Sponsors of Pleasure: Wide Reading Re-imagined Through Social Curation

ABSTRACT

This article moves beyond book-based school ‘wide reading’ to propose constellations of multimodal media, including music videos, fashion parades, literary works, online games and material artefacts, along with associated pedagogies, as sponsors of pleasure. The article, based on empirical research with teachers in an Australian secondary school, proposes how the pleasure teachers experience in textual curation and research during curriculum planning might inform understandings of what reading might be for students. The author also considers the barriers to recognising diverse texts as having merit for study. Featuring Mattel’s Barbie, Kanye West and Andy Warhol, the article demonstrates how curation can inspire a vibrant reading fan culture and asks how teachers and students can negotiate or co-design ‘reading for pleasure’ curricula that make meaningful use of learner desires to seek collaboratively and collate creatively traces of meaning across media. Reading is an inevitable, spontaneous and enjoyable aspect of these practices.

KEYWORDS:

• Wide reading
• intertexuality
• popular culture
• reading for pleasure
• sponsors of literacy
• multimodality

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. An Australian term for a bag of promotional goods, especially samples, available at trade or agricultural fairs. It has been adapted for use in the primary and lower secondary classroom as a presentation tool.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Lucinda McKnight

Lucinda McKnight is a British Australian former English teacher and is currently a lecturer in pedagogy and curriculum at Deakin University. She teaches English method and inclusive education and has research interests in curriculum design, gender and media. She has an MA in Media, Culture and Communication from the Institute of Education, UCL, and a PhD in Education.