For my undergraduate History degree I needed to take 4 classes (16 hours) of upper-level courses in the school of Arts & Humanities that were not History or Philosophy. This mostly left LIT courses, which I knew all required a significant amount of reading. I identify as a slow reader: in order to reach an adequate depth of understanding and to properly engage & internalize the content, I feel like took me a lot of time. Each class could require 3-5 books, followed by a synthesis, analysis, or comparison across the books. The ambitious undergrad student, who was aiming for 2 undergraduate degrees, taking 18 hours of classes each semester, and had a part-time job could not muster neither the will nor time to commit to reading books that were chosen for me. My solution: take 3 communications classes and 1 grammar class. At the time, I would rather give speeches, write, and analyze the structure of English grammar and usage rather than spend the time to read books. A large part of this spirit is with me in how I approach reading, but I have now amended my position.

I often want to “get to the point.” Rather than reading an entire book, it is easier than ever to turn to pre-produced synopses or to generate a “condensed” version of the material. However, “the point” in reading is often not to simply cognitively understand a subject, but to spend time developing a web of analyses. Because our brains have the ability to perform parallel processing, and because reading does not maximize our brain’s processing capacity, while reading and engaging with the material, we are making connections; both consciously and subconsciously. We are conjuring previously-learned facts, constructs, and notions that we believe are related to the material. We are evaluating the material against those previous thoughts. We are critiquing the author against what we previously held. We are correcting previous beliefs to conform to new material the author is presenting. We are asking questions, conducting internal dialogue, and projecting out implications that were not necessarily explicitly stated. Much more is accomplished rather than a cognitive understanding of the material during the time we spend reading. We are calibrating our own internal facts, figures, and systems.

Should all content demand this depth of calibration? I hope not, and I certainly don’t practice such. But if we spend zero time performing such an exercise, through reading, are we left with shallow thoughts, beliefs, and unchecked systems? If we always stop at “getting the point” but our own internal values, thoughts, and emotions are never touched, then what? While we evaluate and decide to commit to a particular reading, let’s not stop at “how do we get to the point the fastest.” Let’s additionally consider whether this subject needs “tuning” and if we are open to such from the author.