The Goddess speaks: You have the right to read with your ears!
Posted by: Mary Burkey
Dr. Teri Lesesne, better known as the Goddess of YA Literature, declared a YA Reader’s Bill of Rights at the recent ALAN conference during her keynote speech as the ALAN Award winner:
YA Reader’s Bill of Rights
1. Right to read YA Literature at any age
2. Right to read extensively instead of intensively
3. Right to demand changes in the literary canon for the 21st century
4. Right to read with their ears
5. Right to see the movie or play instead of reading the book
6. Right to read books that disturb them and especially their parents
7. Right to have access to books at school and at home
8. Right to read books with lots of pictures in them
9. Right to refuse to read a proscribed book
10. Right to demand a redefinition of what it means to read
Bless you, Teri, for championing every listener’s right to listen to literature!
November 28th, 2008 at 5:50 pm
You would also have heard a commercial for this blog, audiobooker, in the speech. I also played some Odyssey cuts at the panel at NCTE. Audio rocks!
November 28th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
Wish I could have been there! Thanks for being such a great champion of audiobooks!
Mary
November 28th, 2008 at 11:37 pm
Go Teri! A great advocate for audiobooks and reading. And I love your list.
December 1st, 2008 at 7:33 pm
I can’t tell you how many times this past Summer when I have offered a “required summer reading book” on audio and the parents just glared at me. “I am trying to get my child to read!”
To me I travel a lot with my kids and we have listened to everything from “Around the World in 80 Days” by Jules Verne to “Double or Die: the Young James Bond”. We all love it!
So kudos to you! Listening is a great skill to learn.
December 1st, 2008 at 7:58 pm
Great to meet another audiobook evangelist, Lynn! Be sure to check out my Audiobooker’s Choice titles – you might find some great new family listening titles!
December 2nd, 2008 at 9:33 am
Wake ‘em and shake ‘em, Teri! Your Bill of Rights is all about allowing reading to catch up with the times so young readers will be engaged. We complain that “kids don’t like to read”, but we make sure to make it totally uninteresting to them. I hope your words spread like wildfire … the good kind (is there a good kind of wildfire?).