The Reader Organization
The Reader is an organization whose origins can be found in the literary magazine The Reader, which appeared in Liverpool from spring 1997 . Dr. Jane Davis, together with other staff at the university, conducted courses that instead of literary theories focused on reading and communication between readers and text and the dialogue between readers about what they have read. The special method of these courses was that the participants read unprepared texts out loud and slowly in sections, with each section being followed by a conversation about what had been read.
Inspired by the positive experiences with the university courses, the organizers came up with the idea of expanding the target group to include participants who, for various reasons, would never enter a university. In 2002 the project "Get into reading" (roughly: start reading) was started. Participants in the first two groups were young mothers and adult students and the term shared reading , a trademark of this method today, was for the first time filled with the content for which it is now known in the narrower sense. The positive reactions and evaluations of the participants confirmed the organizers in their assumption that reading together in groups not only means getting closer to the literature, but can also lead to improved mental and physical health of the participants. Greater self-confidence , increased personal stability, a better understanding of others and less social isolation of the participants are also achieved.
Today there are nearly 400 shared reading groups spread across much of the UK . One tries with this method in particular to reach people who are in nursing situations, in the penal system , in the educational system and in dementia care. The project is partly financed by public funds and donations , part of the work is done on a voluntary basis .
In Germany, the project was presented at the Leipzig Book Fair 2016 by Thomas Böhm and Carsten Sommerfeldt, who jointly run the company “Literary Enterprises”, with the assistance of Jane Davis. In April 2016 took place in the Galli Theater Berlin during the week-long event "READ! BERLIN. Literature Festival ”, a pilot project with SharedReading under the direction of Böhm and Sommerfeldt. The pilot project met with great interest, and from autumn 2016 weekly reading groups called “Read-With-Share” could take place in the rooms of the Berlin America Memorial Library . The reading groups in the Berlin Central and State Library will continue until further notice.
Since autumn 2016, Böhm and Sommerfeldt have been holding seminars lasting several days at the Berlin Literary Colloquium for training to become a group leader for shared reading, known as 'facilitator'.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original from March 30, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. accessed on March 2, 2017
- ↑ http : //literäreunternehmungen.de/ accessed on March 2, 2017
- ↑ http://read.berlin/termine/ accessed on March 2, 2017
- ↑ https://www.zlb.de/veranstaltungen/aktuell.html accessed on March 2, 2017
- ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original from March 31, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. accessed on March 2, 2017
