Wednesday, December 08, 2004
Just found this gem of an article by Steve McConnell on his site. McConell in a nutshell says that there are different ways to read a technical article. The actual source for the article is a book called "How to read a book" by Mortimer J.Adler, which he summarizes and puts forth some important points. Basically there are 4 types of reading:
Elementary - where one learns to recognize individual words on the page.
Inspectional - where one skims over the article so as to get the most out of it in a given time
Analytical - where one reads the article so as to get the most out of it when one has theoretically an unlimited amount of time
Syntopical - where one reads multiple books or articles on the same subject so that the conclusions that one arrives at is a much bigger picture - much different than what the authors for each individual article intended to convey.
McConnell says that the original author advocates not going beyond "Inspectional" reading if one doesnt have to. This actually makes me real happy because I, like McConnell, often feel guilty about not finishing a book I bought. But from what he says, is okay to skim through it or read it in part. If the need arises for a more detailed form of reading like analytical or syntopical, we can always do it at a later date (I assume you own the book!).
Quoting him from the article:
"Prior to reading this advice in How to Read a Book, I had always felt a little guilty about not finishing a book. But Adler makes a strong case for not going beyond Inspectional reading unless you need to. I found his advice liberating; he told me that it was acceptable to read a book in this way, and gave me a systematic method for doing something I had previously been doing only haphazardly."
My feelings, exactly. Just for this article, I think I should go and buy his book!
Elementary - where one learns to recognize individual words on the page.
Inspectional - where one skims over the article so as to get the most out of it in a given time
Analytical - where one reads the article so as to get the most out of it when one has theoretically an unlimited amount of time
Syntopical - where one reads multiple books or articles on the same subject so that the conclusions that one arrives at is a much bigger picture - much different than what the authors for each individual article intended to convey.
McConnell says that the original author advocates not going beyond "Inspectional" reading if one doesnt have to. This actually makes me real happy because I, like McConnell, often feel guilty about not finishing a book I bought. But from what he says, is okay to skim through it or read it in part. If the need arises for a more detailed form of reading like analytical or syntopical, we can always do it at a later date (I assume you own the book!).
Quoting him from the article:
"Prior to reading this advice in How to Read a Book, I had always felt a little guilty about not finishing a book. But Adler makes a strong case for not going beyond Inspectional reading unless you need to. I found his advice liberating; he told me that it was acceptable to read a book in this way, and gave me a systematic method for doing something I had previously been doing only haphazardly."
My feelings, exactly. Just for this article, I think I should go and buy his book!
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