CHAPTER

2 Reading Critically

2.1 What is Critical Reading?

Critical reading is a more ACTIVE way of reading. It is a deeper and more

complex engagement with a text. Critical reading is a process of analyzing,
interpreting and, sometimes, evaluating (Sutherland & Incera, 2021). When
we read critically, we use our critical thinking skills to QUESTION both the
text and our own reading of it. Different disciplines may have distinctive
modes of critical reading (scientific, philosophical, literary, etc).

To the critical reader, any single text provides but one portrayal of the facts,
one individual’s “take” on the subject matter. Critical readers thus recognize
not only what a text says, but also how that text portrays the subject matter.
They recognize the various ways in which each and every text is the unique
creation of a unique author.

A non-critical reader might read a history book to learn the facts of the
situation or to discover an accepted interpretation of those events. A critical
reader might read the same work to appreciate how a particular perspective
on the events and a particular selection of facts can lead to particular
understanding.

Textbooks on critical reading commonly ask students to accomplish certain

goals (Verheij, 2010):
• to recognize an author’s purpose
• to understand tone and persuasive elements
• to recognize bias
Notice that none of these goals actually refers to something on the page.
Each requires inferences from evidence within the text:

• recognizing purpose involves inferring a basis for choices of

content and language
• recognizing tone and persuasive elements involves classifying
the nature of language choices
• recognizing bias involves classifying the nature of patterns of
choice of content and language

Critical reading is not simply close and careful reading. To read critically,
one must actively recognize and analyze evidence upon the page.

Table 1. Reading and Critical Reading Differences

Reading Critical Reading
Purpose To get a basic grasp of the To form judgments about HOW a
text. text works.
Activity Absorbing/Understanding Analysing/Interpreting/Evaluating
Focus What a text SAYS What a text DOES and MEANS
Questions What is the text saying? How does the text work? How is
What information can I get it argued?
out of it? What are the choices made?
The patterns that result? What
kinds of reasoning and evidence
are used? What are the
underlying assumptions?
What does the text mean?
Direction WITH the text (taking for AGAINST the text (questioning
granted it is right) its assumptions and argument,
interpreting meaning in context)
Response Restatement, Summary Description, Interpretation,
Evaluation
2.2 Critical Reading v. Critical Thinking

We can distinguish between critical reading and critical thinking in the

following way (Demetriou, 2023):

• Critical reading is a technique for discovering information and ideas

within a text.
• Critical thinking is a technique for evaluating information and ideas,
for deciding what to accept and believe.

Critical reading refers to a careful, active, reflective, analytic reading. Critical

thinking involves reflecting on the validity of what you have read in light of
our prior knowledge and understanding of the world. For example, consider
the following (somewhat humorous) sentence from a student essay:

Parents are buying expensive cars for their kids to destroy them.

As the terms are used here, critical reading is concerned with figuring out
whether, within the context of the text as a whole, "them" refers to the
parents, the kids, or the cars, and whether the text supports that practice.
Critical thinking would come into play when deciding whether the chosen
meaning was indeed true, and whether or not you, as the reader, should
support that practice.

By these definitions, critical reading would appear to come before critical

thinking: Only once we have fully understood a text (critical reading) can we
truly evaluate its assertions (critical thinking).

The Two Together in Harmony

In actual practice, critical reading and critical thinking work together

(Kurland, 2000).
Critical thinking allows us to monitor our understanding as we read. If we
sense that assertions are ridiculous or irresponsible (critical thinking), we
examine the text more closely to test our understanding (critical reading).

Conversely, critical thinking depends on critical reading. You can think

critically about a text (critical thinking), after all, only if you have understood
it (critical reading). We may choose to accept or reject a presentation, but
we must know why. We have a responsibility to ourselves, as well as to
others, to isolate the real issues of agreement or disagreement. Only then
can we understand and respect other people’s views. To recognize and
understand those views, we must read critically.

2.3 What Need to be Done to Prepare for Critical Reading?

There are two steps to preparing to read critically (Is et al., n.d., 2004):

1. Self-Reflect: What experiences, assumptions, knowledge, and

perspectives do you bring to the text? What biases might you have? Are
you able to keep an open mind and consider other points of view?
2. Read to Understand:

a. Examine the text and context: Who is the author? Who is the
publisher? Where and when was it written? What kind of text is
it?
b. Skim the text: What is the topic? What are the main ideas?
c. Resolve confusion: Look up unfamiliar words or terms in
dictionaries or glossaries. Go over difficult passages to clarify
them.

2.4. What is the Process for Reading critically?

To read critically, you must think critically. This involves analysis,

interpretation, and evaluation. Each of these processes helps you to interact
with the text in different ways: highlighting important points and examples,
taking notes, testing answers to your questions, brainstorming, outlining,
describing aspects of the text or argument, reflecting on your own reading
and thinking, raising objections to the ideas or evidence presented, etc.

Analysis Asks: What are the patterns of the text?

Analysis means looking at the parts of something to detect patterns. In

looking at these patterns, your critical thinking skills will be engaged in
analyzing the argument the author is making:

• What is the thesis or overall theory?

• What are the supporting points that create the argument? How do
they relate to each other? How do they relate to the thesis?
• What are the examples used as evidence for the supporting points?
How do they relate to the points they support? To each other? To
the thesis?
• What techniques of persuasion are used (appeals to emotion,
reason, authority, etc.)?
• What rhetorical strategies are used (e.g. definition, explanation,
description, narration, elaboration, argumentation, evaluation)?
• What modes of analysis are used (illustration, comparison/contrast,
cause and effect, process analysis, classification/division,
definition)?

Interpretation Asks: What do the patterns of the argument mean?

Interpretation is reading ideas as well as sentences. We need to be aware

of the cultural and historical context, the context of its author’s life, the
context of debates within the discipline at that time and the intellectual
context of debates within the discipline today.

• What debates were the author and the text engaging with at that
time?
• What kinds of reasoning (historical, psychological, political,
philosophical, scientific, etc) are employed?
 • What methodology is employed and what theory is developed?
• How might my reading of the text be biased? Am I imposing 21st
century ideas or values on the text? If so, is this problematic?

Evaluation Asks: How well does the text do what it does? What is its
value?

Evaluation is making judgments about the intellectual/cognitive, aesthetic,

moral or practical value of a text. When we are considering its
intellectual/cognitive value we ask questions such as these:

• How does it contribute to the discipline? Are its main conclusions

original?
• Does the evidence and reasoning adequately support the
theory/theories presented?
• Are the sources reliable?
• Is the argument logically consistent? Convincing?
• Are any experiments, questionnaires, statistical sections, etc
designed and executed in accordance with
• the accepted standards of the relevant discipline?
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of the theory?
• How would competing theories criticize this text? How could the
author reply?

Overall, is the theory/approach in this text better than competing

theories/approaches? In other words, what are its comparative strengths
and weaknesses? In reading critically we need to keep competing theories
in mind.