Reader Response Theory

Question 1

Reader Response Theory - General idea

Answer 1

• Explains the diversity of readers responses to literary works

Question 2

Gaps

Answer 2

• This theory argues that texts contain gaps that affect the reader, who must fill in the gaps

Question 3

Implied Reader

Answer 3

• Excepted to respond in specific ways
• Response inviting structures
• Target audience

Question 4

Actual Reader

Answer 4

• Response to the text is coloured by his or her own experiences

Question 5

Literary Competence

Answer 5

• A reader that makes sense of what she/he is reading by anticipating what is still to come
• These anticipations may be fulfilled, but can also be mistaken
• These mistakes are important to the meaning of the text

Question 6

Interpretive Communities

Answer 6

• Composed of members who share a particular reading strategy or set of community assumptions they bring to the reader
• Ex. I would interpret a text differently then someone who survived the holocaust

Question 7

Transactional Approach

Answer 7

• Text controls the reader/reader controls the text