Unit 1.pdf - Southwest High School

Activity
1.6
Introducing Reader Response
Critical Theory
SUGGESTED Learning Strategies: Marking the Text, Discussion
Groups, Brainstorming, Quickwrite
Academic VocaBulary
Reader Response Criticism
focuses on a reader’s active
engagement with a piece
of print or nonprint text.
The reader’s response to
any text is shaded by the
reader’s own experiences,
social ethics, moral values,
and general views of the
world.
Reader Response Critical Theory
Your personal attitudes, beliefs, and experiences influence how you
derive meaning from text. Examining the way in which you understand
text involves adopting critical lenses that affect your perception of a
text. A critical lens, or theory, is a way of judging or analyzing a work of
literature.
Much as putting on a pair of tinted lenses colors the way you look at
the world, critical lenses influence how you study and perceive text.
Reader Response Criticism asks you to think about your role as a reader
whenever you look at text. The critical lens of Reader Response Critical
Theory focuses on the relationship among the reader, the reader’s
situation, and the text. The theory suggests that the process of making
meaning relies not only on the text itself, but also on the qualities
and motivations of the individual who is interacting with the text. See
Appendix 1 for more information on this theory.
The diagram below illustrates this idea.
Reading
Situation
Reader
Meaning
Text
© 2011 College Board. All rights reserved.
Reading Situation: the circumstances surrounding the reading,
including the purposes for reading
Reader: the individual engaged in the reading process
Text: what is being read
12 SpringBoard® English Textual Power Senior English