The Reading Man in the Mirror of 21st Century Socio-Humanitarian Knowledge

The far reaching changes in reading practices associated with the explosive spread of screen culture have become a challenge both for specialists faced with the outflow of readers from libraries and the decline of in print circulation, and for researchers who need to conceptualize these changes from a theoretical perspective. The aim of the article is to identify possible points of growth for interdisciplinary research into the phenomenon of reading.

The presentations at the 4th International Scholarly and Practice Conference “Homo legens in the past and present”, held on 23—25 March 2023 in Novosibirsk and Nizhny Tagil in inperson and remote formats, are reviewed. The event was attended by scholars representing various academic disciplines (cultural history, book studies, sociology, philology, library science, art studies, pedagogy, psychology) and specialists engaged in serving readers and popularizing reading.

The method of thematic analysis allowed to identify five trends in studying of reading and reading practices: 1) the use of theoretical approaches inherent in various socio-humanitarian disciplines, which are applicable to the understanding of reading activity; 2) the study of historical aspects of reading; 3) studies formed by representatives of contemporary socio-humanitarian knowledge, who study the phenomenon of reading with the orientation on the use their findings in professional practices; 4) transformations produced by librarians and educators who implement various socio-cultural projects to promote reading; 5) the development of science at the intersection of art studies, literary studies, cultural studies and museum practices. Since the reading is the most important practice that provides the mass audience with socially meaningful information, the authors believe that the scholarly forum, which brought together specialists related to the study of the Reading Man, should serve not only to demonstrate the already achieved scholarly and practice-based results, but also to form the prospects for further research on reading as a complex interdisciplinary phenomenon.

This review may be helpful both to scholars and practitioners to working in the field of book and library science to engage readers.

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