Literature as Useless

Next month, I’ll be presenting at a conference on the uselessness of literature in an age of new literacies. It will be at the TCETC (Teachers College Educational Technology Conference) in New York. In short, my argument is that English teachers are being called on to teach into “21st Literacy Skills” more and more, as this past NCTE conference suggests. These new “real-world” skills—searching, filtering, citing, writing online—are being given emphasis because they have a pragmatic end: They are skills students will need to work and live in the decades to come. Literature, however, is use-less. It doesn’t have a comparable pragmatic end. While I don’t agree with the idea that literature is completely use-less, I do think English education needs to do a better job at conveying the value of literature to others. I’m pasting the whole proposal—just under 600 words—below.
- Please visit my blog for more on teaching literature and new literacies: http://www.tomliamlynch.org

Literature as Useless
It has been commonplace recently to pit literature against technology. We read in the news about librarians who are putting books down in order to teach basic information-based research techniques (Rich, 2009). Or, respected voices weighing the effects of new literacies on reading (Gardner, 2008). In another instance, we hear the concerns teachers have that text messaging and online practices are supplanting students’ study habits (Rich, 2008). While on the one hand we read about President Obama’s own love of reading and writing (Kakutani, 2009), his Secretary of Education seemed fine with the dichotomy of books vs. “those electronic gadgets” (Dillon, 2009). English teachers, whose work has always been rooted in literary works, (Applebee, 1974), are understandably affected by new technologies and the literacies they make possible.
On the other hand, literature has been taught as many things: an extension of Christian dogma (Applebee, 1974; Graff, 1987), as a structured object to be deconstructed (Scholes, 1998), and even as a political tool (Scholes, 1986). None of these approaches to literature argue convincingly for its value, however. They assume the value of literature. Furthermore, I suggest that even many groundbreaking works on teaching literature—transactional theory (Rosenblatt, 1983), the balancing of reader experience with authorial intention (Rabinowitz & Smith, 1998), the role of imagination students’ private readings in schools (Sumara, 1996)–while of immense importance, ignore this historical problem that teaching literature has been, at best, tolerably useless. That is, it is use-less and lacks the utility of other disciplines: physics can send human beings to the moon, foreign languages can allow people of different backgrounds to communicate, history teaches students to participate in government. They are useful; literature is useless.
At the end of his detailed history of teaching English in America, Applebee (1974) lists a number of issues the field must confront. He articulates one thus: “The knowledge and goals of the teaching of literature are in conflict with the emphasis on specific knowledge or content” (246). Here he means that English teachers are uncomfortable defining teaching literature “as a body of knowledge” because their goals are not knowledge-based but are “questions of values and perspective” (ibid). That is, teachers of literature have been, according to Applebee, in the business of literary experience and imagination. Thirty-five years later, I argue, this is still very much the case. However, we now face a new problem. It is the English teacher who is being tapped to help guide education into this era of new literacies. But, new literacies research cares little for the imaginative and aesthetic experiences valued by teachers of literature. How can a field that has only held on to the teaching of literature by historical happenstance defend literature against newer literacy needs?
After a brief review of some of the most prevalent voices in new literacies studies—(Coiro, Knobel, Lankshear, & Leu, 2008), (Alvermann, 2008), (Tierney, 2007)—I issue a call to others in English education. Teachers of literature must make it clearer to the public, to themselves, to our students why teaching literature is important. It is something the field has failed to do. The result has been the slow suffocating of literature in schools. We must accept that not all students will be English majors and that reading literature does not have to mean reading like a professor. New literacies has much to offer the teaching of literature, but it is up to us to make it clear what is teaching literature and what is not. What we need is a New Literatures movement. The Old Literatures approach has taken us as far as it can.

Works Cited

Alvermann, D. E. (2008). Why bother theorizing adolescents’ online literacies for classroom practice and research. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 52(1), 8-19.
Applebee, A. N. (1974). Tradition and reform in the teaching of English. Urbana, Illinois: NCTE.
Coiro, J., Knobel, M., Lankshear, C., & Leu, D. J. (2008). Central issues in new literacies and new literacies research. In J. Coiro, M. Knobel, C. Lankshear & D. J. Leu (Eds.), Handbook of research on new literacies. New York: Lawrence Erblaum Associates.
Dillon, S. (2009, January 13). Few specifics from education pick. New York Times. Retrieved January 17, 2009, from http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/14/us/politics/14webduncan.html?_r=1&ref=education
Gardner, H. (2008, February 17). The end of literacy? Don’t stop reading. The Washington Post. Retrieved October 13, 2008, from http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=0&did=1430370181&SrchMode=2&sid=1&Fmt=3&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=PQD&TS=1223908182&clientId=15403
Graff, G. (1987). Professing literature: An institutional history. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Kakutani, M. (2009, January 18, 2009). From books, new president found books. New York Times. Retrieved March 15th, 2009, from http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/19/books/19read.html?_r=1&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink
Rabinowitz, P. J., & Smith, M. W. (1998). Authorizing readers: Resistance and respect in the teaching of literature. New York: Teachers College Press.
Rich, M. (2008, July 27). Literacy debate: Online, r u really reading? New York Times. Retrieved October 13, from http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/27/books/27reading.html?ex=1374897600&en=81a364206914f90a&ei=5124&partner=facebook&exprod=facebook
Rich, M. (2009, February 15th, 2009). In web age, library job gets update. New York Times. Retrieved March 15th, 2009, from http://video.nytimes.com/video/2009/02/15/arts/1194837851726/the-21st-century-librarian.html?ref=education
Rosenblatt, L. M. (1983). Literature as exploration. New York: Modern Language Association.
Scholes, R. (1986). Textual power: Literary theory and the teaching of English. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Scholes, R. (1998). The rise and fall of English: Reconstucting English as a discipline. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Sumara, D. J. (1996). Private readings in public: Schooling the literary imagination. New York: Peter Lang.
Tierney, R. J. (2007). New literacy learning strategies for new times. In L. S. Rush, A. J. Eakle & A. Berger (Eds.), Secondary school literacy: What research reveals for classroom practice. Urbana, Illinois: NCTE.

Related posts:

1. Losing Literature Literature is losing the fight.  By “the fight” I mean...
2. “Electronic Gadgets” Jab This week, when Chicago schools chief Arne Duncan was questioned...
3. No Stimulus Plan for Literature I am sitting in a doctor’s office. CNN is on....
4. English Scores Up, Literature Down Last week, newly released test scores in middle school English...
5. Kindle, Literature, and New Literatures The Kindle is poised to change the way we read,...