READING AND RESPONSE

In recent years what is understood by the word "reading" has become increasingly complex. We now know far more about what is involved when someone reads. A reader is not at the mercy of a text, passively absorbing its surface and hidden values and messages, but is busily making significance through an active engagement with what is being read. The increasing use of the term "response" is a recognition of this interaction. Most of the contributors in this book support and investigate this vision of reader should be such a collusive process. For them, a text is something to be questioned, an opportunity for debate and "resistance" instead. The contributors brought together here mirror the main issues in this debate about the nature of reading and response. Occasionally divided in debate, they are united in their commitment to empowering young people through successful reading in a problematic world. Their work is not a matter of abstruse academic enquiry and theory: across the world, the stances that teachers adopt towards reading affect students of all ages, each and every day, in the classroom and beyond.