In October 2024, The Atlantic published a widely circulated article called “The Elite College Students Who Can’t Read Books.” Drawing on accounts from 33 professors, it argues that many students arrive at college unprepared to read complete novels. Some professors suggested potential causes, including increased screen time and short-term video exposure, as well as fewer books in the classroom, as America has shifted towards excerpt-based standardized testing.
However, beyond the insular, elite circles of traditional academia, books have also found a different kind of popularity on social media. The most prominent imagery of books on social media is “performative” reading, epitomized by staged paparazzi photos of celebrities holding books and, most recognizably, the “performative male” who reads feminist literature in public with the intent to impress women. Reading has become sexy.
But the emphasis here is on the aesthetic and symbolic value of reading, not the substantive value of books. It’s tempting to criticize these images as insincere or anti-intellectual, but we should embrace their positive contributions to the literary discourse as they have the potential to revitalize a declining love for reading.
Critiques of performative reading are popular and decry people using books as props rather than actually appreciating them. This criticism is valid, but it ignores a beneficial by-product: performative reading pushes books into the spotlight. While not everyone posing with a book on their Instagram is actually reading, increased exposure to literary imagery may encourage people to want to read themselves. As college students, we shouldn’t be too quick to criticize this trend since we’re barely reading as it is. Rather, we should be glad that performative reading may move the needle in the right direction.
The other side of online literary culture is the discussion-based communities on various social media platforms. Content on these platforms varies from seconds-long wordless TikTok videos to almost hour-long reading vlogs that detail the reading process and opinions of the vlogger. These creators put greater emphasis on feel-good genre fiction, as opposed to the classical literature that would be seriously studied in university English departments.
There is frequent criticism about these communities’ genre fiction fixation and the superficiality of content creation. Although these critiques are valid, they overlook the ability of these videos to increase exposure to reading. This informal, stylized and personality-forward approach to literary discussion creates a welcoming environment that may encourage previous skeptics to indulge in the pleasure of reading.
As people increasingly turn to social media and short-form videos for entertainment, these spaces are becoming the new frontier of reading. As college students, we are one of social media’s main demographics, so while it may be entertaining to poke fun at trends like the performative male, social media could be a promising solution to this modern problem. For every time that we mock a post of a celebrity or performative man posing with a book in hand, we should strive to pick up the book ourselves, if only to better mock the poster. If our algorithms lead us to a reading vlog or book recommendation video, we should take a beat and consider whether our time could be better spent with a book.
Appreciation of books in any form is aspirational. The creation of open spaces where people feel comfortable discussing anything from Sarah J. Maas to Jane Austen, or joking about men reading Joan Didion, is more exciting than alarming. So the next time you see a performative man reading bell hooks on campus, take a second to laugh, definitely question his intentions and then be happy he’s reading at all.
Zeke Tesler ’29 can be reached at zeke_tesler@brown.edu. Please send responses to this opinion to letters@browndailyherald.com and other op-eds to opinions@browndailyherald.com.
