies, Julie Bertagna’s Exodus Trilogy, ecological sustainability, ESL, teaching readingÅ forstå psykologiske leseprosesser: Lærerstudenten som leselærer i engelskfagetSammendragDenne artikkelen handler om lærerstudenters metakognitive ferdigheter i sammenheng med leseundervisningen i engelskfaget. Lesing er en av de grunnleggende ferdighetene i alle fag i Kunnskapsløftet. Dette innebærer å være engasjert i, forstå, bruke og reflektere over det som leses, samt bruk av lesestrategier – dette krever metakognitiv tenkning. Forskningsspørsmålene er: 1) Hvordan kan “narrativ transport-teori” (Gerrig, 1993) hjelpe lærerstudenter i engelskfaget til å forstå den psykologiske leseprosessen? og 2) Hvordan kan kunnskap om denne teorien motivere dem til å utvikle seg som lærere i lesing, med evnen til å fostre dybdelæring gjennom litteratur? Jeg bruker Julie Bretagnas ungdomstrilogi i sjangeren science-fiction (Exodus 2002; Zenith 2007; Aurora 2011), for å illustrere hvordan narrativ transport fungerer, og belyser litterære kvaliteter som setter det i gang. Valget baseres hovedsakelig på Overordnet del av læreplanen (2017) som omtaler “Respekt for naturen og miljøbevissthet” (1.5) og “Bærekraftig utvikling” (2.5.3), der skolen får i oppdrag å lære elever om ansvaret de har for å skape en økologisk bærekraftig utvikling. Trilogien tematiserer klimaendringer og kan påvirke leserens atferd og holdninger. Fortellingen kan igangsette mange følelser, som igjen kan forsterke eller endre leserens overbevisning. Men lærere må huske at lesing som underholdning ikke er nok; de må ta i bruk metakognitive lesestrategier i sin undervisning for å sikre dybdelæring og oppnå læreplanmålene.Nøkkelord: ungdomslitteratur, narrativ transport-teori, metakognisjon, metakognitive lesestrategier, Julie Bertagnas Exodus Trilogy, bærekraftig utvikling, engelsk som annet språk, leseundervisning


LETRAS ◽  
2013 ◽  
pp. 13-30
Author(s):  
Alejandra Giangiulio Lobo

Se estudia la teoría de la recepción a partir de diferentes autores y críticos literarios, para caracterizar los distintos tipos de lectores, según cada aproximación y los procesos de lectura y creación de significado. El ensayo se centra en el enfoque fenomenológico de Wolfgang Iser sobre la recepción del lector, la generación de significado y los tipos de lectores. Reader-response theory is studied from the perspective of different authors and literary critics to characterize the different types of readers, according to each approach, the reading process and the creation of meaning. The essay centers on Wolfgang Iser’s phenomenological approach to reader response, creation of meaning and types of readers.    


2020 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 332-347
Author(s):  
Susanna Soosaar

The importance of the reading experience has been accepted in literary studies ever since the advent of reading-response theories in the 1970s-1980s. Several notable scholars have stressed that meaning is created through the interaction between reader and text, highlighting the significance of the reader. Even though the main principles of reader-response have become commonplace, for some time, reading theories remained relatively stagnant. In the 2000s, however, the topic of reading was rediscovered as new perspectives for examining the reading experience and the reader’s relationship with the text were offered. These new theories shed new light on the figure of the reader and on the work that goes into the process of reading. While the question of the experience of reading has been under discussion in the Anglo-American context, it has never been widely discussed in Estonia. The purpose of this article is to give an overview of well-known reader-response theories that became popular in the 1970s. In addition, examples of a renewed interest in reader-response theories in recent decades are presented. Finally, the article will also examine how Estonian-language literary criticism has engaged with reader-response theories.


2009 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 509-526 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timo Järvilehto ◽  
Veli-Matti Nurkkala ◽  
Kyösti Koskela

The paper introduces measurement of fixation-speech intervals (FSI) as an important tool for the study of the reading process. Using the theory of the organism-environment system (Järvilehto 1998a), we developed experiments to investigate the time course of reading. By combining eye tracking with synchronous recording of speech during reading in a single measure, we issue a fundamental challenge to information processing models. Not only is FSI an authentic measure of the reading process, but it shows that we exploit verbal patterns, textual features and, less directly, reading experience. Reading, we conclude, is not a matter of decoding linguistic information. Far from being a text-driven process, it depends on integrating both sensory and motor processes in an anticipatory meaning generation based on the history of experience and cultural context of the reader. Finally, we conclude with remarks on the social character and cognitive history of reading.


1988 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-126 ◽  
Author(s):  
J Duncan ◽  
N Duncan

Insights from literary theory are applied to the analysis of landscapes. It is suggested that the concepts of textuality, intertextuality, and reader reception may be of importance to those interested in the notion that landscapes are read in much the same way as literary texts. It is further suggested that landscapes can be seen as texts which are transformations of ideologies into a concrete form. This is an important way in which ideologies become naturalized. What is lacking in the radically relativistic theoretical perspective of much of twentieth-century literary theory, however, is a consideration of the sociohistorical and political processes through which meaning is produced and transformed. Examples of the relation between texts and landscapes from several different types of societies are then offered.


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