Anna Gibson
@annagk.bsky.social
Victorianist, English prof, Dickens Notes co-editor, novel fiend, Brit.
This is just the best!
Contribution idea: This lovely reading assignment by @aktange.bsky.social
bsky.app/profile/akta...
Contribution idea: This lovely reading assignment by @aktange.bsky.social
bsky.app/profile/akta...
Here you go! I'll write some new ones for this semester too. They loved them. The "read without your phone or screens in the room" was a revelation, and many of them decided to keep doing it. They had NO IDEA (& were horrified) how often they interrupt themselves to look at a phone for no reason.
![Reading Scenario Experiments. This series of prompts is designed to get you thinking about how the setting for reading affects concentration, comprehension, and even the existential experience of reading. Every week, one of the following prompts will appear on the syllabus. I encourage you to try all of them that you are able. How does a different reading setting affect your mood? Your receptiveness to the prose? Your pleasure or difficulty reading? What are the particular impacts of changing your lighting or surroundings? What do you notice about yourself and about the work you are reading during this experiment?
1. read by candlelight (use a small lamp in dorms where no candles are allowed!)
2. read for one hour without checking any devices, answering texts, etc.
3. walk out into nature (climb a tree, sit on a rock, grab a spot in a hammock) and read
4. host a reading night with friends & food (sit in companionable silence, reading without chatting)
5. read aloud a chapter to someone else
6. climb into bed at night and read by flashlight under the covers for at least 30 minutes, as if you’ve already been told “lights out” as a kid
7. reread a chapter and see what new things you notice the second time through
8. change your ambient-noise level: add music if you normally read in the quiet; or read without music if you are normally a music-listener
9. read with a sketchpad at hand and sketch scenes, characters, or other elements from the story
10. practice focused listening: have someone read to you
11. make yourself a special, fancy snack on a real plate to nibble while eating: pay attention to the cooking or arranging or choosing of ingredients to make it especially appetizing first
12. make tea (even if you’re not usually a tea drinker), and read and sip
13. invent a new reading scenario for yourself, or repeat the one you liked the best from this term
[writing assignment using these prompts follows; text character limit prevents inclusion of it in full]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:rfs7afx6ue4mknbhhpnrzkyz/bafkreiel77b25truczj372qokmg5p3apa2dphux3jtplpz3dv35jul6wdu@jpeg)
August 16, 2025 at 12:43 AM
This is just the best!
Contribution idea: This lovely reading assignment by @aktange.bsky.social
bsky.app/profile/akta...
Contribution idea: This lovely reading assignment by @aktange.bsky.social
bsky.app/profile/akta...
Maybe we just dispense with the paper now and get them turning in an essay prompt with a rubric. Optional: they feed it to ChatGPT and grade it themselves. Who needs instructors 😆😜😭
June 13, 2025 at 12:48 AM
Maybe we just dispense with the paper now and get them turning in an essay prompt with a rubric. Optional: they feed it to ChatGPT and grade it themselves. Who needs instructors 😆😜😭
It was such a pleasure to talk with you all!
April 18, 2025 at 11:18 AM
It was such a pleasure to talk with you all!
I spent much of last semester applying for an NEH grant. All that work is wasted now. But this is so much bigger than my own disappointment.
April 3, 2025 at 9:55 PM
I spent much of last semester applying for an NEH grant. All that work is wasted now. But this is so much bigger than my own disappointment.
That one’s length is intimidating even to me! It’s been sitting on my to-read shelf since we moved into this house.
November 15, 2024 at 12:09 PM
That one’s length is intimidating even to me! It’s been sitting on my to-read shelf since we moved into this house.
I was hoping for something more recent so we could consider how we reframe “Victorian” now. But I love teaching the JE/WSS pairing!
November 15, 2024 at 12:08 PM
I was hoping for something more recent so we could consider how we reframe “Victorian” now. But I love teaching the JE/WSS pairing!
I love it too! That was my default pick. I just wish I could find something that engaged more meaningfully with race.
November 15, 2024 at 12:04 PM
I love it too! That was my default pick. I just wish I could find something that engaged more meaningfully with race.
From *there* it gets weird? 😆
November 15, 2024 at 3:19 AM
From *there* it gets weird? 😆
I just taught A Christmas Carol this week; I hadn’t heard of Mr. Timothy!
November 15, 2024 at 2:18 AM
I just taught A Christmas Carol this week; I hadn’t heard of Mr. Timothy!
Ahh, both of those sound so fun! One day I want to teach a Jane Eyre class filled with retellings. So easy to fill a syllabus!
November 15, 2024 at 2:04 AM
Ahh, both of those sound so fun! One day I want to teach a Jane Eyre class filled with retellings. So easy to fill a syllabus!
Possibly! I just have to create some sort of connecting thread to the rest of the syllabus. Part of my goal here is to get students thinking about how we imagine "The Victorians" or Victorian literary forms from a 21st-C perspective.
November 15, 2024 at 1:57 AM
Possibly! I just have to create some sort of connecting thread to the rest of the syllabus. Part of my goal here is to get students thinking about how we imagine "The Victorians" or Victorian literary forms from a 21st-C perspective.