The Space and Practice of Reading: A Case Study of Reading and Social Class in Singapore

Loh Chin Ee
Paperback, 130 pages
9781138365766

Mirroring worldwide debates on social class, literacy rates, and social change, this study explores the intersection between reading and social class in Singapore, one of the top scorers on the Programme for International Assessment (PISA) tests, and questions the rhetoric of social change that does not take into account local spaces and practices. This comparative study of reading practices in an elite school and a government school in Singapore draws on practice and spatial perspectives to provide critical insight into how taken-for-granted practices and spaces of reading can be in fact unacknowledged spaces of inequity. Acknowledging the role of social class in shaping reading education is a start to reconfiguring current practices and spaces for more effective and equitable reading practices. This book shows how using localized, contextualized approaches sensitive to the home, school, national and global contexts can lead to more targeted policy and practice transformation in the area of reading instruction and intervention.

Contents
1. Acknowledgements
2. Preface
3. Introduction: Social Class, Cultural Capital, and Reading
4. Becoming a Reader: Home-School Connections
5. Singaporean Boys Constructing Global Literate Selves: School-Nation Connections
6. Levelling the Reading Gap: Socio-Spatial Perspectives
7. Conclusion: The Space and Practice of Reading

Loh Chin Ee is Assistant Professor at the National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University.