John Miedema

For this last (no promises) bit of publicity of Slow Reading, I would like to thank some people.

I am grateful to the advance readers of Slow Reading who offered blurbs for the back of the book:

Catherine Ross is a professor at Faculty of Information & Media Studies, University of Western Ontario, where I am student. She is author of Reading Matters, along with McKechnie (see next) and Rothbauer. I refer to Ross’ research in Slow Reading.

Readers make choices in the kinds of attention they give to texts–from scanning, skimming and speed reading to deep reading and rereading. In Slow Reading, John Miedema draws on both his personal reading experience and the extensive research literature on reading to make a powerful case for the deep pleasures of engaged, reflective reading.

Lynne McKechnie is also a professor at FIMS. She supervised my original research on slow reading that formed the basis of the book. I love the opening line of her comment:

A little book likely to make a large impact. Slow Reading challenges our notions of what it means to be a reader in an ever more complex information world.

Jessamyn West is the author of librarian.net. Jessamyn was an early supporter of my writing on slow reading, going back to the short-lived Slow Library blog, and continuing through some of her presentations. It was important to have this support early on.

Slow Reading is a reflective look at what it means to simply read in a fast-paced digital age. John Miedema takes us through the psychology, practice and personal nature of slow reading and gives us some background on the more general slow movement. Writing worth reading, and worth reading well.

This isn’t the Junos but I’d like to echo the acknowledgements of the book that names other people who provided particularly helpful comments and support during the slow reading phase of this blog. They include Holly Cole, Walt Crawford, Jason Hammond, Jim Murdoch, Pete Smith (South Yorkshire UK), and Peter Stephens.

Once again, thanks to Clara for the cover photo, and Rory Litwin for giving the subject of slow reading a second life by suggesting that the research be turned into a book.