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WVOQuineMegaFan t1_ix4anoh wrote

Reply to comment by PuzzleheadedWalrus71 in Students at NYC high school get third grade-level lessons on Goldilocks by fppencollector

I sure would, unless those novels are closer to novellas.

I don't even know why we spend so much time teaching "English" in the first place when those same skills could be built in a history class

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cavalryyy t1_ix4bc6v wrote

Because assessing the deeper meaning of media is valuable in more contexts than just historical analysis?

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thefirstnightatbed t1_ix4ews7 wrote

You don’t really need full length novels to do that, though. Most of my readings in university English classes were short stories.

I do agree with you on English classes being important.

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cavalryyy t1_ix4fqrz wrote

You don’t need full length novels, but certainly some of the best works of all time are novels and there is intrinsic value to having read them. But yeah, I have many gripes with the American school system, and definitely English classes. But glad we’re on the same page that they’re important!

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WVOQuineMegaFan t1_ix4cmyx wrote

I don't believe that's a skill which is all that distinct from general literacy and comprehension, especially given the way English is taught in K-12. There's really very little doubt in my mind that people learn more from reading 1984 than reading about the Soviet Union and analyzing primary source documents

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cavalryyy t1_ix4dz2j wrote

> I don't believe that's a skill which is all that distinct from general literacy and comprehension, especially given the way English is taught in K-12.

I’m not really sure what you mean by this. You don’t learn to understand themes and motifs, separate authors intent from readers interpretation, etc through “general literacy and comprehension”. Understanding what’s being said and understanding what’s meant are different skills

>There's really very little doubt in my mind that people learn more from reading 1984 than reading about the Soviet Union and analyzing primary source documents

I’m not sure if you meant to say this but I agree with this lol. People do, indeed, learn more (about certain things) from reading 1985 than about the Soviet Union

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WVOQuineMegaFan t1_ix4ga3r wrote

> themes and motifs

There are absolutely themes in historical analysis. It's true you don't learn about literary motifs, but that doesn't seem like a topic that justifies English taking up more time in school than any other subject. Also, I don't remember much time being spent on "motifs" in English classes anyway.

> separate authors intent from readers interpretation

Of course you learn about this in a history or sociology class, both explicitly in textbooks and implicitly when analyzing primary source documents, which are almost never unbiased or entirely accurate.

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Another thing: if English really is about the deeper meaning of media it should mostly ditch novels and focus on movies, television, news articles, and social media. Most people only read novels occasionally and *never* read poetry. The only reason they teach literary fiction is because literary fiction is generally considered to have more aesthetic value than great television or TikTok, which I personally agree with but also think is basically irrelevant.

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NotAHoneypot t1_ix8ljte wrote

"Most people only read novels occasionally and never read poetry."

Okay, if you say so then this must be true 😅. Weirdly enough though, Audible is incredibly popular. And even stranger, Lewis Carroll and Homer are considered highly rated and very popular authors on it. Both are poetry-centric.

And before you say anything about audiobooks, bear in mind Stephen King - a cherished wordsmith who married a poet, Tabitha King - has long since been an emphatic supporter of how they can help improve literacy.

Kind of a bummer if you don't like poetry - different stroke for different folks, but to say people never read it seems far more opinion than fact 🤡

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