Reading texts in the humanities. The interpretation of texts is central to the humanities disciplines. A reader in the humanities needs the tools to analyze a text—whether a primary or secondary source, ancient or modern, literary or historical, verbal or visual—and carefully consider the arguments it makes.

To read critically in the humanities (2d and Chapter 9), you will need to pose questions and construct hypotheses as you read. You may ask, for instance, why a writer makes some points or develops some examples but omits others. Rather than finding meaning only in the surface information that texts or artifacts convey, use your own questions and hypotheses to create fuller meanings—to construct the significance of what you read.

To successfully engage texts, you must recognize that you are not a neutral observer, not an empty cup into which meaning is poured. If such were the case, writing would have exactly the same meanings for all of us, and reading would be a fairly boring affair. If you have ever gone to a movie with a friend and each come away with a completely different response, you already understand that a text never has just one meaning. Most humanities courses will expect you to exercise your interpretive powers; the following guidelines will help you build your strengths as a close reader of humanities texts.