Putting reader roles to the test: an ethnomethodological approach

That readers read within roles has long been argued by literary theorists and more recently by technical communication theorists. Yet few scholars have attempted to put their theories to a test. The study reported in this paper attempts to do by using a conversation analysis tool called ethnomethodology. In an experimental setting, subjects were videotaped reading and responding to a set of instructions. Their responses indicate that: readers will often choose to play a role different from the one embedded in a text, especially if the text role offends them in some way; readers with similar education and interest may display different reader roles, making these roles difficult to predict; and within a single reading, a reader may change roles frequently. The paper concludes by discussing the implications of the findings and the appropriateness of ethnomethodology for reader-role research