RUNNING HEAD: A Critique on Teaching Study Skills for English Literature

Critique on Teaching Study Skills for

English Literature

By Prof. Jonathan Acua Solano

Thursday, May 7, 2015
Twitter: @jonacuso
Post 167

For Long (1986), both literature and language teaching involve the development
of a feeling for language. And literature can provide a basis for extending language use
(McKay, 1986). And, as stated by Vincent (1986), if the reader must bring to the text
linguistic, conceptual, and cultural understanding of a high order, teachers must be
prepared to deal with literature in the classroom with more than the simple formalistic
approach to literature instruction, what Short & Candlin refer to as teaching about
literature instead of teaching literature itself.
Short & Candlin (1986) carried out, with the help of several colleagues from and
at the University of Lancaster (GB), a case study with three different groups of literature
teachers from around the globe, and one of these courses took place in Nanjing, China
with only Chinese instructors. The course organizers included three different instructional
strands: stylistic analysis (language & literary study), reading strategies (levels of
meaning,

strategies,

&

difficulties),

and

curriculum

design

(purpose,

content/methodology & evaluation).

Prof. Jonathan Acua Solano

A Critique on Teaching Study Skills for English Literature

Based on Short & Candlins (1986) case studies at Lancaster and Nanjing, what
was suggested to course participants is that if a reader feels some need to process a
text as a literary artefact , he or she will attempt to apply a set of special interpretative
conventions. From my experience, this predisposition or literary indisposition can
trigger a high anxiety level when learners are faced with texts they are not ready to deal
with. Students should be confronted with literature from a different angle where they can
perceive the text not so much as a literary one (Short & Candlin, 1986). It is a shame
that the case study authors did not include other activities they developed along their
training courses.
Should literature be treated as something that is not connected to language? For
Short & Candlin (1986), if there is a distinct corpus of texts which can be called
literature, it would appear that the corpus will have to be defined at least partly in sociocultural rather than in linguistic terms. In other words, literature as the mirror stage in
Lancans words (Bruss, 1981) is a way to have the reader live life or its experiences over
again. What literature awakes in the reader/student is what really counts, and if
instructors are able to awake all this set of sensations, feelings and emotions, the
beginning of some sort of literary criticism can start to happen in terms of literary
appreciation.

Prof. Jonathan Acua Solano

A Critique on Teaching Study Skills for English Literature

Bruss, N. (1981), Lacan & Literature. The Massachusetts Review. Vol. 22, No. 1 (Spring
1981). pp. 62-92. Retrieved on 2015, April 2, 2015 from the Jstor webpage at
http://www.jstor.org/stable/25089121
Long, M. (1986). A Feeling for Language: The multiple values of teaching literature.
Literature and Language Teaching. Edited by Brumfit & Carter. Oxford: OUP
McKay, S. (1986). Literature in the ESL Classroom. Literature and Language Teaching.
Edited by Brumfit & Carter. Oxford: OUP
Vincent, V. (1986). Simple Text and Reading Text. Literature and Language Teaching.
Edited by Brumfit & Carter. Oxford: OUP
Short, M. & Candlin, C. (1986). Teaching Study Skills for English Literature. Literature
and Language Teaching. Edited by Brumfit & Carter. Oxford: OUP

Prof. Jonathan Acua Solano