Interpretation of Authentic Literary Texts

• In Event: Reading for Understanding: Initial Studies of Students and Teachers Using Multiple Sources in Content Areas

Abstract

Objectives: This poster reports an experimental study examining differences in the kinds of interpretations students construct when reading different types of authentic literary text (short story vs. poem). As well, interpretations of a single text were compared to interpretations of two simultaneously presented texts.

Theoretical Framework: Empirical studies of literary text comprehension indicate that there are clear differences in the approaches taken by experts and novices. Experts, in contrast to novices, contextualize the literary work by comparing and contrasting it with different kinds of texts and consider multiple perspectives in constructing thematic understanding (Goldman, 2004; Graves & Fredericksen, 1991; Peskin, 1998; Zeitz, 1994). Also, experts tend to focus on thematic/rhetorical interpretations in contrast to novices’ focus on plot information. However, such expert – novice differences in literary interpretation have had little impact on instructional efforts in middle and high school. Indeed, little empirical research has been done to identify and assess the kinds of representations readers construct while reading authentic literary text like short stories and poems rather than lab-designed textoids (Rapp, Komeda, & Hinze, 2011). The present study addresses questions of interpretation in authentic literary works.

Methods: Eighty-nine undergraduates were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: single text, short story (There Was an Old Woman She Had So Many Children She Didn’t Know What to Do from The House on Mango Street); single text, poem (Boy Breaking Glass by Gwendolyn Brooks); multiple texts, poem and short story. After reading the material, they were asked to respond to a prompt (single text: “Write an extended essay about the author’s perspective on what it means to live in poverty;” multiple texts: “Write an extended essay about the similarities and differences in these authors’ perspectives on what it means to live in poverty.”

Results: Traditional approaches to scoring essays (e.g., amount of information from the text that appeared in the essay, inferences, etc.) seemed to miss important differences in how readers assembled their responses and revealed their interpretations of the literary work(s). Readers who read both the poem and short story focused on the rhetoric and structure of the texts, but failed to warrant their claims. Those who read the short story constructed essays that focused on the events of the story, but also lacked warrants for the claims. In contrast, those who read the poem focused on interpreting the rhetoric of the text and warranted their claims by connecting how that interpretation of the text informed their understanding of the author’s perspective of the theme. This pattern of results suggests that the conventions of poetry cue an interpretive frame that extends to short stories in the multiple text condition.

Significance: Results of this study suggest that pairings of different text genres (e.g., poem and short story) may encourage readers to engage in more interpretive, expert-like processing of literary text. This suggests an important design principle for development of text sets for supporting literary interpretation. The study indicates the need for new methods of analysis to capture literary interpretation of authentic texts.

Authors

• Kathryn S. McCarthy, University of Illinois at Chicago

• Susan R. Goldman, University of Illinois at Chicago