D.Litt. et Phil. (Library & Information Science) / One of the characteristics of publishing in South Africa is that it does not reflect the demographic make-up of South Africa. Publishing in South Africa has been largely financed and controlled by whites and little effort until recently has been expended on the incipient black reader. This has contributed to the lack of a reading culture amongst black people in South Africa. Oral cultures or even cultures with residual amorality Her from Western literate societies. These differences affect cultural products, such as stories, and responses to cultural products. Readers whose norms and expectations of formal discourse are governed by residual oral mindset relate to a text quite differently from readers whose sense of style is fundamentally textual. When an author writes, he postulates an audience. He has to know the tradition - the intertextuality - in which he is working. He can then create fictional roles that the reader is willing and able to play. It is not easy to get into a reader's mind, but it is not an impossibility if both the reader and writer are familiar with the 1iterary tradition in which they work, whether this tradition is oral or literate. There are major differences between an oral and literate culture in their thought processes, perceptions of the world, narrative structures and understanding and response to literature. This must affect cultural accessibility of text. An oral culture, such as black South Africans, will look for different structures, characters and types of discourse in their literature.

M.A. (Library Science) / Children's literature transmits values regarded as important by society and is an important means of socialisation. It will tend to reflect those· values regarded as important and fundamental to the dominant social class. Alternative values and the questioning of traditional values only takes place in children's literature when society in general begins to question its values. Reading is a transactional process. Meaning is not "contained in the text" but the result of interaction between the reader and the text. The reader's cultural background and attitudes will play an important role in determining how a text will be understood. Children from diverse backgrounds will not necessarily understand a text in the same way, as they bring their background to the text and understand it or interpret it in the light of that background or schema. Values are the foundation on which people base their actions, beliefs and attitudes. Each culture develops its own value system in terms of which values will be ranked in order of importance. Through socialisation these value systems will be passed on to new generations...

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Thesis (M.A. (English Studies)) --University of Limpopo, 2016 / Local and international assessments on reading have shown over the past years that South African primary schools learners fail to perform at the expected levels in comparison to their counterparts in other parts of the world. However, efforts by the Department of Education to improve the situation through the introduction of intervention programmes, like the Foundations for Learning do not seem to yield the expected results. This was evident in the Annual National Assessment reports which provided a gloomy picture despite the FFL’ s declared intention to improve reading performance to nothing less than 50%. This study therefore, sought to evaluate the implementation of the FFL reading guidelines. This study followed a qualitative research approach wherein observations and interviews were used to engage teachers in four selected Grade 6 rural schools. The resultant data was further corroborated by document analysis that confirmed the findings arrived at. The main finding emerging from this study was that schools treated the FFL reading guidelines as optional. Other findings were that the participating schools found it difficult to integrate the prescribed time allocated to reading activities into their school time tables without interfering with times allocated to other subjects. They therefore, resorted to their own discretion on how best to use the available time to engage learners in reading activities. The implications of the findings are that the reading guidelines were differently and partially implemented by the schools. The other implication was that the reading instruction conducted by the participating schools focused more on reading for assessment than on reading for pleasure. The ultimate goal of reading, which is to develop learners into independent readers, was therefore compromised.

A dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of M. Bibl. in the Department of Library Science at the University of Zululand, South Africa, 1987. / Primary school children of the Mehlwesizwe Circuit, who are learning to read for the first time do not have sufficient reading material in Zulu. These books are essential to the formulation of proper reading habits and the stimulation of the desire to read. An investigation was conducted with all lower primary schools of Mehlwesizwe Circuit, South African publishers, all local bookshops and libraries to ascertain whether any appropriate books in Zulu were available for purchase or loan. Results indicated that few such books were available and of those found, 88 % were translations from other languages and were often unsuitable.1 Possible solutions and recommendations have been presented. / Human Sciences Research Council

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The problem selected for study in the present research project is to determine the reading interests of freshman, sophomore, junior, senior, and graduate students enrolled in the North Texas State Teachers College, Denton, Texas, during the first semester of the 1942-1943 school year.