Well said! Let's hope some journalists bite.

My thoughts exactly. Though of course much better-put. I got quoted sorta to this effect (in very reduced form) in an article in the Christian Science Monitor published July 11ish (alas, even the CSM is now charging for access to its archives). My main point was to ask what exactly counted as "reading" in the survey, and why we should privilege those forms of reading over the many others that are now thoroughly imbricated in our lives. And whether, perhaps, it wasn't preferable to think about how other forms of communication might serve the same laudable purposes that print culture served for the last five centuries, rather than knee-jerking our way into an elitist, retrograde, decline-of-western-civilization stance.

Anyhow. (Sorry to be running a bit behind, these days!)

An article just appeared in Reading Today, published by the International Reading Association, written by the President, MaryEllen Vogt. She is also in agreement with you. Here is the letter I wrote to Reading Today, which will be published:

Is the reading decline real?

IRA President MaryEllen Vogt is one of the few
commentators who has not panicked at the reported decline in book reading in the United States (“Book reading drops, says new survey,” August/September 2004). Vogt points out the limits of the Reading at Risk report, noting that people might be engaging in
other kinds of literate behaviors other than book reading and reading in formats other than books (online reading, zines, etc.).

A closer look at the actual report supports Vogt’s position: Reading At Risk tells us that 9.3% of the respondents indicated that they listened to books on tape. We have no data on the use of books on tape in earlier surveys, but this option was certainly not as widespread as it is now. It is likely that a number of people have transferred some of their reading to books on tape: In my case, nearly all my fiction “reading” is done with books on tape, while driving. The popularity of books on tape could account for at least
some of the “decline” in book reading, especially in the literature category.

Also, data from earlier surveys suggests that the dip in “literature” reading may not be stable: The percentage of adults reporting reading literature dropped from 54% in 1992 to 47% in 2002, but back in 1945, only 41% said they read literature (the 1945 figure did not include poetry and plays, however).

Those who feel we are becoming less literate might want to consider the data on writing: Reading at Risk reported that the percentage of people engaged in creative writing has remained amazingly stable. In the 1982 survey, 7%, 1985, 9% and 2003, 7.1%%. Clearly, a lot of people are writing. The 2003 report also tells us that “only 1 percent (or 2 million people) had a work published.” I find this an astoundingly high number and a very positive sign of intellectual vigor.

Before we look for solutions to this current “literacy crisis” we should make sure it is real. Prof. Vogt has asked the right questions.

Stephen Krashen
Professor Emeritus
University of Southern Californi

Thanks for checking in here, Stephen. That's a good letter.

This is an excellent response to the report, which I intend to get a copy of today so that I can determine how the act of reading is defined and what exactly constitutes reading in the eyes of the NEA.

As a book discussion group facilitator for groups in online settings and physical locations, I can tell you that PEOPLE ARE READING, that adults of all ages, male and female, and of diverse socioeconomic and professional backgrounds ARE reading.What's more they are reading print, ebooks and hypertexts and a surprising number of elderly are computer savvy about reading hypertext documents and willing to read hyperfiction.

If you are interested, I can share with you the results of my print and hypertext reading and writing culture survey, conducted in early 2003.

Again, thanks.

Sincerely,
Christine

I would love to read Christine Goldbeck's survey and any other data related to this issue. Please post URL, or send to skrashen@yahoo.com. Some of my work is available at www.sdkrashen.com. It is important that we share our findings. The "decline" reported by the NEA has reached the status of urban legend.

Yes, Christine, if you have a URL please do feel free to post it here.

Here is the latest. The assumption of course is that the decline is real. The NEA's solution is to get a big grant.

NEA Ready to Lead Reading Initiative
by Jim Milliot -- Publishers Weekly, 8/30/2004

The National Endowment for the Arts chairman, Dana Gioia, hopes the organization can soon take the lead in creating private-public partnerships that will promote reading. In the nearly two months since the NEA released its "Reading at Risk" report, Gioia said he has met with a variety of individuals, companies and groups (including the AAP) about what can be done to address the drastic decline in reading of literature documented by the "Reading at Risk" study.

Gioia said the NEA will create a "national initiative" next year that it will fund at some level, but he noted that while he is hopeful that the association's budget will be raised in the fiscal year beginning October 1 by $10 million, to about $132 million, the NEA "can't change things by ourselves. We can inform people about the issue and coordinate model programs that address the problem."

The NEA's July press conference about the report has generated over 300 articles, and the Endowment is in the process of setting up presentations across the country with writers' groups and libraries to continue the debate. Gioia said there has been an "enormous public response [to the study], but no less than the topic deserves. It is an important issue, and these are scary statistics." He said that some critics who have questioned the methodology used—the survey did not focus on people who read nonfiction—miss the larger point about the erosion of the reading habit. Gioia noted that the survey did find that only 56% of American adults read any book in 2002, while 47% read literature. "If we added quality nonfiction, I don't think the results would have changed," Gioia said, "the survey was designed to be as inclusive as possible. Anyone who had read a paragraph of fiction" was included in the reading column.

With the NEA's first objective of creating a discussion about the decline in reading well underway, the association is beginning to develop "effective model programs," Gioia said. He is a proponent of "civic programming" and cited the City Reads programs as an example of one form of reading outreach that the NEA could help expand. Gioia also wants to find ways to increase the media's coverage of reading, pointing out that "people only do things that they are aware of." Gioia said he would like to "reconnect literature with the notion that reading brings enchantment, pleasure and wisdom."

Gioia aims to start a few reading projects next year with some seed money from the NEA. He would like to model the reading initiative after an NEA Shakespeare program, which the association has spent about $7 million on over the past two years, and the private sector has contributed about $20 million. While Congress is likely to appropriate funds to support effective programs, that could take two years, he said. "We can't wait. We need to act now."

Stephen I don't see the NEA initiatives here as a bad thing at all. In fact, it's good to see these topics so much on the public agenda (compared to the usual state of affairs). But I do think that if we're going to debate (and indeed, *act* on) the assumption that reading is "at risk" we need to work harder than the NEA has thus far done to define reading: define it socially, technologically, historically, and cognitively. That's where the work should begin.

It all depends on what they want to do. The research overwhelmingly says that access to reading material is the number one variable. But instead of improving libraries, the usual approach is incentives (which don't work, see my paper on Accelerated Reader on my website and books by Alfie Kohn), and posters that urge people to read.
But yes, we need to define reading as more than book reading and bring it to the public's attention that the "decline" may or may not be real. I hope to write to Publisher's Weekly in the next few days.

I just sent a long letter to Publishers Weekly in response to several articles they published on the "decline" in reading, quoting Prof. Kirschenbaum. I have posted it on my website, along with the articles from the magazine. You can find it at www. sdkrashen.com, under "View archives" then go to Krashen maillist archives. Permission granted in advance to share, download, post elsewhere.