The decline in both literacy rates and recreational reading has been steady, and it’s a saddening glimpse of the future for the United States. Point Loma Nazarene University students and faculty said reading has impacted their lives by offering comfort and connection with ideas and experiences beyond their own.
A recent study from the journal iScience found that in a cohort of over 236,000 Americans studied for 20 years, reading for leisure has declined by more than 40%.
Reading has been a means of understanding a multitude of perspectives, gaining knowledge in topics unknown to many, and diving deeper into uncomfortable spaces that we typically do not find ourselves in.
To me, reading has acted as an avenue to immerse oneself in new communities and unite unlikely groups of people. PLNU’s mission is to “provide higher education in a vital Christian community where minds are engaged and challenged,” according to its mission statement.
Emma Grace Weber, assistant director of the Writing Center and a second-year master of arts in writing student, describes her initial connection to literature as a way to bond with her family.
“I have two older sisters, and my most immediate sister has been so cool and literary to me,” she said. “That was the first one [book] I could understand, and it was talking about big concepts that I could understand.”
“Franny and Zooey,” written by J.D. Salinger, is a modern bildungsroman that Weber read to obtain a better understanding of two things: who her sister was and how she can better relate to her. Through the willingness to get closer to a loved one, Weber opened up about the power reading possesses.
“I think it’s cool that books bring people together,” Weber said. “Finding that commonality between people, and sometimes I read a book knowing the books my friend read and thinking, ‘I should tell them about this.’”
An attribution to why many individuals do not pick up reading for fun, according to some students, is that it often appears a daunting task — long books, dense prose and uncomfortable topics.
However, not every book needs to be a strenuous endeavor and can instead be likened to picking what food you want to eat. The largest chunks of meat are going to be chewy, thick and consumed over a long period of time. Instead, a person should be encouraged to find their favorite bag of potato chips, where once they take the first bite, the whole bag is nearly gone before they realize it.
Bettina Pedersen, PLNU professor of literature and women’s studies, said that her potato chips of choice are poems and the Bible.
“I love the Psalms; that is what I go back to over and over. I have started revisiting the Gospels as well. They speak powerfully to me,” she said.
Pedersen exudes passion for literature and laments over the loss of the unique nature of sitting down to read, where she feels that the most meaningful gift of instilling a love to read has been stripped away by distractions.
“They are heartbreaking trends, most obviously because they have been replaced by cell phones and social media, which we are now recognizing as having detrimental effects to mental health. But reading is the antidote to that,” she said.
Pedersen bolsters the idea that community is formed through literature by emphasizing the dynamic nature that reading has on shaping an individual.
“Spiritually, emotionally and psychologically, with fiction especially, allows us a safe distance to consider questions, to explore realities, to enter into other experiences we haven’t had, in a way that does not make us feel so threatened that we won’t do it.”
Rachel Henderson, a first-year master’s in writing student and Writing Center tutor, said she sees students gain confidence when learning to embrace reading and writing.
“When students come in [the Writing Center], they leave feeling more confident in what they are writing,” she said. “It gives them a space to talk it out, and assess and feel their feelings about their capabilities.”
Kate Williams