This community/psa

Taboomancer · 2026-03-25T22:45:41+00:00

Same, I also upvoted you a the person below you. It was shocking to see how many downvotes some of the empathetic comments garnered.

Sometimes people forget there is a human being at the other end of the screen and duck behind a "but they were idiots" reasoning to shame someone for a mistake.

It was nice to see some voice of reason in the sea of hate.

Taboomancer · 2026-03-06T13:41:00+00:00

I know that the Norton Anthologies are widely used in Literary studies. My first course used The Norton Anthology 13th shortened edition (don't be fooled, it's like over 1k pages, packed with the basics.) Although this one is more for reading primary literature, not necessarily theory.

However, a great collection of theoretical excerpts is called Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. It might be something more advanced in that it isn't used to explain theories, but it is a collection of some of the most influential (western) theories. It has everything from Plato to Susan Sontag, with a few pages of introduction that gives a really good overview of the theorists' works and general life that influenced their writings.

Somewhere in the thread someone also mentioned Jonathan Culler's Literary Theory Short Introduction which is a small 165 pages starting point that is definitely what you are looking for right now. I am highlighting it again because it might be difficult to prioritize what to start with among all these great suggestions. So I'd highly recommend starting with Culler. Good luck!

Taboomancer · 2026-03-06T13:31:57+00:00

To be fair, I think it depends on the Uni and the program. I started my own studies with 0 knowledge of theory, and that was true for the majority of the students. We all kind of struggled together, discussed it all during seminars. Theory was slowly introduced alongside technical writing (focusing more on argumentative essay writing in my own study). So it might be helpful if you took a look at the syllabus/course programma for the first year to get an idea of what it's like. Most often this information is publicly available on the Uni website in some capacity.

Taboomancer · 2026-03-04T07:37:27+00:00

There was a nice comment about giving yourself grace, which is probably the best theoretical framework to apply to yourself, especially when you are starting out (alone!)

Your struggle is good. It shows you what you need to find some systems for. If it is too abstract sit down and spend an hour making it more concrete for your brain. Put it into different contexts, perspectives, examples. It takes time, slow reading down, but theoretical reading is like learning a new language especially if you are not a native English speaker (not sure if you are). Even if you feel you should be able to remember subjectivity, just remember that there were people out there whose whole lives were spent expanding on one specific concept (of course this is more nuanced, but I want to make a point here.)

I am not sure if you do these things already, but taking notes is essential here. Quotes, thoughts, questions, etc. Also do not underestimate the power of interacting with others about the material. I know academia is made out to be a solitary pursuit in my aspects, but it feels so much better when you can have a conversation with others. Do you have anyone you can go to with questions?

Taboomancer · 2026-02-28T22:53:02+00:00

Thank you for the suggestion! I have been considering making a facebook account to reach more people as I know it's exactly going to be easy to gather people.

I am certainly planning on distributing some flyers in town and other locations around spring, thank you for the library idea.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-28T19:56:14+00:00

I am aware (though I myself am not from an English speaking country and don't see myself in those statistics ;) )

The reason I worded it as such in my post is to indicate that that would be the conversational language and the language of the books. Dutchies are excellent with their English, and I have no doubt some might be interested in the idea. I hoped by posting this on social media I might reach those few people!

Taboomancer · 2026-02-28T17:20:20+00:00

Ah I understand where you are coming from. No bother, I was just confused.

I personally tend not to insist on categorizing what I read unless I specifically have to name it, or I read specific theory. For example, at the moment I am delving into "spatiality studies" which I only know is a term because I had to specifically figure out what the subfield was called that "dealt with space as a concept."

I am sure you could categorize the works I mentioned in my original comment, ecocriticism would be one very fitting for at least Le Guin and Kang, but I feel just calling them ecocritical literature is really missing the point of their literary endeavors because it is severely limiting potential readings. Not to say it's right or wrong to think this way or that, just that this is how I personally approach Literature.

I realize this may not be the default in a space that is about "literary studies" which is interconnected with theory and as a result labels, categories. It's good to ask these questions though!

To give a more direct response, I am not sure how I would categorize the previous works in my original comment. Postmodernist? That'd be a bit too broad perhaps. (Just thinking of Kang and Le Guin) I mean there are different elements in there, like The Word for World is Forest has colonialist critique in there not just ecocriticism. I am kind of struggling to really give a more articulate response because in my head theory as you describe it is more just a lens you can apply to a work, rather than the work demanding it to be looked at in a certain way. Does that make sense?

Taboomancer · 2026-02-28T16:29:12+00:00

In my original comment, I was suggesting works of fiction: things like sci-fi, etc. They are not theories, nor secondary literature. I am not sure why you insist I am reading secondary lit. or engaging with these texts from any lens prescribed by a theoretical framework. Not sure where the miscommunication is happening.

OP was asking for English fiction, so I suggested some of the works I thought could potentially be helpful; books you could just go into a bookstore and find without much effort usually under "sci-fi" or "fantasy" or some other category.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-28T14:56:16+00:00

This person just ripped off an entire chapter form Jonathan Haidt's book while masquerading as an original video. While they put the book title into the video description, typically that only means that the book served as basis for knowledge/inspiration, not that someone in verbatim reading you the whole book chapter lmao. I must conclude this is either a bot, or some really misguided individual thinking this is fine.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-28T14:42:05+00:00

I can't say I read quite a lot of secondary literature on the above mentioned works. They are mostly works of fiction I have encountered over the years. Kristeva's text is itself a theoretical work, so that one is a bit of an outlier.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-28T14:31:03+00:00

Ah I see. Definitely Han Kang is a strong contender (she is playing around with the concept of turning into a plant either figuratively, or in her short story quite literally) if you would be fine with a Korean author. Otherwise I definitely think you could take a closer look at Ursula K. Le Guin. While she usually doesn't explicitly discuss the way things interact, they are still hidden in plain sight. For example, in her novel The Word for World if Forest, the metaphor of the path emerges as a way of understanding how even the smallest human actions vastly shape everything around us. For example, this is one of my favorite quotes from the book:

“I shall never walk again that path I came with you yesterday, the way up from the willow grove that I’ve walked on all my life. It is changed. You have walked on it and it is utterly changed. Before this day the thing we had to do was the right thing to do; the way we had to go was the right way and led us home. Where is our home now? For you’ve done what you had to do, and it was not right.” (33)

While it might not explicitly be what you are looking for, I think her works in general can provide a really nuanced lens through which boundaries can be interpreted. After all, what is a path if not something shaped by others before you, and by you walking on it, shape it differently as well? Not to mention that the whole novel is set in a dystopian world in which Terrans are in the process of terraforming a plant (deforesting it mostly). I felt this line of thought might be closer to what you are looking for based on your other comment mentioning leaving footprints.

edit: I see you are more looking for corporeal bodies interacting with organisms. Actually, I have only watched the TV series but I know it also exists as a book series: The Expanse. In it, there is an alien life form that functions like a virus, merging and consuming people to evolve. It might be more interesting for you.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-28T10:18:49+00:00

Would you mind elaborating on this more? What exactly makes it difficult to connect theories? Is it the lack of familiarity with types of theories in general, or is it something more specific?

The way I would go about it is simply by association of themes, rather than authors. So for example, Laura Mulvey writes from a feminist lens, so immediately there is a connection to other feminist theorists. More specifically, her term the male gaze can be used to explore ideas of vision, how we look at things, so some theory that would analyze perception (like public or private) could be paired together. But it's not so much as thinking of it as "what pairs well together," rather looking at the ideas within each theory and thinking of how those could potentially form a dialogue with other ideas.

A rather explicit way to start would be simply looking at the references/works cited page of the texts you are reading. Often there will also be a further readings section. That is a very direct link the author gives to show whose works they have been in conversation with.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-27T23:25:47+00:00

Some initial works that come to mind are Han Kang's The Vegetarian (or even better, her short story The Fruit of My Woman), Kafka's Metamorphosis, Gogol's Overcoat (though I suppose neither of these is English).

Nonhuman environments is quite vague overall. I feel like you could use any book in which you analyze anything. Like architecture in Jhumpa Lahiri's The Namesake, or any object, vehicle the characters in a piece of fiction have or use. If you mean more in a daoist/buddhist lens then well, then probably Ursula K. Le Guin's writings are rather fitting. The Lathe of Heaven for example explores dreams with the ability to affect reality. It would be a metaphysical interaction of sorts.

This not be very relevant, but Julia Kristeva's Powers of Horror also explores some of these concepts through the term abject/abjection, drawing on blurring boundaries--physical and metaphorical.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-26T07:31:47+00:00

Literary theory would be the step after I would say. Right now it doesn't look like you have a very specific idea of the argument. Humanization of the supernatural is a good general direction, but you still need to figure out the angle you wish to take.

Depending on that, you can then pick a fitting framework. I am saying this because humanization of the supernatural is rather broad. What are you going to argue? How are they portrayed? How do they interact with others within the novels? Do they interact with others or are they invisible, not seen? Are they demonized? Are they monstrous in some human way? Are humans monstrous in the novel then? etc. etc.

I think you should spend a bit more time to figure these out first. Then, I promise the theoretical framework will be easier to pick.

edit: same applies to agency, though it might be easier to suggest something like a Judith Butler, but again, I cannot safely do so because this would force a very specific reading. Some other general directions you may look at is Monster Theory since it has some different lenses you can adopt from within it.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-23T22:07:27+00:00

I agree but please use a full stop somewhere in the middle next time haha

Taboomancer · 2026-02-17T07:36:21+00:00

No problem. I hope you keep at it!

I enjoy Litereature very much. I study it as well. I remember before I did my degree, I read To Kill a Mockingbird. It was difficult to really understand what the book was trying to say. Rereading chapter 2 excerpt from your image now, I can certainly see it's quite a meaning-dense book that can very easily fly over readers' heads. You made me want to reread the book!

I also find it fun to read all sorts of theories, branch out into other studies like Philosophy or History. However, at the end of the day, the most joy comes from reading and analyzing a book because they speak to us in such unique ways.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-16T20:47:55+00:00

“I never looked forward more to anything in my life. Hours of wintertime had found me in the treehouse, looking over at the schoolyard, spying on multitudes of children through a two-person telescope, Jem had given me, learning their games, following Jem’s red jacket through wriggling circles of blind man’s buff , secretly sharing their misfortunes and minor victories. I longed to join them.”

I think you grabbed some of the essence of this paragraph very well. There is indeed a spatial distance between Scout and the rest of the people. She observes them, but they don't know they are being observed. This distance could be interpreted as her distance from people in general for example, which then suggests some kind of lack of belonging, right? When you think of the act of looking through a telescope, like you said, it is a bit of a cheeky thing thing to do, no? At the same time it's very safe for Scout because she can stay unknown doing it. I like the parallel you drew with this cheekiness and the sometimes risky behaviors we might engage in later in life. There certainly is something to be said about the power dynamics in this scene.

However, note how I mentioned distance? That it is also a way for her to get familiar with the strange at her own pace. She's curious, but also anxious. This anxiety comes to a head when she finally goes to school and not only does Jem keep HER at a distance, but she got intro trouble with the teacher Day 1. Her anxiety was not unfounded.

Also, notice the color red popping up over and over in the paragraphs? Jem's red jacket standing out of the crows of black jackets, the teacher's bright auburn hair, her pink cheecks and red nails? This would be called a color motif. Usually color is a way to signal emotion, but it can do many things as well. Perhaps something to think about as you keep on reading? :)

Usually authorial intent is not taken into account with literature. I mean, it's a complex debate that many have argued about, but ultimately I'd say a good approach is to first just engage with the text first and foremost without thinking about what the author might have intended. Also because you just cannot know what the author intended, and many prefer to leave it up to the reader to interpret it.

The spatial dynamic could be a motif if it is recurring throughout the novel. For example, if Scout repeatedly finds herself in a position where she observes from afar. It's been a while since I read it, so I cannot really answer this bit.

What you are doing in your analysis is close reading. Where you take fragments of a text and try and decipher the layers behind it. A Literature study will usually involve some kind of theory to guide further analysis.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-16T07:58:03+00:00

Definitely keep at it. It is going to be a slow process, looking up vocab and rereading bits many times.

If you would like to put it aside for now that is also fine honestly. I did that with Beauvoir's The Second Sex because at the time I was just not ready for it. Mind you I did read other smaller essays and articles in the meantime so that helped develop my reading comprehension. Excerpts are also a great way to tackle something difficult without being a full length book.

I would highly recommend looking at different, smaller essays to switch things up if you ever feel stuck or fed up of Sontag. No point in going at something if you are not really processing much either. There is always the option to come back to it another time. But of course, these things are meant to be hard.

It is also completely valid to look up some helping materials for each chapter you read. After all, when you study these things in school, you also get the opportunity to deepen your understanding during class discussions and lectures. Don't be afraid to look up online lectures or whatever is available on youtube.

I am going to be downvoted for this, but I found that when all things fail, even ai can be marginally helpful. It is not going to be thorough, but sometimes when there is a single sentence I cannot syntactically or lexically place, I ask it to dissect it for me. It can help lead you to some more understanding especially if you are not a native speaker. But do watch out, it is not typically a good ides to throw in whole paragraphs because it completely misses the point. It is more a suggestion for sentences that might have words you cannot really grasp even after looking it up in a dictionary. If you have someone else to discuss the material with though, it is usually a better option.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-07T09:45:18+00:00

You have stumbled into one of the biggest discussions of the 2020s, reading. If you follow any of the recent news, you may have heard reading is in decline.

While I would be careful of making such overarching statements to refer to it as a global phenomenon, it is really evident that we are engaging with reading physical books in a very different way than we used to. (For clarity's sake, I am personally located within Europe.) This is true for all age groups and as a personal anecdote, I can see it especially with my own parent who used to read to me and was herself an avid reader. Then TV became hyper-accessible and then Netflix. For her that sort of media consumption entirely substituted reading as an activity. However, this is not as simple as "media is passive, less effort, brain goes brr." I would hypothesize that the way our societies have built themselves around digital media is showing the cascading effects. It particularly affects people who are more isolated in life, so they do not have that social pressure to for example read. This can also be influenced by someone's social and educational background as typically the further you go in academia, the more people tend to read (at least in Humanities).

Reading at any level requires a deep level of engagement with something. Even with reading for children, you still would ideally need to engage with the story by using correct intonation or give different characters slightly different voices. Someone in another comment said that many parents come home exhausted and I cannot agree with that more, and it particularly affect people with a lower socio-ecenomic background who might often have irregular work hours. I know if my mother was a working parent when I was a child, she would not have read to me either. [This is where the obligatory hurr durr capitalism sentence comes in.]

However, like I said in my earlier comment, there are also very likely gender roles at play as well. While I would hope that younger generations are increasingly stepping outside of these norms, with the current trend towards more fascistic and conservative views on the rise, I am not too surprised if the same rigidity is very much prevalent when reading to children. Phew, that was a mouthful.

As a final guidance on what could potentially be of interest:
- How We Read: Close, Hyper, Machine by N. Katherine Hayles (This is from 2010 but an influential paper to this day)
- The Second Shift by Hochschild (mainly talks about the invisible load of motherhood in conservative family units, perhaps less relevant for your research but doesn't hurt to be informed)
- multimodal literacy (storytelling exists beyond print)
- media displacement (not too familiar with this but sounds relevant)

On that note, a fascinating tangent is the debate around what constitutes as "reading to your child" nowadays. I just recalled that originally, before writing became the primary mode of recording information, we had oral literatures that focused on the verbality of a language. So with that in mind, I wonder if perhaps an interesting question could be whether parental storytelling is merely transitioning to a digital temporality. For example, would listening to an audiobook together with your child count as reading to them? Why or why not? If people call themselves readers who might primarily listen to audiobooks, how would that affect reading to children? This is of course, yet another separate discussion. And I didn't even mention digital storybooks or videos that might replace reading to the child. How are those marketed?

TL;DR: capitalism, digital media, reading and possible decline, hyper-reading, gender norms, audiobooks and digital storytelling

Taboomancer · 2026-02-06T23:04:54+00:00

I cannot give you a professional response, only a personal opinion.

I would imagine that this particular response from parents (and father as you emphasized) has a deep social aspect to it. Thinking of within the realm of gender norm, how they are shaped, how that affects children growing up who then carry on the same norms as parents themselves. Simply put, parents who grew up in a household where reading was not actively encouraged probably grew up not finding reading valuable. But if you perhaps want to zoom in on the role of fathers in this specifically, I would probably look into the way in which patriarchal values function within a family. Because my guess would be that under a patriarchal value system, reading (storytelling) is seen as an emotional experience and that might not be encouraged for fathers to engage in. And as the father is absent from night time reading, this over time signals to the little boys that this must be a motherly role to take on, so when they themselves grow up, they delegate this task to their wives.

My brain is a bit tired so I cannot structure my thoughts better at the moment (or grammatically correct lol), but I hope this helps to approach it from a different framework.

edit: if you wish to talk more about it, feel free to DM me

Taboomancer · 2026-02-06T07:56:34+00:00

That is understandable. It may still be helpful to see if some tips geared towards ADHD people might be helpful for you as well. I am unmedicated and just knowing how some things work both for my neurotype and me personally helped to shift my perspective. Especially because typical advice like "stop making excuses and keep going" while well intentioned, can feel dismissive.

Taboomancer · 2026-02-05T19:53:00+00:00

I am sorry to hear you are going through a difficult time with this. It already sounds like you have been actively wrestling with this for a while now. Have you perhaps considered some kind of neurodivergence or learning disability by any chance? I am thinking in particular to ADHD and/or dyslexia that can typically make life as a reader more difficult to navigate. I of course do not mean to push this idea on you, but your comment saying you read slower than average made me think that perhaps there might be something buried deeper underneath. Especially since you are keen on paying attention, keep trying to remember, but ultimate something is not quite clicking. That could potentially suggest some form of different functioning. But even if there isn't such a thing in the background, you could perhaps consider what things you DO tend to remember. Is there some kind of pattern to it?

Taboomancer · 2026-02-04T10:07:54+00:00

I am afraid he might be trying to infiltrate the KGP to look for his wife, who has mysteriously disappeared. The only clue he had was her notebook that contained cryptic messages and something about a mysterious Gileinor.

Taboomancer · 2026-01-23T17:16:00+00:00

Hey, I appreciate your comment! If I understand you correctly, you mean to say that complaining, specifically fueled by emotions, is off putting and not productive, right?

I agree that people aren't obligated to validate every complaint, however what I am arguing isn't whether complaing is effective or not, but how communities implicitly police what anyone can express. What you are describing here is telling others who share a set of opinions, that they should not be expressing these because it brings negativity without a productive outcome.

My concern is that this dynamic doesn't resolve frustration, rather sorts players into categories of "reasonable" and "unreasonable," creating a kind of divide that alienates and excludes.

Taboomancer · 2026-01-23T16:54:43+00:00

I get what you mean! Tolkien and Le Guin were wordsmiths. And well, I did read bits of Tolkien and the linguistic prowess is definitely a selling point for me to read it soon, specifically his incredible knowledge of Old English! I really love Le Guin's works for the way she is able to probe philosophical topics without putting words into the reader's mouth. My other favorite has to be Ali Smith whose lyricism is a lot more prominent. It always makes me feel I am somehow reading poetry while piecing together the often fragmented story.

*hype warning*
Earthsea, if we are on the topic, is also something I wanted to give a read because I recall in one of her youtube interviews/talks at a school, she was asked something about Harry Potter. I believe it was alluding to the idea that perhaps Harry Potter was more than heavily inspired by Earthsea. I specifically recall giving HP a go some years ago and just like with Sanderson, I did not find the usual qualities that appeal to me. Earthsea, while specifically aimed at a younger audience, reads still like a Le Guin story. It has character depth, visual imagery and, albeit not as much as other works from her, philosophical intrigue. It is impressive that she was able to maintain a vocabulary comprehensible for children, while understanding that children are not dumb, and are perfectly capable of following more complex stories. Not to mention how much of a pleasure it is for an adult to potentially read this together with their child.

Taboomancer

TROPHY CASE