I am a former teacher, and part of what disgusted and disappointed me about the job was the students' lack of interest in reading. Nearly all of the students acted as though reading a book was torture, or a waste of their precious time. Granted, schools probably contribute to this reading reluctance by forcing reading on children before they're ready or developmentally capable.

I remember trying so hard to entice my students with words and enchant them with outstanding stories by reading aloud to them, only to have one or two actually listen and get into the tale.

Granted, the students with parents who read to them in their early childhood years had a leg up on appreciating books and reading, but the ones raised totally on TV and electronics couldn't seem to muster up any interest or enthusiasm for reading, saying it was "boring."

I believe this waning interest in books and reading is another symptom of our society's preoccupation with technology and immediate entertainment, as well as quick results and delivery. All these things meant to make life easier and more streamlined have actually contributed to peoples' impatience and disdain for anything traditional. It's like we're losing our touch with humanity, as well as our appreciation for the simple pleasures in life.

Reading is a basic form of human communication. How do we interact, as a society, when we lose our ability and our desire to sit down and read?

Sent by Beth Mason | 11:59 AM ET | 11-19-2007

But one has to really think about how reading is defined. Just because people - adults and teens - aren't reading books doesn't mean they aren't reading and that they aren't reading for pleasure. For example, for many teens reading about how to better their scores in online games is reading for pleasure. For many others reading fanfiction on the web is reading for pleasure. 13-year-olds can't spend an hour of their waking hours without reading. They read blogs, wikis, web pages, YouTube pages, text messages, and more.

We have to re-define what we consider reading in order to perform high-quality and adequate research.

Sent by Linda W. Braun | 12:09 PM ET | 11-19-2007

I don't is right to generalize, but from what I see is that Americans have no interest on what goes on in the world. They do not read the foreign papers( in English version). I think this is one of the reasons they choose such a stupid/ignorant President.
All they care is text messaging, talking on the cell phone, watching beauty contests.
A very vain society with very little interests.
And then you have this country with very little knowledge- interfering in the politics and lives of other countries.

Sent by Kozi | 1:20 PM ET | 11-19-2007

One of the best gifts my parents gave to me as a child was a passion for reading. Because of that passion, my love for books has become my job: an online bookseller.
I feel sorry for those young people who refuse to read, stating that it is "boring". How can anyone claim that reading would be boring? Is it because books do not have special effects, ready to dazzle your senses? Or, could it be because it actually requires thought?
What a waste of youth.

Sent by Kimberly Richardson | 3:00 PM ET | 11-19-2007

In response to the last sentence, "People who read... 'are more likely to exercise, visit art museums, keep up with current events, vote in presidential elections and perform volunteer work,'" I think thats more of a correlation than causation, but a good point either way. I also agree with the previous posts, especially Linda's. I spend a few hours everyday reading blogs and online articles about current events. I rarely get news from TV, and when i do, I almost always already read about it online. I'd like to think that counts toward my reading.

As for encouraging children to read more, i believe this falls on the shoulders of parents. As was said by Beth, children whose parents read to them appreciate books more. In my opinion, parents are not doing enough these days, and not just with reading to their kids.

Sent by Bryan | 3:10 PM ET | 11-19-2007

I spend my working day reading federal acquisition regulations and the Defense version, requests for proposals, statements of work and other deathless prose. When I can read for pleasure, I can feel my mind relaxing, like it's uncoiling on a featherbed. And Kozi, please don't judge all of us by some of us, and I won't judge your society by your imperfect English and snotty attitude so like the Americans you deplore.

Sent by CJ | 3:40 PM ET | 11-19-2007

25 years ago at age 30 I started notebooks with the title, author and a brief review of every book I read. I have just compiled the list onto a spread sheet so I can search for a title or author. I have read 603 books in that time and only wish I had started my notebooks in my teens. Most of my friends are incredulous. It's interesting to look back and see how my tastes in reading have changed.

Sent by Amanda Marie | 3:48 PM ET | 11-19-2007

I'll hazard a guess that this correlates nicely with the demise of the school librarian, especially at the elementary level. Parents can only do so much and the schools have the captive audience. Here in CA, school librarians used to make such a difference in 'the joy of reading.' School librarians are becoming scarce.

Sent by Linda Matchette | 5:02 PM ET | 11-19-2007

While reading for pleasure has been shown to have a high correlation with performance this report ignored one major reality.

The Internet has become the dominant text in the lives of youth today. Defining reading for pleasure as only involving a book is a fallacy and causes issue in how these finding can be generalized to today's youth.

In fact according to the Kaiser Family Foundation more students spend time reading online than they do offline. Furthermore, according to the PEW foundation 70% of students turn to the Internet as the primary source of information. Therefore not including the Internet into the definition "of reading for pleasure" calls into doubt many findings of the study.

Another consequence of ignoring online reading and other multimedia in the definition of reading the NEA report does not acknowledge many studies from the new literacies perspectives.

Researchers in the many fields taking a new literacies perspective believe evolving technolgies require new skills, strategies, dispositions, and social practices in order to make meaning with texts.

For example reading studies have emerged that show online reading comprehension and offline reading comprehension are not only different, but online comprehension may take more flexible learners with more complex skills.

Secondly, other research in new literacies and video games find these complicated narratives also require more complex skills. I completely agree with Linda Braun that reading discussion boards or fanfiction should count for "reading for pleasure."

Hey maybe that is why surgeons who play video games may perform better when holding a scalpel.

I guess that until the "National Endowment of the Arts" hands out grants to starving video game and web designers reading will always be defined as using a book.

I just wish NPR would have presented a more balanced perspective that acknowledged the monumental shift the Internet has caused in literacy.

Sent by J. Gregory McVerry | 5:53 PM ET | 11-19-2007

I often wonder how upset the ancient people were when their kids stopped memorizing the traditional stories of their past in favor of reading books. I'm sure that some thought the world was going downhill, that we would loose that special bond in family gatherings, that life was over as they knew it. I'm sorry, but things change. Kids are reading different things now and it is going to continue to change. Although many people love and have always loved the stories, the imagination invovled in reading, not every one does or has. I know teachers who are wonderful teachers, visit museums, love learning what she wants to learn and who absolutely hates reading books for pleasure. For her it is a total waste of time. I'm an author, yet I know that things are changing. Media is changing and no matter how much we protest the changes, they will continue. Are these changes for the good? I believe that they are. Our children are different beings than we or our parents were. They are moving forward towards a new future that holds things that we can't even comprehend. There will always be an exchange of ideas, thoughts, feelings. In the past they were shared with oral storytelling, and now books. In the future, I'm sure that this exchange will use a different media than the past.

Sent by Linda | 10:46 AM ET | 11-20-2007

I think some of the people who are arguing that reading blogs and MySpaces in the internet is reading for pleasure are missing the point. It's true, we read all the time and for most of the day, we read billboards, magazine and newspaper ads, those little scrolls at the bottom of the tv screen, t-shirts and hats, and it goes on and on... but is that really reading? Do you really gain anything from reading a MySpace page, a 16 year old's blog, instructions on how to beat video games or the comments on stupid YouTube videos? I don't think those sources contribute to increased vocabulary, better reading comprehension, and perhaps, in turn, better writing abilities? If you start looking at blogs and MySpaces as a form of reading that furthers learning and intelligence, then maybe we should start looking at cell phone conversations as intelligence boosters as well, because that's essentially what these sources are.

Sent by Nate | 11:04 AM ET | 11-20-2007

"When the novel is dead, then the technological society will probably be totally upon us. You'll need a score card to be able to tell the Communists from the Texans." Norman Mailer

The Bush/Clinton Years

We as a people have come to read too many blogs as though trying to decipher the Rosetta Stone and understand ancient hieroglyphics.

Unfortunately, bashing government has become far too easy. The Left has become as strident as the Right. Two extremes do not offer a lot of pleasant choices for the middle.

George Bush is going out of office soon. There should not be any impeachment proceedings or any other such dalliance to delay the electoral process.

As voters, we should be looking toward the '08 election as the end of the Bush/Clinton years. There is no time machine to take us back to redo the past. We can only go forward from here.

Asking to bring down your government is akin to being wary of what you ask for. Whatever has been done right by our government, and whatever has been done wrong by our government, has not been the best or the worst the world has to offer.

Yes, there are people out there doing things better than we have done. At the same time, there are people out there doing things a lot worse than we have done.

The concept of bringing down your government can lead to anarchy and chaos. A breakdown of the system can open the door to some very nasty people. People who've committed far worse crimes than our government has been accused of committing.

So, in '08, let's put an end to the Bush/Clinton years and look for something else to start anew from.

We don't need to strictly vote either Republican or Democrat. Let's go for the candidate who offers to cut the past for a new direction.

Fred Call

Sent by fred call | 11:54 AM ET | 11-20-2007

Linda's comments pondering people's reaction to the spread of literacy seem to agree with Carl Sagan in his book /The Dragons of Eden/. Sagan suggested that people did worry about depending on written forms instead of developing the memory. Sagan went on to argue that the use of calculators (and perhaps by extension, computers) gives the human brain the opportunity to work at a more complex and profound level.
At a school where I used to teach, we passed around an article that discussed the physical changes found in the brains of young people who spend a lot of time using computers. I became obsessed with the topic and went around asking students how they perceived their skills in comparison to what they observe in adults. The most memorable answer came from a student who told me that she envied me the freedom of my youth! She said she would change her fluent computer skills any day for that freedom. Food for thought.

Sent by Eloise Rodriguez | 10:41 PM ET | 11-20-2007

Sent by Eloise Rodriguez: Sagan suggested that people did worry about depending on written forms instead of developing the memory.

Interesting. Kurt Vonnegut was asked why his style of writing (as well as Hemingway's and Phillip K. Dick etc) came off as popular. Vonnegut explained that the it is a difficult electromagnetic process for the human mind to decipher those little squiggles called letters that form sentences. When a writer makes the process a little less difficult, reading is that much more relaxing and enjoyable.

Marshal McCluhan argued that the aural tradition of story telling (before Guttenberg) makes the listener a story teller....because the story is passed down from ear to mouth to ear. Relying more on memory. Alas, memory often changed the verbal/aural story plotline through the generations. Print set the story in proverbial stone.

fred call

Sent by fred call | 10:08 AM ET | 11-21-2007

While on the topic of the relationship between memory and language, a bunch of years back (80s), NPR ran such a true story I can't find in the archives.

I believe it was on Fresh Air. Which was probably before Terry Gross' tenure?

If memory serves correct, the incident happened in Philadelphia? Police discovered a sixteen year old girl whose father had kept her sequestered from the world in a single room. She never learned about the outside world. She never was taught to read nor write. She could not speak when the police discovered her plight.

The young girl apparently had no memory of her life.

As the young girl went through therapy, as she was taught to read and write, her memory returned in parallel in slow bits and pieces.

I've often wondered what became of the girl. If there was ever a follow up to her story.

And if anyone can tell me where to find that original story in the archives, I'd be most appreciative.

fred call

Sent by fred call | 10:28 AM ET | 11-21-2007

Let's not forget that when they say people who don't read are "less likely" to do other socially admirable things, it is not saying that reading *causes* them to do those things. It just says that they are correlated. It is just as likely that being socially aware causes you to be more likely to read. The causal relationship is unclear. I believe there is probably a meta-problem that is causing people to be less engaged in the wider world (which would include reading). Pushing reading is admirable, but will never solve the problem if the lack of reading isn't the root cause.

Sent by J Walker | 4:18 PM ET | 11-29-2007

Turn off the TV. Take away the Internet. And, if necessary, take away the IPOD, the PS3, the Wii and the Xbox. I am on my third child starting high school and I wish I would have done this for the first two. After we got through the initial drama I have noticed the most delightful change in my ninth grader's orientation. As we progress through further grades I expect the severity of electronic denial to lessen, but currently there is too much competition for a limited amount time where reading should be number one, both personal and study. As an adult I set the example by limiting how long any of the screens in the house are allowed to be on. Oh, and I read constantly.

As for the apologists for the lack of reading and whatever its cause and effect relationship might or might not be, I can only state the obvious: reading is fundamental. There is no substitute. There hasn't been a new paradigm since Hammurabi.

Sent by C Morrison | 1:27 PM ET | 11-30-2007

Let's not put all the blame on the internet.

To be very honest, there is a world of information on the internet. But it takes the will power of the individual to seek that information out.

The problem is, in large part, the laziness that has become inherent in the American individual. Why seek out the valuable information on the internet when seeking out pop-up advertisement is so much simpler a guide where to go?

As for political blogs and the like, the average attendant into the realm of the political blog doesn't read the opinions. They go there to use everyone as a sounding board while they voice their opinion (just like the majority are not reading this comment).

Everybody is using everybody else as a sounding board, while no one is reading. Hence, it is not the technology of the internet that fails. It is the human laziness that fails.

You can take a child to the public library, but you can't force the child to learn by reading. You have to first teach the child how to be self reliant.

fred call

Sent by fred call | 2:05 PM ET | 11-30-2007

Judging by the quality of writing that I find on the internet--fan fiction, wikis, livejournal or myspace entries--I find no comfort in the idea that young people might be choosing not to read books in order to make time for that kind of reading. I teach university students, and their writing skills are by and large quite poor. If they are reading a lot on the internet, it isn't helping them to develop writing skills, while reading well-written books gives people a good example.

Sent by Lindsay | 12:17 PM ET | 12-01-2007

Sent by Lindsay: I find no comfort in the idea that young people might be choosing not to read books in order to make time for that kind of reading.

Okay, so Danielle Steele is a modern day Bronte, and books are generally a great example belittling the internet's literary quality. I get the picture.

Which is one reason Warhol's 'Brillo' boxes is one of the more important artistic commentaries on mass produced society.

I get a kick out of reading the literary appeal contained in Civil War letters written home by soldiers from the battlefields. A lot of them are just farmboys who, at best, got their educations in little red school houses. Of course, there's the story of Lincoln learning to write with a piece of fireplace charcoal on a piece of slate (and given Lincoln's physical appearances, he couldn't get elected today).

At the same, Melville barely got published in his lifetime.

The works of the late Anthony Burgess (Clockwork Orange) paints an image of language evolving into the future. As Burgess would aplty describe: Appy-polly-loggies.

fred call

PS...and who can resist the artistic merits of this link: Topless Putin woos Russians

And I, for one, was getting very weary of these: Ask The Candidates Mass Produced Foolish Questions That Politicians Have Stock Answers For So They Don't Have To Listen To You While Campaigning In A Largely Illiterate And Starving Barefoot Global Marketplace Run By A Handful Of Round Table Billionaires Who Are More Warm And Fuzzy Reliable Than Electronic Voting Booths.

Thank Gawd this debate thing is almost over with for NPR, and let the candidates go waste time pretend debating on some other media outlets more equipped for the general illiterates (and, please, don't feel obligated to provide equal time for the equally illiterate Republicans).

Just my pesonal opinion,
thank you,
fred call

Sent by fred call | 11:36 AM ET | 12-02-2007

I'm afraid the Associated Press's report simply isn't true. People who don't read care nothing about culture and shy away from museums. The problem becomes noticeably serious when students can't read directions correctly and lack the vocabulary that many of us have taken for granted since junior high school. Ask me: I'm a college professor with a website that follows the printed page.

Sent by Elaine | 2:05 PM ET | 12-20-2007

I was homeschooled, and raised without a TV. My Dad would read us lots of classic books, with a different animated voice for each character. I grew up to love reading. Since growing up, one of my favorite books has become:
The Underground History of Education by New York teacher of the year John Taylor Gatto. If your library doesn't have it, you can read it online:
(http://johntaylorgatto.com/underground/toc1.htm)

Anyway, one of the interesting claims of the books is that some of the people involved in the creation of the public school systems actually had reasons for wanting to children to NOT read.

Sent by Jennifer | 10:34 AM ET | 12-21-2007

Charles Dickens tried to bring culture to Xmas. All he brought was anguish and tears and more misery. Get over that stuff about ghosts and all that. Could we have just ONE Xmas without all the crying jags?

Willie: Is daddy home?

Kid: He's on an adventure, exploring the mountains. He's been gone a long time.

Willie: Exploring mountains, huh? How long is he gonna be gone?

Kid: Until next year.

Willie: Yeah? What about mommy?

Kid: She lives in God's house; with Jesus and Mary and the ghost and the long eared donkey and the talking walnut.

fred camorra call

Sent by fred camorra call | 1:39 PM ET | 12-21-2007