Secondary Worlds: Literature Teaching and the Visual Arts (English, Language and Education) Book

What sort of learning goes on in the literature classroom? Michael Benton's concerns are to theorize the practice of literature teaching and to extend the English teacher's remit to encompass aspects of the visual arts, especially those of painting and picture books. He advocates the need for a working theory of literary and visual experience and develops the concept of the unique "secondary world" created by each reader/viewer when reading or contemplating a work of art. He argues that the stance of reader-response theory and practice offers English teachers the most coherent position in relation to their work because it focuses upon the live processes of literary experience. Approaches to literature and painting which draw upon aspects of narratology, aesthetic theory, and feminist theory are accommodated within this framework and all are exemplified through accounts of work with young readers.Read More