Introduction. This study aims to contribute to a better understanding of the learning that reading by listening requires from readers with print disabilities.

Method. Sixteen semi-structured interviews were conducted with university students with blindness or vision impairment in Australia.

Analysis. A theoretical reading of the interview material was conducted, with a basis in sociocultural learning theory.

Results. The responsibility for learning to use audio-based reading tools was often left to the participants themselves. The process of appropriating audio-based reading tools included two important aspects: digital literacy and learning to manage the sequentiality of audio text. This process was related to trajectories of participation in academic communities of practice, English-speaking communities of practice, and blindness and visual impairments communities of practice. It also included learning to participate in practices where vision and reading by seeing is the norm.

Conclusion. Three conclusions are drawn: 1) reading by listening is not a passive and effortless activity, it requires specific expertise, 2) socio-economic and socio-political circumstances influence how reading by listening is practiced and the learning that this form of reading requires, and 3) reading by listening requires learning how to navigate and manage the effects of institutions and systems that are disabling.

Introduction. The ability to read and interpret different types of text can be significantly impacted by neuropsychiatric disabilities, which affect cognitive abilities. This paper explores and reviews previous studies within library and information science on neuropsychiatric disabilities in relation to reading practices.  

Method. Searches were performed in LISA and LISTA to identify research on readers with neuropsychiatric disabilities. Results were screened and 14 peer reviewed articles were chosen for inclusion. Utilising content analysis, the examined articles were deductively and inductively categorised according to the following themes: impairment, user group and context, research design, assistive technologies for reading, reading for information seeking, reading for evaluation, and reading, self-efficacy and identity.

Findings. Most articles address dyslexia. The majority of studies have been conducted in educational settings and have an experimental research design. Six studies address assistive technologies for reading, the remaining eight concern reading in relation to information practices.

Conclusion. There is an imbalance in the types of impairments that have been addressed in previous research. Few studies concern everyday reading practices and more research outside of educational contexts is needed. Furthermore, there is a lack of research that delves deeper into the experiences of readers with neuropsychiatric disabilities.

Introduction. This paper introduces an emerging area of research, critical studies of reading, that has been identified and developed by the authors. 

Approach. Seven features of critical studies of reading research are introduced and the paper argues for how this type of research can shed new light on historical and current reading practices and reading activities. Examples of studies with such features within library and information science, as well as neighbouring disciplines are presented.

Conclusions. Future directions for critical studies of reading research are outlined, highlighting the possibilities, as well as the challenges for this emerging area of research. 

Purpose The aim of the paper is to create a greater understanding of how people who are blind or vision impaired describe their use of audio-based reading technologies, with a particular focus on how they reason about whether the use of these technologies can be understood in terms of reading.

Design/methodology/approach The study is part of the emerging research area Critical Studies of Reading and draws theoretical inspiration from Document Theory, New Literacy Studies and Critical Disability Studies. The article presents a discourse analysis of how 16 university students in Australia who are blind or vision impaired and use audio-based reading technologies describe this use in semi-structured interviews.

Findings The participants relate to a division between ‘real' reading and reading by listening, where the latter is constructed as an exception and is connected to the subject position of being blind or vision impaired. However, resistance is also noticeable, where reading by listening is constructed as something that is normal, and as a right.

Originality/value The article is a theoretical and empirical contribution to the ongoing discussion on the use of audio-based reading technologies. It presents perspectives from the users of these technologies and argues why a specific understanding of this use is important.

This study aims to identify and analyse how aesthetic reading was problematised in Swedish educational policy 1940- 1962, in order to create a better understanding of the politics of reading in an era that has been of great importance for how reading is understood in contemporary Sweden. The empirical material consists of reports from three school commissions, laying the foundation for the new compulsory and comprehensive school that was introduced in 1962. The reports have been analysed using a discursive methodological framework, focussing on problematisations of aesthetic reading. The main problem that aesthetic reading was meant to solve, according to the analysis, was a lack of aesthetic taste. There is a shift in emphasis during the period from problematisations of what to read towards problematisations of how to read. Thus, the solution to the problem of aesthetic reading during the period transformed from a governing of taste to a governing of skills. Educational and cultural policy shares the problematisation of aesthetic upbringing, made possible by its roots in modernist ideas of general character formation and the ideals of free public education. We argue that research on the politics of reading in Sweden can be reinvigorated by exploring the governance of cultural practices emanating from policy fields other than explicit cultural policy

This study contributes to a growing number of critical studies of reading that are seeking to understand how reading is constructed socially and politically. It addresses issues concerning why certain types of reading are deemed more appropriate than others in various contexts and historical eras. The aim of the study is to explore constructions of reading, reading promotion, and readers that can be identified in Swedish literature policy 2012-2013 in order to make explicit the implicit assumptions embedded in the politics of reading. This is achieved through a discourse analysis of the Swedish Government Commission report on Literature from 2012 and the subsequent Government Bill from 2013. The analysis focuses on the construction of the ‘problem’ that reading is supposed to solve, the subject-position of the reader, and the knowledge practices that underpin the construction of the ‘problem’. The analysis reveals that the main ‘problem’ is the changing reading habits of the Swedish population and the decline in the reading ability of Swedish children and youth. This is seen as a threat to several important societal values, such as children’s learning and development, democracy, “the culture of reading”, Sweden’s economic competitiveness, and the market for literature. Responsibility for the problem is placed on the school system, parents, and the use of computers and the Internet. The remedy is seen as the promotion of the right kind of literature. Furthermore, the analysis illustrates how the subject position of the appropriate reader is formed around the notion of the harmful non-reader. Similar dividing practices are constructed around youth/adult, pupil/teacher, child/parent, and son/father where the latter is expected to make the former a reader and thereby a desirable subject. The analysis also shows how two contradictory knowledge practices are joined together in the policy texts, where seemingly rational, objective, and empirical research is paired with humanistic Bildung values.

Purpose. The purpose of this paper is to historicise research conducted in the fields of Information Seeking and Learning and Information Literacy and thereby begin to outline a description of the history of information in the context of Swedish compulsory education.

Design/methodology/approach. Document work and documentary practices are used as alternatives to concepts such as information seeking or information behaviour. Four empirical examples of document work – more specifically informational reading – recorded in Swedish primary classrooms in the 1960s are presented.

Findings. In the recordings, the reading style students use is similar to informational reading in contemporary educational settings: it is fragmentary, facts-oriented, and procedure-oriented. The practice of finding correct answers, rather than analysing and discussing the contents of a text seems to continue from lessons organised around print textbooks in the 1960s to the inquiry-based and digital teaching of today.

Originality/value. The paper seeks to analyse document work and documentary practices by regarding “information” as a discursive construction in a particular era with material consequences in particular contexts, rather than as a theoretical and analytical concept. It also problematises the notion that new digital technologies for producing, organising, finding, using, and disseminating documents have drastically changed people’s behaviours and practices in educational and other contexts.

The paper explores problematisations of reading in current Swedish literature policy through a discourse analysis of the Swedish Government Commission report on Literature from 2012 and the following Government bill from 2013. The analysis focuses on problematisations of the reading citizen and the knowledge practices that have made these problematisations possible. A central problematisation is the declining reading literacy of children and youth, threatening children's learning and development; democracy; "the culture of reading"; Sweden's economic competitiveness; and the market for Swedish literature. This problematisation produce dividing practices around problematic non-readers and themore desirable readers. Other dividing practices can be identified around youth/adult, pupil/teacher, child/parent, and son/father where the latter should educate the former about the virtues of reading. Underpinning these problematisations are knowledge practices where instrumental policy actions, based on seemingly rational, objective, and empirical research is paired with humanistic building values.

I detta projekt har vi analyserat inspelade svensklektioner från slutet av 1960-talet med fokus på hur läsundervisningen organiserades. Resultaten visar att faktaorienterad informationsläsning gavs stort utrymme vid denna tid. Möjligheterna att försjunka i skönlitteratur var däremot få. Idag ses faktaorienterad läsning ofta som problematisk och som en ny företeelse som hänger samman med teknikutvecklingen. Vårt projekt visar att denna typ av läsning är en del av en längre tradition.