Reader Profile Series: Manga Mania

This is the seventh in a series of interviews with Middle School readers. I took on this interview project because I wanted to showcase some of the different reader profiles that I encounter every day in the Middle School library. I will post a new interview in a blog post each week. Some of the interviewees will be self-identified "readers," but others will be non-readers. I won't identify the interviewees here by name. Instead, I'll offer a profile that describes them.

These interviews are intended to offer a small glimpse into the way that kids think about reading.

This week’s interview is with a male student who likes a good amount of action in his books. He reads a lot of manga. If you are not familiar with manga, (pronounced mahng-guh), it is a type of Japanese comic book or graphic novel that is usually serial in nature. Many Japanese manga series, like Pokémon, Naruto, and Dragon Ball Z, are also anime TV series or video games. While the stereotype I see at our middle school is that "manga is for boys," there are many manga series written especially for girls. These are called "shojo." An American would tell you that manga books are "backwards," because manga is written in a traditional right-to-left Japanese style. Students who read a lot of manga tell me that their brains adapt to the different method of reading very quickly, and soon they can read the books from right to left automatically.

There are all kinds of studies out there about kids reading graphic novels and comic books, and many people have raised questions about whether reading comic books actually counts as reading or whether graphic novels can be quality literature. (I would personally answer both of these questions with a firm yes.) Researchers have found that kinesthetic learners and visual learners are especially engaged by the visual nature of graphic novels and also by the large amount of action that tends to be in many comic books or manga series. (These are the same elements that make video games so engaging.)

This week's interview can be found below.

READER PROFILE:

GENDER: Male
GRADE LEVEL: 5
READER STATUS: Manga Maniac

Do you consider yourself to be a reader?

Yeah. Yes. Because I read.

How often do you read?

I read at least five days a week, twenty minutes to thirty minutes.

What types of books do you like to read?

Funny books, apocalyptic books. I like to read manga.

How do you find new books to read?

I go to the library.

What is your favorite book?

Rot and Ruin [by Jonathan Maberry]. I like it because it's apocalyptic and people die in it.

What is your favorite place to read?

Anywhere. A chair.

Paper, or e-reading?

Paper books.

Image credit:

"Man Avatar Head Body Circle Sketch Drawing." Pixabay. Pixabay, n.d. Web. 24 Jan. 2013. <https://pixabay.com/en/man-avatar-head-body-circle-39087/>.