"Why teach literary theory to students who aren't going to college" is a question explored by Deborah Appleman in Chapter 8 of Critical Encounters in High School English (2009, 119). This question is rather encompassing of high school in general: Why teach __________ to students who aren't going to college? I have taken other classes where the line of thought was that what teachers teach should remain relevant to their students. I certainly agree that teachers need to make what they teach relevant to their students. However, assuming that literary theory is only useful to students who go to college is guilty of what Kelly Gallagher calls "assumicide" in Deeper Reading (2004, 49).
Gallagher defines assumicide as "the death of a book that occurs when it is assumed that students possess enough prior knowledge, connections, and motivation to make higher-level reading possible" (2004, 49). What Gallagher is describing here is the issue of overestimating your students. I suggest that assumicide also occurs when you underestimate your students. Literary theory does not just apply to literary texts, but to texts of all forms. Therefore, literary theory can have practical applications for students, in and out of the classroom, who may or may not be going to college. Either way, as Appleman shows, theory can provide students the tools neccessary to develop higher-level reading skills and avoid Gallaghers notion of assumicide.
Appleman provides a variety of examples of students integrating theory into their analysis of not only literary texts but magazines and other cultural texts that permeate their everyday lives. You can use gender theory when discussing magazine images of beauty, or postcolonial theory when analyzing issues of race. Theory can help students develop their own deep reading skills. Even if you are not going to college, having a variety of critical lenses to view the world is a tool that can apply to everyday life.
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