Download PDF Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, by Maryanne Wolf
Why need to be this publication Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf to review? You will certainly never ever obtain the expertise as well as encounter without obtaining by yourself there or attempting by on your own to do it. Hence, reading this book Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf is required. You could be great and correct enough to obtain exactly how important is reviewing this Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf Even you always check out by responsibility, you can assist yourself to have reading e-book behavior. It will be so helpful and enjoyable after that.
Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, by Maryanne Wolf
Download PDF Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, by Maryanne Wolf
Schedule Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf is among the precious worth that will make you always rich. It will certainly not indicate as abundant as the money provide you. When some people have lack to face the life, individuals with many publications sometimes will certainly be smarter in doing the life. Why need to be book Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf It is in fact not suggested that book Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf will offer you power to get to everything. Guide is to read as well as what we implied is the book that is checked out. You can likewise view just how guide qualifies Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf and also numbers of publication collections are providing below.
When going to take the experience or thoughts types others, book Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf can be a great resource. It holds true. You could read this Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf as the source that can be downloaded and install below. The method to download is likewise easy. You can visit the web link page that we offer and after that acquire the book making a bargain. Download and install Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf and you can deposit in your personal gadget.
Downloading and install the book Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf in this website listings can provide you much more benefits. It will certainly show you the most effective book collections and also finished collections. A lot of publications can be discovered in this site. So, this is not just this Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf Nonetheless, this publication is described check out considering that it is an inspiring publication to give you more chance to get experiences and ideas. This is easy, check out the soft data of guide Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf and you get it.
Your perception of this book Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf will certainly lead you to acquire exactly what you specifically require. As one of the inspiring books, this book will certainly supply the presence of this leaded Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf to collect. Even it is juts soft file; it can be your cumulative file in gizmo and various other tool. The vital is that usage this soft documents publication Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf to read and also take the perks. It is just what we imply as book Proust And The Squid: The Story And Science Of The Reading Brain, By Maryanne Wolf will certainly enhance your thoughts as well as mind. After that, checking out book will likewise enhance your life quality a lot better by taking great activity in balanced.
The act of reading is a miracle. Every new reader's brain possesses the extraordinary capacity to rearrange itself beyond its original abilities in order to understand written symbols. But how does the brain learn to read? As world-renowned cognitive neuroscientist and scholar of reading Maryanne Wolf explains in this impassioned book, we taught our brain to read only a few thousand years ago, and in the process changed the intellectual evolution of our species.
Wolf tells us that the brain that examined tiny clay tablets in the cuneiform script of the Sumerians is configured differently from the brain that reads alphabets or of one literate in today's technology.
There are critical implications to such an evolving brain. Just as writing reduced the need for memory, the proliferation of information and the particular requirements of digital culture may short-circuit some of written language's unique contributions--with potentially profound consequences for our future.
Turning her attention to the development of the individual reading brain, Wolf draws on her expertise in dyslexia to investigate what happens when the brain finds it difficult to read. Interweaving her vast knowledge of neuroscience, psychology, literature, and linguistics, Wolf takes the reader from the brains of a pre-literate Homer to a literacy-ambivalent Plato, from an infant listening to Goodnight Moon to an expert reader of Proust, and finally to an often misunderstood child with dyslexia whose gifts may be as real as the challenges he or she faces.
As we come to appreciate how the evolution and development of reading have changed the very arrangement of our brain and our intellectual life, we begin to realize with ever greater comprehension that we truly are what we read. Ambitious, provocative, and rich with examples, Proust and the Squid celebrates reading, one of the single most remarkable inventions in history. Once embarked on this magnificent story of the reading brain, you will never again take for granted your ability to absorb the written word.
- Sales Rank: #59106 in Audible
- Published on: 2008-08-26
- Format: Unabridged
- Original language: English
- Running time: 506 minutes
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Wolf, a professor of child development at Tufts University, integrates psychology and archaeology, linguistics and education, history and neuroscience in a truly path-breaking look at the development of the reading brain-a complicated phenomenon that Wolf seeks to chronicle from both the early history of humanity and the early stages of an individual's development ("unlike its component parts such as vision and speech... reading has no direct genetic program passing it on to future generations"). Along the way, Wolf introduces concepts like "word poverty," the situation in which children, by age five, have heard 32 million less words than their counterparts (with chilling long-term effects), and makes time for amusing and affecting anecdotes, like the only child she knew to fake a reading disorder (attempting to get back into his beloved literacy training program). Though it could probably command a book of its own, the sizable third section of the book covers the complex topic of dyslexia, explaining clearly and expertly "what happens when the brain can't learn to read." One of those rare books that synthesizes cutting edge, interdisciplinary research with the inviting tone of a curious, erudite friend (think Malcolm Gladwell), Wolf's first book for a general audience is an eye-opening winner, and deserves a wide readership.
Copyright � Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Review
"...intriguing..." -- New Scientist
"Blindingly fascinating...detailed and scholarly....There’s a lot of difficult material in here. But it’s worth the effort....For people interested in language, this is a must. You’ll find yourself focusing on words in new ways. Read it slowly--it will take time to sink in." -- The Sunday Telegraph
"Brilliant and eye-opening." -- Philadelphia Inquirer
"Everything Wolf says makes sense....She clearly knows her stuff." -- Washington Post Book World
"Fascinating....Wolf restores our awe of the human brain." -- Associated Press
"Proust and the Squid is an inspiring celebration of the science of reading....Wolf’s insights are fascinating....Proust and the Squid has much to offer on this important--perhaps the most important--subject" -- The Guardian (London)
"This humane and fascinating book...is a paean to what Proust, �ber-reader, called ‘that fruitful miracle of a communication in the midst of solitude,’ to all that has been and can be achieved for individuals and for mankind through literacy." -- The Evening Standard (London)
"Wolf’s alarm about the spread of semi- literacy among the young is obviously justified, and her book provokes thought about it as only reading can." -- Sunday Times (London)
"[Maryanne Wolf] displays extraordinary passion and perceptiveness concerning the reading brain, its miraculous achievements and tragic dysfunctions." -- BookForum
From the Back Cover
“Human beings were never born to read,” writes Tufts University cognitive neuroscientist and child development expert Maryanne Wolf. Reading is a human invention that reflects how the brain rearranges itself to learn something new.� In this ambitious, provocative book, Wolf chronicles the remarkable journey of the reading brain not only over the past five thousand years, since writing began, but also over the course of a single child’s life, showing in the process why children with dyslexia have reading difficulties and singular gifts.
Lively, erudite, and rich with examples, Proust and the Squid asserts that the brain that examined the tiny clay tablets of the Sumerians was a very different brain from the one this is immersed in today’s technology-driven literacy. The potential transformations in this changed reading brain, Wolf argues, have profound implications for every child and for the intellectual development of our species.�
Most helpful customer reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful.
Richly informative...
By John P. Jones III
Maryanne Wolf has written a richly informative work, which covered a number of areas that I had very limited knowledge of. She is an academic who has made numerous complex subjects and concepts accessible to the non-specialist, yet has not trivialized the material. She never explains when and how she had the inspiration for a very memorable title, which would nag with the question: What could Marcel Proust and a Squid possibly have in common? Ah, like so much in the book, and in real life, it is the connections that our neuro-pathways make.
The author has covered three principal topics. As she explains in the first chapter: "This book consists of three areas of knowledge: the early history of how our species learned to read, from the time of the Sumerians to Socrates; the developmental life cycle of humans as they learn to read in ever more sophisticated ways over time; and the story and science of what happens when the brain can't learn to read."
Admittedly, rather late in life, I finally read The Odyssey. The version was a new one by Barry B. Powell. In his introduction, he posits the theory that the Greek alphabet was invented around 800 B.C., in order to record the poetic rhythm of Homer's epic tale. Thus I was particularly attentive to Wolf's account of how writing systems evolved, starting with the "bird tracks," of the Sumerians through the Akkadians (a language I have only recently become aware of - apparently there are a few hundred people in the world still trying to keep the language alive) and on to the hieroglyphics of the Egyptians. Each of these languages contained a pictorial element. It was only when the Greeks invented their language, which was largely and directly related to the phonetics of the language, that a true alphabet was established.
In human evolution the ability to read has developed only recently. Wolf makes the point that we are not "hard-wired" to read. For each of us, we must learn - sometimes painfully, and with limited success - to develop those neurological pathways that make sense of the small, repetitive shapes on a piece of paper - or now, increasingly, on a digital screen. I found this section fascinating too. For example, she cites the work of three Chinese neurologists in the 1930's who studied the case of a bi-lingual businessman who had a severe stroke. He had completely lost his ability to read Chinese, but could still read English. It required completely different sections of the brain to read a more pictorial based alphabet as opposed to the limited characters in the alphabet used to write English.
Another section that strongly resonated concerned re-reading books at different periods in one's life, deriving different meanings depending on the evolving experiences in one's own life. Wolf specifically mentioned George Eliot's Middlemarch (Penguin Classics) which she had read several times, which was precisely the theme of Rebecca Mead's recently published My Life in Middlemarch. I too have been re-reading a number of works first read 30-40 years ago, finding new meaning, and re-assessing.
The last third of the book dealt with those who have difficulties reading, and are often labeled dyslexic, a term that Wolf says has no real meaning. She does cover the number of areas in which individuals may have deficiencies in their ability to read fluently. These deficiencies can be unique, or overlapping. And it seems that the brains of these individuals are simply different, with more equality between the left and right hemispheres. And "dyslexics" seem to be more creative. She names numerous historical individuals who appear to have had that problem, and whose names are definitely remembered today, like Einstein. She also reveals it is a personal issue, since her son has had reading problems.
I did have some problems with this book. First and foremost, Wolf repeatedly makes the point that Socrates was opposed to the transition from the oral to written medium for conveying knowledge, and attempts to connect that to the transition from knowledge obtained through books to that obtained from the Internet. But she never really develops this theme; she just raises it repeatedly. I felt particular unease - though I admit doing it myself, in deciding a book of Diane Arbus' photographs was not suitable viewing material for my once-upon-a-time seven year old daughter - to Wolf's theme that access to knowledge should be "guided." That concept is right out of the playbook of many a totalitarian state... or, increasingly, wantabees. Who does the "guiding" and with what criteria was another topic she did not address. I also felt she succumbed to a congenital weakness of academics: "plugging" the work of colleagues for no particular purpose, other than, the "plug."
Finally, and it is a particular concern of mine. With all the effort that is expended on learning how to read - to obtain that "eureka" moment that Wolf beautifully described in one case, why do so very few people continue to read serious works once the school assignments are finished? Also, unaddressed. Overall, for Wolf's work, a very informative 4-star rating.
40 of 41 people found the following review helpful.
Difficult to Read
By Ohioan
I think the information in this book is very important, especially the author's main point, that reading changes the brain. However, even though I'm an avid reader of all kinds of books, from graphic novels to scientific nonfiction, from picture books to adult novels, I found this book in particular difficult to read. The sentences are long and convoluted, filled with scientific terms that aren't really explained to a lay reader. From the way it has been advertised and reviewed, this book APPEARS to be aimed at the lay reader: somebody who is interested in reading and reading comprehension. However, the way the book is written, it seems addressed only to academics and perhaps people in law -- those who spend their days reading long, complex sentences that vary little in style or tone.
I liked the content of this book so much that I'd really like to give the book four stars, but I just can't, because, ironically, this book on reading and reading comprehension does not seem to take into consideration what makes a reading experience pleasurable. I maintain that even factual information can be presented in an accurate and well-written way that makes reading it a pleasure. Plus, there is no humor at all in this book. Very dry.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
Highly technical, but reads like a story
By Beholden
I found out about this book from an article in the Boston Globe. I am such a voracious reader that I would read the back of the cereal box if I had nothing else before me while eating breakfast. I have always been fascinated by the fixation that reading holds on me. As a physician (pediatric surgeon,) father, and grandfather, I wanted to learn more about how to impart the reading habit upon my family and other children in my sphere of influence. This book is satisfying to someone with a strong science background, but I think it would appeal to anyone who has an interest in the wonder of reading and language facility - the greatest treasure of humankind, in my estimation.
Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, by Maryanne Wolf PDF
Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, by Maryanne Wolf EPub
Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, by Maryanne Wolf Doc
Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, by Maryanne Wolf iBooks
Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, by Maryanne Wolf rtf
Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, by Maryanne Wolf Mobipocket
Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, by Maryanne Wolf Kindle
