Transactional Theory of Reading

The transactional theory of reading, developed by the American educator Louise Rosenblatt beginning with her 1938 book Literature as Exploration, holds that the meaning of a text is not fixed within the text itself, nor is it determined solely by the reader, but instead arises from a transaction between the reader and the text in which each shapes and is shaped by the other. Rosenblatt argued against imposing any single preconceived notion of the proper way to respond to a work, proposing instead that readers approach a text from one of two stances treated as poles of a continuum rather than a strict either-or choice. In the efferent stance, a reader's attention centers on what can be extracted and retained after reading, such as information, directions or conclusions to be used or acted upon afterward. In the aesthetic stance, attention centers instead on the sensations, feelings, images and ideas experienced during the act of reading itself, including the sound and rhythm of the words. A reader's attention typically shifts along this continuum during a single reading, and which stance predominates guides what that reader selectively notices and takes from the text. The theory became foundational to reader-response criticism and has been widely influential in the teaching of literature and literacy.