Langer's Literary Interpretation

I'm glad that Langer wrote about a better way to do literature instruction. In my high school experience of reading and analyzing literature, I think it was about learning the "right" way of looking at a text. Rather than discussing my own impressions as I read, my instructors would guide me and my classmates to particular places where they, or some consensus of people, saw important things in the text. And rather than letting us give our thoughts first, we were immediately bombarded with the "correct" thoughts of someone else. It's as if these teachers were saying, What good things could measily high school students such as yourselves find in the text that a scholar couldn't?

The problem with this approach (as Langer assumes in her article) is that children don't learn best that way, and literature doesn't work that way. Children are not mere receptacles where knowledge can be dumped. They have minds that must be engaged in their learning, and this can only fully happen when they are given time to think, to try out ideas, to make hypotheses, and to test these hypotheses before hearing what a teacher or a scholar has to say. Besides, the varied and continuing debate that goes on in most literary circles about most literature is proof that no one has really settled upon the "right" way of interpreting it. With instruction focused on teaching children to do their own analysis, they will learn to be critical thinkers (even "scholars") in their own right.

Yet I think there is something missing (or at least not explicitly stated) in Langer's approach to literature instruction: children should always be taught to reference the text when making any interpretive statements. She is right - our goal should not be to put forth "the teacher's perception of the right response" (Langer 1990: 816). But we should always lead children to finding the place in the text from which they are drawing their interpretation, whether it be in the form of a question, a conclusion, or connection. While we are not looking for some specific correct response, we are and should be looking for a response that finds its basis in the text. Interpretation cannot be an anything-goes activity. We must train students to look for things that are most supported in a text, and to evaluate responses based on their textual support. This way, children can interpret something in conflicting ways, and both can be good - yet both student and teacher can evaluate interpretations, and even speak in terms of "more supported" or "less supported," on the basis of what the text says. Langer says that this evaluation should happen "only after the students have worked through their understandings" (815), but the basis for it - textual references - should be pushed from the very beginning of the student response time.

The addition of this point gives teachers more direction in how to engage their students in critical thinking. First, they do it by modelling. If a student says, Janie is really mean!, then the teacher can help everyone (including the student herself) by asking, Where do you see Janie being really mean?, and to follow up if needed, What page are you looking at?, or, What words make her sound mean to you? Of course, it is important for teachers to use open-ended responses to students' thoughts, such as, Tell me more about that. But one important characteristic of critical thinking is precision, so students' critical thinking will be greatly benefited by locating exactly where and what is leading them to their interpretations.

David Koch