The NEA has fully documented a critical decline in reading for pleasure among American adults. Who can argue with the obvious?A few facts, and then I’ll shut up about the embarrassing, non-reading scourge spread-eagled across this nation. In the five minutes it takes to read this column (if you finish it), you will have logged exactly half the time the average 15- to 24-year-old now spends reading for pleasure each day.
And if you’re over twenty-four, have never played a video game and think MySpace is a craft outlet store, what do these reading studies have to say about you? To use the hackneyed grabber expression we hear every day on sensationalist TV news: “You won’t believe . . . .” Believe it. Reading is down, way down, for every age group.
It’s all there and more in the gruesome statistics of two NEA reports: “Reading at Risk” and “To Read Or Not to Read.” You tell me, can this be a good thing?
Full Terre Haute Tribune Star article HERE
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