"Critical literacy helps wipe away the dirt on our glasses": Towards an understanding of reading as ideological practice

Abstract

This paper reports on a qualitative teacher inquiry conducted in a tertiary, English-as-a-foreign-language classroom in Taiwan. The purpose of the study was, first, to implement a poststructuralist view of critical literacy that focuses not only on texts but also on the practice of reading as constructed and contested, and second, to examine the ways in which the students understand and practise this view of texts and reading. Findings reveal that the students were not only cognizant of the role of a text analyst but were also able to put this knowledge into practice. That is, they demonstrated an understanding as well as displayed the practice of the critical competence of reading. However, when later asked in more general terms of their conceptualisation of reading, the students did not immediately make the connection between reading practices and the critical literacy perspective, but insisted on an understanding of reading as mainly emotional and factual. These findings suggest that to understand reading as a critical practice requires a paradigm shift in emphasis from a view of reading as social practice to a view of reading as ideological practice. Pedagogically, a view of reading as ideological practice means placing emphasis on students' understanding of not only texts as constructed but also reading practices as constructed and contested. This also necessitates class discussions of why particular ways of reading have become the dominant and sometimes the only correct way of reading.

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