10 Examples of Critical Reading

Critical Reading

The critical reading is a way of reading a text that consists of analyzing the main concepts and understanding the structure, the argumentation and conclusions to interpret it from another point of view, establish relationships with other texts and find ambiguities.

Critical reading differs from other types of reading because it does not consist only in reading, but what is read is evaluated. Many texts have been analyzed and interpreted more than once, because a text has more than one way of being approached.

There are writers and researchers who are dedicated to analyzing theories, writings, essays, literary texts, among others, to construct hypotheses that propose a new way of reading a text and discover in it new senses.

Critical reading is usually reflected in different argumentative texts, in which the authors analyze theoretical or artistic texts in order to explain them in a different way.

How to do a critical reading?

To make a critical reading it is necessary:

Examples of critical reading

1. The new journalism, by Tom Wolfe. In this book the author proposes a new way of doing journalism and, for this, he makes a critical reading of traditional journalism, of the literature of no fiction (the new journalism), the classification of literary genres, 20th century literature in relation to realism and criticism literary. In the book, the critical reading carried out on other texts allows the author to explain how this new literary genre arose and what it is like.
2. The three vanguards, by Ricardo Piglia. In this text four central axes are analyzed: the concept of avant-garde, some works by Juan José Saer, some works by Rodolfo Walsh and some works by Manuel Puig. The book was not written by the author, but they are recordings of a seminar that Piglia gave at the University of Buenos Aires. At the beginning of the book, the author makes a critical reading of the notion of avant-garde and how different authors describe it. Afterwards, a critical reading is made of certain works by the three authors in relation to the avant-garde.
3. Mimesis, by Erich Auerbach. In this book, the German literary critic analyzes different works from the West to explain how reality is represented in different works and according to different authors. Furthermore, the book is organized in such a way as to show how the conception of mimesis changed over time.
4. The nature of Greek myths, by Geoffrey Stephen Kirk. In this book the author makes a critical reading of the different definitions and conceptions that exist about myths. In addition, myths differ from fables, legends and sagas. The author also makes a critical reading on Greek myths and how they should be classified.
5. The historical text as a literary artifact, by Hayden White. In this book, the author makes a critical reading of history and its epistemology by stating that history creates a narrative that contains the same elements as fictional texts. In other words, the book analyzes historical discourse from another point of view.
6. Borges, a writer on the border, by Beatriz Sarlo. In this text the author makes a critical reading of the works of the Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges. To do this, she analyzes his works, the author's career, the author's position regarding the conception of literature and the readings that have been made about the author.
7. The philosophy of the Enlightenment, by Ernst Cassirer. This book makes a critical reading of the different thinkers of the Enlightenment. To do this, the author analyzes the theories that emerged at this time and specifically evaluates the work of Immanuel Kant, the German philosopher.
8. Truth and legal formsby Michael Focault. This book is a transcript of five lectures given by the French philosopher. They pose different questions for which a critical reading of the work of Nietzsche, Marxist theory, the conceptions of the relationship between subject, history and social practices, science and the discourse of justice, theories of the subject, such as psychiatry and medicine, among others.
9. My Pushkin, by Marina Tsvietáieva. In this text, the author makes a critical reading of the Russian writer's work and a detailed analysis of his work. It is also a critical reading about how Pushkin was read, since the author highlights other texts by the author, different from those that she highlighted by literary criticism. In this book, critical reading consists of analyzing an author's work from another point of view.
10. All that is solid melts into air, by Marshall Berman. In this book, the author makes a critical reading of the idea of ​​modernity and progress as a point starting point to analyze literary works by Goethe, Pushkin, Dostoivski, Gogol, Mandelstam, among others. There is a critical reading because it is proposed to read literary works from a new point of view to find other meanings.

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