I'm trying to understand people who don't read for pleasure.

Sorry, Daevuh, the word "child" does not have a gender, therefore the use of "its" is appropriate. I know, in the past certain grammarians insisted on using the awkward "his or hers" but it's just not necessary. (It's also confusing. Is it always "his or hers"? Can it ever be "her or his"?? bleech. )

BTW, the same is true for other mammals: The [pick one]: pup, calf, kitten, chick, sweet little baby goat was returned to its parents.

Joe(Returned to his parents but they refused delivery)Nation

I understand that there r SOME insects
who do not have a sex; just neuter gender.
A child of such an insect is indeed represented by a neuter gender pronoun,
but logic requires me to stand by what I 've said qua mammals.
The one gender that we know for SURE that a person is NOT,
is neuter. To use a neuter gender pronoun is simply to be inaccurate.





David

If you do not know the gender, wont the neuter be closer to the truth than the opposite?

Just say: he or she.





David

manored, you're approach to the argument is rather circuitous. I think simply noting the hypocrisy of a dude who insists on using his own perverted phonetic, emboldened, vertical script offering grammar advice to others would sufficiently close the conversation.

<this has been cracking me up since you posted it >

Noes! =)

Ha! Good point =)

Where were we? Oh yeah, reading for pleasure.
Years and years ago while studying audiology (an actor has to have a minor) I was engaged in a study of young children and reading and listening. The subjects were eight or nine years old. Half of them were given cards on which there would be a short sentence:
The dog walked across the street.
A girl put a doll on a table.
The wagon was full of bottles.

--and so on-- one sentence on each card.

The other half of the group (um. there must have been some control group but I don't recall now.) had the sentences read to them, one at time.

Then the process was reversed, the read-to group got cards with different sentences to read, the listen group got new sentences read to them.

A few minutes later each child was asked about the sentences, asked to IMAGINE what the sentence had been about. Both the sentences they had read and the ones they had listened to.

What kind of dog was it? What kind of street, busy in a city or was it out in the country? Where was the dog going? Was it at night or in the day?

They were told there were no wrong answers.

I wish I still had the data but the upshot was this: There was a significant difference in about 14-16% of the children in being able to imagine through both senses. They were really good about seeing in their imagination what the doll looked like IF they had been read to, but they were less able to do the same with the sentences that they themselves had read. or vice versa. One sense was considerably more useful to them than the other, in most cases the stronger sense was hearing.

The guy running the study was convinced that the difference had to do with our primordial past of hearing folktales around a cave fire.
meh.

Most of the children showed no difference, they could imagine from either sense source.

The really sad few were the kids who seemed to have no imagination:
What kind of dog? Dunno.
What kind of street? (Shrugs)
(Dis those children became cops or prosecuting attorneys?? They only knew what was in evidence.)
==
I throw this out here now because, of late, I have been listening to histories, novels and a few books on language from Audio-books .com while I am running. I like to listen to something as I trot along, but, here's the thing, I have to listen to the same chapters two or three times in order to catch everything that the author is saying and not because of the noise, because, I think, I am not sitting somewhere and reading the words....or maybe I just need to concentrate more on what it being said and ignore the big FedEx truck rolling through the stop sign in front of me.

BTW: It's impossible to listen to someone read Ulysses, at least it was for me.

Sorry, this post is long and a big mish-mash of random thoughts and musings.
Joe(now you know what it's like to be in a bar with me.)Nation

That is pronounced: "Day vu " ??





David

Explain what that means, Manored ??

I was always destined to enjoy reading for pleasure, but when I was eleven or twelve I seldom picked up a book.

The trouble was, it took a while for me to lose myself in books. The exposition was always tedious, but once I'd made it past that, into the action, I could not put the book down until I finished. There may be latent readers out there who simply can't stand the first 20 pages or so, because they need fast paced excitement. Some books start in the middle of the story, but even then I needed time to get immersed in the author's fantasy world.

At age about eleven, I took to reading Sports Illustrated. (I subscribed because I liked the look of one of the introductory bonus offers on TV). Near the start of each magazine you could find very short pieces that required no real attention span of any kind. So I read that every week. I think lots of times when someone doesn't read for pleasure, it's because he or she just hasn't met the right match yet.

You can ignore the last two letters if you want.

Now that you mention it, its probaly why many books/movies/games/etc start in an advanced point the plot before going back in time and explaining how things got there. I prefer it then authors keep the timeline straigh though. I specially hate it then authors go further and altogether ignore chronological order.

WHAT 's the problem ??

Eh, irritantly insistent, you.

I refuse to give a gender. period.

U leave yourself exposed to retaliatory counter-refusals.

I dont care, I will just ignore them =)

"I'm trying to understand people who don't read for pleasure."

Are such people even called "people"? If so, should there be another word, perhaps?

people
[pee-puhl]
noun, plural -ples for 4, verb, -pled, -pling.
–noun
1. persons indefinitely or collectively; persons in general: to find it easy to talk to people; what will people think?
2. persons, whether men, women, or children, considered as numerable individuals forming a group: Twenty people volunteered to help.
3. human beings
4. the entire body of persons who constitute a community, tribe, nation, or other group by virtue of a common culture, history, religion, or the like: the people of australia; the Jewish people.
5. the persons of any particular group, company, or number (sometimes used in combination): the people of a parish; educated people; salespeople.
6. the ordinary persons, as distinguished from those who have wealth, rank, influence, etc.: a man of the people.
7. the subjects, followers, or subordinates of a ruler, leader, employer, etc.: the king and his people.
8. the body of enfranchised citizens of a state: representatives chosen by the people.
9. a person's family or relatives: My grandmother's people came from Iowa.
10. (used in the possessive in Communist or left-wing countries to indicate that an institution operates under the control of or for the benefit of the people, especially under Communist leadership): people's republic; people's army.

11. animals of a specified kind: the monkey people of the forest.

–verb (used with object)
12. to furnish with people; populate.
13. to supply or stock as if with people: a meadow peopled with flowers.

Why do you hold people who dont read for pleasure is such low regard? What is so special about reading for pleasure?

I'm young and I believe reading is an essential art of life. It doesn't necessarily have to be about politics or something boring or educational. People should read just because. There are very interesting books out there. I personally enjoy reading mystery and drama books.