Post 6: Readicide

I don’t think genre fiction is less worthy than literary fiction. They are two different types of fiction, but both worthy all the same. To me genre fiction is much more enjoyable than literary fiction. I would enjoy English classes so much more if they taught a fifty/fifty split of genre and literary fiction. By doing this students will want to keep reading because they know there is an equal balance of what they like to read and what they hate to read. I think it would be really cool if English reading assignments were similar to best sellers. Give students a list of books for literary fiction and allow them to choose what book interests them and then create tests that apply to themes in all books. For genre fiction you could give students a list and then create a project that applies to all the books on the list. This is giving students a fifty /fifty shot of enjoying what they are reading for school. I do not think that literary fiction is always relevant to our culture. Given, there are some books that have relatable themes, but I just don’t think every book in the literary fiction world applies to the current culture. I don’t think it is preparing kids for the job market they are about to enter. How is a story about a sulking teenager going to prepare someone to work at P&G? Or the story of a man who struggles being and African American going to help someone be a CEO? While the struggles these characters face was relevant at their time, it isn’t really now. I personally better identify with the struggles of a girl trying to find herself  better than anything, and for most current genre fiction heroines, this is their central struggle. While all this is a matter of opinion, mine is that we should teach genre fiction as well as literary fiction.