- Reading path
A reading path is a term used by
Gunther Kress in "Literacy in the New Media Age" (2003). According to Kress, a professor of English Education at theUniversity of London , a reading path is the way that the text, or text plus other features, can determine or order the way that we read it. In alinear , written text, the reader makes sense of the text according to the arrangement of the words, both grammatically and syntactically. In such a reading path, there is a sequential time to the text. In contrast, with non-linear text, such as the text found when reading a computer screen, where text is often combined with visual elements, the reading path is non-linear and non-sequential. Kress suggests that reading paths that contain visual images are more open tointerpretation and the reader's construction of meaning. This is part of the "semiotic work" that we do as a reader [ Kress, G. (2003). Literacy in the new media age. New York: Routledge. page 57]Linear reading path
An example of a linear reading path might be a textbook, without pictures, where the reader is led to assume cause-and-effect sequences, for example. Speech is also a linear path because the path is more "set" [Kress, G. (2003). Literacy in the new media age. New York: Routledge. page 4] according to Kress.
Non-linear reading path
An example of a non-linear reading path might be a text that has images alongside it. Kress argues that this different mode yields a different
affordance ; the visual image allows for open interpretation. A concrete example on paper might be a diagram such as aflow chart orgraphic organizers . In such multi-modal texts, the reading path is much less linear and more open to the reader's interpretation.The idea that reading paths differ according to evolving, emerging, multi-modal texts, are part of the
New literacy studies ,visual rhetoric , and the concept of multiliteracies.References
Kress, G. (2003). Literacy in the new media age. New York: Routledge.
External links
* [http://www.knowledgepresentation.org/BuildingTheFuture/Kress2/Kress2.html Reading Images, Multimodality, Representation, and New Media]
* [http://btrayner.info/multilits/ Multiliteracies for online learning]
* [http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0508/08-delaney.php Scanning the Front Pages]
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