Page - 224 - in Über Bücher reden - Literaturrezeption in Lesegemeinschaften

© 2021 V&R unipress, Brill Deutschland GmbH ISBN Print: 9783847113232 – ISBN E-Lib: 9783737013239 respectedmyposition:“Let’s set theseaside, fornow,” shecalmlysuggested.So wedid. For7years. InJune2012, Ihadtheopportunitytotakepart in ‘DevLab’which, intermsof its format,was a combinationof ahackdayanda speed-dating event.Cultural workers fromartsorganisations inmyregionwhohaddataoradata challenge were ‘matched’ throughaseriesofbriefmeetingswithdevelopers. Iwastheonly academicresearcher therethatdayandIhadwithmeadatastickwithaCSVfile of theresponses.Mydeclaredintentionwastobuildsometypeofdigitalappthat couldbeusedinpublic librariesandthatmightespeciallyappeal toreaderswho werescepticalaboutdigital culture. Iwantedto findawayofusing thedata that wouldmake sense to readers and thus extend thenotionof reading as a social practice by sharing the commentaries about readers’ experienceswith a virtual communityofmore readers.Thedeveloperwho tookup thechallengewasTim Hodson. Timsawveryquickly, asheputs it, that therewasa setofdata that justneeded tobe shownoff andexplored, rather than being“locked” intheoutputofaresearchprojectthatwouldhavealimitedaudience.So the obviousway to explore thiswas tomake the answers visible on awebsite so that people could thenseeandsearch theanswers forkeywords.18 That day hemade a word cloud so that the keywords were highlighted (and ultimately clickable). However, what Tim understood immediately when he began to read the responses was their emotional resonance. Readers were not telling storiesaboutparticularbooks thathadchanged their livesorabout their favouriteauthors.Thereadinglifestoriesthatwerearticulatedwerepromptedby the terms of the question “what role has reading played in your life?”The ex- periences that were being articulated varied from the banal to the dramatic in tone and sometimes incorporated both.One brief examplewill have to suffice here. The following reader constructs an evocative picture of their reading life, clearly indicatinghow theacts of reading can servedifferentpurposes (suchas education and entertainment); different needs (the desire to escape into an imagined world but also the means of making new friends through sharing reading), anddifferentmoods (sadness, joy andexcitement)ondifferent occa- sionsandatdifferent life stages: [Reading]hasbroadenedmyviewof theworld,encouragedmetotravel,beenafriend when I have been low,mademe laugh, cry and sometimes excitedme. I havemade friends throughplay readingsandescaped toa friendlierworldwhen the real onehas becomeslightly crazy. Soby reading Ihavemade friends, travelledmore than Iwould 18 Hodson2014,n.p. DanielleFuller224 Open-Access-Publikation im Sinne der CC-Lizenz BY 4.0