Critical reading

What is it?
Critical reading is a more ACTIVE way of reading. It is a deeper
and more complex engagement with a text.

Critical reading is a process of analyzing, interpreting and,

sometimes, evaluating.

When we read critically, we use our critical thinking skills to

QUESTION both the text and our own reading of it.

Different disciplines may have distinctive modes of critical reading

(scientific, philosophical, literary, etc.)
Non-critical (or pre-critical) reading is
concerned with recognizing what a text
says about the topic. The goal is to
make sense of the presentation as a
sequence of thoughts, to understand
the information, ideas, and opinions
stated within the text from sentence to
sentence, paragraph to paragraph. This
is a linear activity.
Critical reading is an analytic
activity. The reader rereads a text to
identify patterns of elements --
information, values, assumptions,
and language usage-- throughout the
discussion. These elements are tied
together in an interpretation, an
assertion of an underlying meaning
of the text as a whole.
Critical thinking involves bringing
outside knowledge and values to
bear to evaluate the presentation and
decide what to ultimately accept as
true.
2. Preliminary example:
Dr. Charles Drew, a black doctor, was a leader in the effort to
store blood and, as director of the Red Cross, developed the
first blood banks.
The passages below SAY somewhat the same thing. They
convey essentially the same information. But they DO
different things, and in so doing portray Drew slightly
differently. (The second, for instance, includes a quotation.)
And as a result, they MEAN slightly different things.
What is the overall message in each excerpt? As you read, ask
yourself how the actions of Drew and other parties are
portrayed:
Text 1
“For a long time, the Army and Navy refused to
accept blood from black people. Even after it
started to accept "colored" blood, the Army told
the Red Cross to separate the donated blood of
black people from that of whites. Charles Drew
explained that there was no such thing as "black"
and "white" blood. Blood was blood. But no one
listened. This made Charles Drew very sad and
angry. He resigned from the Red Cross.”
Text 2
“Due to the success of his program [to collect, store and ship blood for transfusions in
England], Drew was appointed as Red Cross director of a nationwide project to collect
blood for the U.S. military. The project was going well until the armed forces told the Red
Cross that it did not want any "colored" blood. Such a racist policy made no sense from
any scientific or medical point of view. In an angry editorial, the Chicago Defender said:
No Negro blood accepted but---
When the terrible blitz raids of London . . . killed and wounded thousands . . . it was an
American Negro surgeon [who organized and sent] U.S. blood plasma overseas.
No Negro blood accepted but---
When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and maimed hundreds of American soldiers
and sailors, it was blood collected by a Negro surgeon that saved their lives.

Because of this kind of protest, the military agreed to accept "colored" blood but insisted
that it be kept separate from blood donated by whites. To Dr. Drew this directive was
completely unacceptable, and he resigned from the blood program.”
The presentations have similar structures: they
both contrast the actions and positions of the
Army, Red Cross, and Dr. Drew. In each case, the
Army's directive to the Red Cross is given as the
cause of his quitting. But by portraying that
action differently, as examples of different
behaviors, different meanings are implied:
The two presentations thus develop different "
inference equations ":
Text 1: resignation due to frustration implies:
quitter
Text 2: resignation based on principle implies:
courageous behavior
We could continue the analysis of the second text by
describing the nature of the quotation from the
Defender:
o What the examples are examples of?
o How the inclusion of such material
contributes to the portrayal of the Army
actions, and hence to Drew's response to
those actions?
Others might analyze these, or any other, texts
differently; critical reading is not about finding a single,
correct interpretation. Rather, utilizing a linguistic
approach to analysis, each reader attempts to find a
consistency in the choices of content, language and
structure available to the author to infer an overall
meaning and perspective for the text as a whole.
But… what are inference equations?
Inferences are not random. Inferences follow
rules. Not mathematical rules, but rules based
on common experience and social conventions.
We draw inferences from the relationships of
certain ideas, and can, in effect, write
"equations" to suggest this process.
Consider the following two remarks:

“The stock market fell. Burger King laid off

1,000 workers.”

What do you infer?

We have two separate assertions: That the stock market fell and that
Burger King laid off 1,000 workers. But watch what happens when
the ideas are related in specific ways.

The stock market fell, after Burger King laid off 1,000 workers.
The stock market fell, because Burger King laid off 1,000 workers.
The stock market fell, therefore Burger King laid off 1,000 workers.
The stock market fell, but Burger King laid off 1,000 workers.
With each set of assertions, we draw inferences based on the relationship of
the ideas.

Burger King's layoffs might have been the cause of the stock market's drop.
Burger King's layoffs caused the drop in the stock market.
Burger King laid off workers because of a drop in the stock market.
The stock market drop did not affect Burger King's laying off of workers.
The overall meaning is conveyed not only by the
individual assertions, the content, but also by how
the elements of the content are related to one
another, the structure. We identify the nature and
relationship of parts, and infer underlying or
unspoken meanings.
Let’s visit a website on “Critical Reading
of An Essay's Argument”.
http://web.cn.edu/kwheeler/reading_ba
sic.html
Following the steps presented in that guide on how to
critically approach the reading of an argumentative essay,
let's carefully analyze the essay that accompanies this
presentation (Hidden Intellectualism
An excerpt from They Say/I Say:
The Moves that Matter in Academic Writing) through a
discussion in our next session. I suggest following up on the
steps presented in a systematic way in order to make a
stronger argument for the conclusions drawn at the end of
the reading. At the end of the webpage you can find an
outline for these steps.
http://web.cn.edu/kwheeler/reading_outline.html