Läsning på recept

Kunskapspraktiker i läsfrämjande insatser för barn och föräldrar under 2000-talets första decennium

Abstract

During the early 2000s, reading promotion initiatives where children’s libraries and child health care collaborated became increasingly common. The purpose of this study is to create an understanding of how such reading promotion initiatives were discursively made possible. The purpose of the study is achieved through a so-called “What’s the Problem Represented to Be” analysis of materials such as leaflets, books, and DVDs that were distributed to parents and caregivers with young children in this type of reading promotion initiatives. In the analysis, a meeting is identified between healthcare-related knowledge practices – especially influenced by logopedics – and children’s library knowledge practices, where the former dominates. In the analysed instructions for reading, the paradox of reading promotion is resolved by equating certain forms of reading and related communicative activities with something that is medically necessary. This is therefore difficult to decline as a parent/caregiver. The study illustrates a breakthrough of an approach in reading promotion for parents/caregivers and their young children based on prevention, diagnosis, and treatment during the first decade of the 21st century. This approach is still active and dominant today, which raises questions about the role of children’s libraries and the children’s librarian’s expertise in the contemporary Swedish landscape of reading promotion.