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| Posted By : Nicholas - 8/22/2007 1:29 AM | | Since we're all reading, we're still in the majority. But according to a new study, 1 in 4 Americans read NO books last year, so it's a shrinking majority. Here's the link to the news article:
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| Posted By : Bill Ward - 8/22/2007 3:11 AM | Actually I think we are in a tiny minority, grabbing some passages from a holy text or reading a celebrity biography isn't the same as the reading actual readers do.
Still, optimistically, we've got a net gain from, say, 800 AD to the present. In the longterm scheme of things, we're improving!  |
| Posted By : MichaelEhart - 8/22/2007 5:54 AM | You know, Bill, that is a pretty dang wise view to take. Readership percentage should be viewed as a continum. And of course, this doesn't consider the changing media. I read four newspapers a day in college, 30 years ago, with a fifth on Sunday. I read much more news now, but subscribe to only one newspaper. The same for professional journals. I only receive one now in print, the rest are online.
Up until about ten years ago, I read 5+ books a week. Now, other than textbooks and tech manuals, a depressing number of which are still in print version only, the only books I read are for pleasure. And an increasing number of them are digital, and that number will only increase as the technology commoditizes to the point where it becomes economically infeasable to produce print versions of most cheap, popular literature.
Read me in 2007!
"The View From the Shotglass Floor" Ray Gun Revival, Feb 2007
"Voice of the Spoiler" The Sword Review, June 2007
"Servant of the Manthycore" The Sword Review, July 2007
"Darkling I Listen; and for Many a Time" Fear and Trembling, coming soon!
"Weaving Spiders Come Not Here" The Sword Review, August 2007
"Six Zombies Doing That Mick Jagger Strut" Damned in Dixie, Summer 2007
"Nothing But Our Tears" The Sword Review, September 2007
"Night of Shadows, Night of Knives" Magic and Mechanica, Fall 2007
"The Scarlet Colored Beast" The Sword Review, October 2007
"The Stars by Law, Forbidden" Unparalleled Journeys II, November 2007
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| Posted By : PaulMc - 8/22/2007 9:19 AM | Nicholas said...Since we're all reading, we're still in the majority. But according to a new study, 1 in 4 Americans read NO books last year, so it's a shrinking majority. Here's the link to the news article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20381678/Curious to see what other writers and editors here will find of note in this poll.
I don't know if the U.S. is "dumbing down" at light speed, or maybe we're all just acquiring A.D.D. from all the sound bytes and no one can focus long enough to read through a single book.
-- Paul McNamee
My Writings
The Tales of Doran Coyle |
| Posted By : Daniel - 8/22/2007 12:20 PM | Paul, I think you have hit on something important.....
"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."
Daniel |
| Posted By : bleacheddecay - 8/22/2007 12:35 PM | I know so many people who say they don't have time to read books. For me it's an addiction and a major part of my enjoyment of life. Simply put, I make the time, it's a priority for me.
bleacheddecay |
| Posted By : Bill Ward - 8/22/2007 4:17 PM | | If I go a couple days without reading I get the shakes. |
| Posted By : bleacheddecay - 8/22/2007 4:33 PM | *nods*
I'd have to have a high fever or something to go a couple of days without reading.
bleacheddecay |
| Posted By : H.P. Lovesauce - 8/23/2007 8:26 AM |
PaulMc said...
I don't know if the U.S. is "dumbing down" at light speed, or maybe we're all just acquiring A.D.D. from all the sound bytes and no one can focus long enough to read through a single book.
I don't know about "light speed"; since ignorance seems to be as strong a force in America as gravity, perhaps we're just accelerating toward terminal velocity.  |
| Posted By : Gustavo - 8/23/2007 4:38 PM | As far as I can tell, the whole world is dumbing down apace... The highest rated show in Argentina, a country once proud of its hyper-educated population, was the local version of the Big Brother reality show. In the finale, nearly one and a half million people actaully voted for the eventual winner - one out of every twenty-five people in the country. And, from the media data, most of the rest were probably watching.
Basically, it means that the preferred entertainment is watching other people live in a big glass house, which is then explained and made to seem important by "experts" - normally media types or actors. Can anything be more dumbed down than that? It's not surprising that the average person on the street is not reading - they're just not used to anything more complicated than the instructions on a pack of toothpicks. |
| Posted By : bleacheddecay - 8/23/2007 4:43 PM | I read. It's one of my favorite things. I also watch Big Brother. *chuckles*
bleacheddecay |
| Posted By : David de Beer - 10/9/2007 12:52 PM | well, 3 in 4 did read a book which is about 74% and a much more optimistic outlook, imo, than the remaining 25%; there has never been an era where all people will read, even with the ability and luxury to do so. tbh, it's higher than I would have guessed, my best guesstimate being 35-40%
so it's a shrinking majority
nnnot quite, as per this blog:
she does a fairly good analysis overall of this survey, but I quote the following of interest:
The NEA survey states that 56% of Americans read any book in 2002 (that's ANY book, not just "literary works," which the survey focuses on.)
The AP/Ipsos survey say that 73% of Americans read any book last year (i.e. in 2006).
Therefore, if these two respected organizations are to be believed...
AMERICANS READ MORE LAST YEAR THAN THEY READ FIVE YEARS AGO.
Honestly? what does concern me is the survey was worded so negatively; I remember following a lot of these discussions and it was surprising how few people ever flipped the figures around, and just took them at face value as indicating that the current state of literature is both in decline and tottering on the edge o fthe abyss. Those are bloody good numbers, IMO, and I for one am actually quite cheered by this study as indicating that reading is very much not dead yet. There is still interest and/ or desire, and while a lot of it will be non-fiction sales, it is still reading and a continuation of the culture of reading and that does have a ripple effect.
(I am at a loss as to explain why the last paragraph of my post insists on being in bold, sorry, especially since this one isn't. The mind is boggled)
www.livejournal.com/users/david-de-beer
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| Posted By : bleacheddecay - 10/9/2007 2:13 PM | I agree with you. It's like they want us to think gloom and doom, dumb and dumber.
LOL
bleacheddecay |
| Posted By : Thirdy Lopez - 10/21/2007 9:07 PM | When I was on vacation in Manila, I stayed at a relative's place. I was pleased to see my nephew's room lined with pocketbooks - an assortment of classics and modern literature. He had some gems in him collection ( Gaiman, Rowling, etc.)
I'm just glad some people still take time to read. I've met quite a number of folks who have never read a single novel, and that's just sad.
- Thirdy
Aurelio Rico Lopez III aka "Thirdy" has had fiction featured in COLD FLESH (Hellbound Books), THE BLACKEST DEATH I, II, and III (Black Death Books), STAR-SPANGLED ZOMBIE (Maniac Press), RAW MEAT (Sideshow Press), SHADOW BOX (Brimstone Press), TRIP THE LIGHT HORRIFIC (RAGE machine Books), DEAD MEN (AND WOMEN) WALKING (Bards and Sages), and THE BOOK OF SHADOWS VOL. I (Brimstone Press). His poems have appeared in Mythic Delirium, Star*Line, Dark Animus, Goblin Fruit, Scifaikuest, Electric Velocipede, Sybil's Garage, The Horror Express, Down In the Cellar, and elsewhere. |
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