Readers between media: sixth-grade students tuning in to literature in different formats

The chapter will empirically analyze reading experiences of 6th grade students in their meeting with a fantasy story which they read as either an illustrated print novel, an audio book or a digital narrative. On a phenomenological and postcritical basis will be analyzed aspects of reading experiences which can be divided into two categories: Partly formal aspects associated with sensory experiences of the three different formats and partly substantive aspects related to attunement, identification and the existential resonance of the story. Theoretically, the analyses are based on literary materialism (Hayles 2002, 2004, 2008, McGann 1991) and theories which contribute with knowledge of the reader’s attachment to literature (Gumbrecht 2004, 2011, Felski 2008, 2015, 2019, 2020a and Løgstrup 2018). The analysis sets out to identify various aspects of what can be characteristic of the reading experiences of 11 and 12-year-olds when they read from different formats (audio, paper and digital), how they express their thoughts about literary reading and how they make use of literature.