The Scien[ce]tism of Reading as National Fantasy: Affect, Identity, and the Un/Making of "Citizen‐Subjects".
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| Title: | The Scien[ce]tism of Reading as National Fantasy: Affect, Identity, and the Un/Making of "Citizen‐Subjects". |
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| Authors: | Dernikos, Bessie P.1 (AUTHOR) bdernikos@fau.edu, Ferguson, Daniel E.2 (AUTHOR) |
| Source: | Reading Research Quarterly (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.). Jul-Sep2026, Vol. 61 Issue 3, p1-17. 17p. |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we think‐with Berlant's (1991) concept of national fantasy to argue that the mainstream interpretation of the Science of Reading (SOR)—particularly its reductive application of Gough and Tunmer's (1986) Simple View of Reading—functions as an ideological force that affectively shapes not only literacy curricula and instruction, but also national identity. Reading, then, becomes not a tool for critical inquiry or democratic engagement, but a performance of national belonging, rooted in the illusion of shared, apolitical values. By framing science as definitively settled, that is, as scientism, narrow conceptions of SOR overlook the ways that literacy is affectively charged, creating a tremendous amount of national anxiety at the thought of reading as anything other than a sanitized, apolitical, and safely "objective" cognitive act. Ultimately, we contend that the optimistic desire to simply "follow the science" is entangled with/in national fantasies that bind emotional attachments to "America" and its "utopian heritage." Not only do such attachments narrowly shape SOR mandates in ways that promote the "slow death" of children's knowledge‐cultures, but they may also potentially re/produce the very cognitive reading difficulties the SOR movement aims to prevent. "Plugging in" (Jackson & Mazzei, 2012) to two data‐scenes—one dilating attention to the Simple View of Reading and the other to a basal curriculum lesson‐set on American "people we celebrate"—we show how attuning to affect is essential for sensing these attachments, amplifying rather than diminishing cognitive considerations, and reimagining literacy as a site of critical nationalism that un/makes children as "citizen‐subjects." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
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| Database: | Education Research Complete |
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| Abstract: | In this paper, we think‐with Berlant's (1991) concept of national fantasy to argue that the mainstream interpretation of the Science of Reading (SOR)—particularly its reductive application of Gough and Tunmer's (1986) Simple View of Reading—functions as an ideological force that affectively shapes not only literacy curricula and instruction, but also national identity. Reading, then, becomes not a tool for critical inquiry or democratic engagement, but a performance of national belonging, rooted in the illusion of shared, apolitical values. By framing science as definitively settled, that is, as scientism, narrow conceptions of SOR overlook the ways that literacy is affectively charged, creating a tremendous amount of national anxiety at the thought of reading as anything other than a sanitized, apolitical, and safely "objective" cognitive act. Ultimately, we contend that the optimistic desire to simply "follow the science" is entangled with/in national fantasies that bind emotional attachments to "America" and its "utopian heritage." Not only do such attachments narrowly shape SOR mandates in ways that promote the "slow death" of children's knowledge‐cultures, but they may also potentially re/produce the very cognitive reading difficulties the SOR movement aims to prevent. "Plugging in" (Jackson & Mazzei, 2012) to two data‐scenes—one dilating attention to the Simple View of Reading and the other to a basal curriculum lesson‐set on American "people we celebrate"—we show how attuning to affect is essential for sensing these attachments, amplifying rather than diminishing cognitive considerations, and reimagining literacy as a site of critical nationalism that un/makes children as "citizen‐subjects." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
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| ISSN: | 19362722 |
| DOI: | 10.1002/rrq.70120 |
