Embracing the Other in Gothic Texts: Cultivating Understanding in the Reading Classroom

Abstract

This case study explores the understandings that seventh graders constructed with Gothic texts in a reading unit designed by the researcher. Gothic is a fictional genre defined by horror and mystery. The stories’ protagonists are often marginalized individuals. The genre was selected due to its popularity with adolescents. Qualitative data were collected and reviewed using thematic analysis. The results of the study reveal that as a result of grappling with the societal other, participants gleaned meaningful knowledge that enriched them personally and socially.

Towards a Dialogic Ethical Criticism:

“…These pedagogies seek to cultivate in students an openness towards those who are often deemed to be different or marginalised in society and the world. Among others, these include teaching multicultural literature from writers of marginal and marginalised communities (Cai, 2002;Ginsberg & Glenn, 2019a;Gunn & Bennett, 2023;Landt, 2006;Loh, 2009;Margerison, 1995;Slaughter, 2021), the teaching of canonical texts with a focus on ethical concerns of discrimination (Del Nero, 2018;Dyches, 2018;Mohamud, 2020;Shah, 2013) and adopting critical approaches to literary representations of race and inequality (Borsheim-Black & Sarigianides, 2019;Dyches & Thomas, 2020;Thein et al, 2011.…”

“…Firstly, one must keenly consider the weight of another's perspective-and that of the text (ibid.). This includes discourse where students explicitly consider their peers' empathetic responses in whole-class and small-group discussions (Bedford, 2015;Brett, 2016;Del Nero, 2018;Louie, 2005). Teachers can also affirm students' culturally specific funds of knowledge in diverse classrooms which can give rise to insightful other-centred interpretations (Bedford, 2015;Habib, 2008;Shah, 2013).…”

“…Firstly, one might engage other D. NAH partners without a shared purpose, direction, or subject matter in interpretive conversation. Students may engage in associative talk about the marginalised group depicted in the text in reductive ways that could have occurred independently of the text (Brett, 2016), express resigned confusion, boredom and disconnection with the text (Del Nero, 2018), or deflect direct engagement with the otherness of the text (Nah, 2023).…”

Influence of Mothers’ Habits on Reading Skills and Emotional Intelligence of University Students: Relationships in the Social and Educational Context

“…Recently, Barrientos-Báez et al [78] defined emotional intelligence as the ability to control and positively manage one's own emotions and those of others in any scenario where experiences and changes occur as part of the personal learning process. There is no doubt that reading is a basic tool for the development of emotional competencies [52,60,[79][80][81][82][83][84][85][86] and that the role of the mother in the choice of her children's readings favors a greater emotional attunement. Aram and Aviram [87] note that the use that mothers make of the language of the state of mind during reading facilitates the understanding of the world [88,89].…”