Definition and Examples of Subvocalizing

Definition and Examples of Subvocalizing Though subvocalizing, the act of  saying words silently to oneself while reading, tends to limit how fast we can read, it isnt necessarily an undesirable habit. As Emerald Dechant observes, It seems likely that speech traces are a part of all, or nearly all, thinking and probably even silent reading. . . . That speech aids thinking was recognized by early philosophers and psychologists (Understanding and Teaching Reading). Examples of Subvocalizing A powerful but woefully under-discussed influence on readers is the sound of your written words, which they hear inside their heads as they subvocalizegoing through the mental processes of generating speech, but not actually triggering speech muscles or uttering sounds. As the piece unfolds, readers listen to this mental speech as if it were spoken aloud. What they hear is, in fact, their own voices saying your words, but saying them silently.Here is a fairly typical sentence. Try reading it silently and then out loud. It was the Boston Public Library, opened in 1852, that founded the American tradition of free public libraries open to all citizens. As you read the sentence you should notice a pause in the flow of words after Library and 1852 . . .. Breath units divide the information in the sentence into segments that readers subvocalize separately.(Joe Glaser, Understanding Style: Practical Ways to Improve Your Writing. Oxford Univ. Press, 1999) Subvocalizing and Reading Speed Most of us read by subvocalizing (saying to ourselves) the words in the text. Although subvocalizing can help us remember what we read, it limits how fast we can read. Because covert speech is not much faster than overt speech, subvocalization limits reading speed to the rate of speaking; we could read faster if we didnt translate printed words into speech-based code.(Stephen K. Reed, Cognition: Theories and Applications, 9th ed. Cengage, 2012)[R]eading theorists such as Gough (1972) believe that in high-speed fluent reading, subvocalizing does not actually happen because the speed of silent reading is faster than what would occur if readers said each word silently to themselves as they read. The silent reading speed for 12th graders when reading for meaning is 250 words per minute, whereas the speed for oral reading is only 150 words per minute (Carver, 1990). However, in beginning reading, when the word-recognition process is far slower than in skilled fluent reading, subvocalizati on . . . may be taking place because the reading speed is so much slower.(S. Jay Samuels Toward a Model of Reading Fluency. What Research Has to Say About Fluency Instruction, eds. S.J. Samuels and A.E. Farstrup. International Reading Assoc., 2006) Subvocalizing and Reading Comprehension [R]eading is message reconstruction (like reading a map), and for the most part comprehension of meaning depends on using all the cues available. Readers will be better decoders of meaning is they understand sentence structures and if they concentrate most of their processing ability on the extraction of meanings using both semantic and syntactic context in reading. Readers must check the validity of their predictions in reading by seeing whether they produced language structures as they know them and whether they make sense. . . .In summary, an adequate response in reading thus demands much more than the mere identification and recognition of the configuration of the written word.(Emerald Dechant, Understanding and Teaching Reading: An Interactive Model. Routledge, 1991)Subvocalization (or reading silently to oneself) cant in itself contribute to meaning or understanding any more than reading aloud can. Indeed, like reading aloud, subvocalization can only be accomplished with anythi ng like normal speed and intonation if it is preceded by comprehension. We dont listen to ourselves mumbling parts of words or fragments of phrases and then comprehend. If anything, subvocalization slows readers down and interferes with comprehension. The habit of subvocalization can be broken without loss of comprehension (Hardyck Petrinovich, 1970).(Frank Smith, Understanding Reading, 6th ed. Routledge, 2011)

How to Make Blogging Work as an Author

How to Make Blogging Work as an Author How To Make Blogging Work As An Author - An interview with Anne R. Allen Here’s another thing that we, startups, have in common with indie authors: we often blog. Whether it’s as a way to establish ourselves (in time) as thought leaders in our industry, to drive traffic to a main website, or to keep customers engaged with us, we are big fans of what we use to call â€Å"content marketing†.This strategy is all the more attractive to authors that they are used to producing content for a living. However, â€Å"blogging† is not â€Å"writing†. It’s writing, engaging, promoting, socialising, etc. It is time-consuming and not necessarily something all authors are good at. I believe there are actually two schools of thought out there, one urging authors to have a blog, the other one stating that time spent on writing for the blog is time you could have spent writing â€Å"sell-able† material: books.So today we interview one of the most successful author bloggers out there: Anne R. Allen. And she offers some good p oints on how useful blogging can be, if done right!Reedsy: Hi Anne, thanks for granting us this interview. It is fair to say that you have, together with Ruth Harris, one of the best-performing author blogs out there. And you’ve written several posts on blogging, but we’d love to dive deeper into that. The â€Å"B† word is sometimes scary to authors: do you think blogging is a requirement for indie authors today? Or just a very useful option?Anne: Thanks. I do post extensively on blogging. I’m a big fan of â€Å"slow blogging†Ã¢â‚¬â€œthat is blogging once a week or less. I feel a working fiction writer doesn’t need to blog as often as somebody who is blogging to monetize, and most of the rules for blogging don’t apply to novelists.But fiction writers can definitely benefit from maintaining a blog.I’ve also written a book that discusses blogging in depth, along with the other skills I think benefit a 21st Century writer. The boo k is HOW TO BE A WRITER IN THE E-AGE, co-written with NYT bestseller, Catherine Ryan Hyde.I’m working on a short handbook specifically for new authors who want to learn to blog. It will launch with Kotu Beach Press later this year.In answer to your question: no, not every author should (or can) blog. Some authors aren’t cut out for writing little nonfiction essays every week. If you hate it, that will show, so don’t do it if it’s not fun for you.On the other hand, blogging is probably the most useful form of social media for the new author. For one thing, it’s the only kind of social media where you have most of the control. It gets you into search engines, helps you relate one-to-one with potential readers, and connects you with other authors and publishing professionals.Virtually all the people I work with in this industry I met through my blog. That includes two of my publishers, my first agent, my blog partner, and the wonderful fellow authors I work with for boxed sets and joint promotions.  Reedsy: I feel there is as big a proliferation of content in blogging as there is in books†¦ And the â€Å"big blogs† are the ones most trusted by the readers, so is it still possible nowadays for a starting blogger to get â€Å"big†, and how might they achieve that?Anne: Wonderful new blogs are getting my attention all the time. They don’t need to be â€Å"big† like ours to be useful to an author for networking and interacting with fans. All a blog needs to do is provide an author with a kind of â€Å"home† online where people can stop by and get to know you.Reedsy: What is the most common mistake you see authors making in their blogging activities?Anne: Oh, you probably shouldn’t get me started†¦let’s give my top 6:Not visiting other blogs. Social media is social, people, get out and meet the neighbors!Dark background, light font. Tough on the eyes and looks like an old M ySpace page. If you’re a writer, your text is all-important. Make it readable!Posting erratically. Don’t try to post every day. Choose a day of the week or month to post, and then do it regularly.Starting a bunch of blogs. Unless you write in wildly different genres, say Christian YA and Erotica, you don’t need more than one blog. You won’t be able to keep them up and readers will be confused and won’t be able to find you.Treating it like a personal journal. A blog is more like a magazine column. Be professional. Nobody cares what you had for lunch.Not putting your name on your blog! I can’t believe how many writers give their blog a cutesy title and don’t let us have a clue who the heck they are and how to contact them. You’re trying to establish a brand here, not join an anonymous hackers club.Reedsy: Is it useful to mix content forms and media (text, image, audio, video) or better to stick to one?Anne: It depends on you and your audience. Ruth and I are strictly old school and our audience is mostly mature adults. They prefer their information gimmick-free. No videos and very few images. Those things take a lot longer to load and we want people to be able to read our blog quickly and interact in the comments. But every blog is different. Lots of great blogs use video, podcasts, and tons of images.Reedsy: You mention in one of your posts that you believe the 500 word limit many set for their posts is archaic now. What would your recommendation be? Is it useful to mix lengths or should the reader always be able to know what to expect?Anne: I’ve seen studies that say today’s ideal blogpost is about 1200-1500 words. Our readers would be very disappointed to see a 500 word post. They expect in-depth work from us. But if you blog more often than once a week, shorter is fine.Reedsy: What should the #1 motivation be for an author to start a blog: the desire to monetise it eventually (through ads or referral programs), the intention of generating traffic to increase book sales, or just for fun?Anne: First, if you’re a new author, I don’t think monetizing a blog is a good idea. The income from affiliates and other advertising sources is going to be pennies a month. Ads annoy your readers and make you look needy.Your blog should aim to raise your online profile and be the â€Å"hub† of your online presence. Blogs aren’t that great for direct sales. What they do is help establish your platform. They make you Googleable. Having fun is a bonus.Reedsy: The #1 topic out there on authors’ blogs is writing and publishing advice. Is this still a good thing to go for or should authors start thinking about blogging on other subjects (maybe topics that are more related to their readership)?Anne: There are a lot of â€Å"how to fight writer’s block† and â€Å"prop up your book’s sagging middle† blogposts out there, so a blog t hat concentrates on writing tips is going to have a lot of competition.What you blog about can change and grow with your career. When you’re starting out, you want to network with other authors, so writing-related stuff can be useful, but later, when you want to reach fans, you’ll want to change focus. Write more about your settings and subject matter and let people know about you as a person.Reedsy: What is the best way to promote a blog? Is it fair to say guest-posting is the most effective method?Anne: Guest posting is probably the best way to get your name out there, whether you have your own blog or not. Landing a spot on a high profile blog can jumpstart a career in a major way. My blog went from about 10 hits a week to 1000 when I won a guest spot on Nathan Bransford’s blog in 2010.But it doesn’t have to be a high profile blog (blogs like ours are booked a year in advance and we only take people who already have big followings†¦although we may run a contest for a guest spot sometime this summer.)But guesting on a smaller blog run by an author who writes in the same genre can actually sell more books than getting on a blog that gets 100K hits a month like ours. One of my best sales days in my early career came when I visited a chick lit blog with only a couple of dozen followers. Nearly every reader bought my book.And the #1 way to get invited to guest blog is also the best way to get traffic to your blog: comment on other blogs. Get to know the blogging community. One comment on a blog like Nathan’s or The Passive Voice (or ours) will put your name in front of thousands of readers.Also, don’t underestimate the power of other social media. My blog took off mostly from Tweets from readers.Google Plus is also essential for bloggers, IMO, because a post that’s reposted on Google Plus will immediately get a high SERP rank.   If somebody Googles â€Å"How to Blog† I might see one of my articles on the first page of the search results. But it won’t be a link to the actual blog. It will be a link to my Google Plus page where the blog has been automatically reposted. People who click through will see my entire Google Plus profile as well as the blogpost link. Very nice for getting your name out there.Facebook is becoming less and less useful for authors (or anybody else), but we still do get about 10% of our traffic from FB shares.Reedsy: Thanks for your time, Anne!  Anne R. Allen is an award-winning blogger and the author seven comic novels, including the bestselling Camilla Randall Mysteries. She has recently published a book of short stories and verses: WHY GRANDMA BOUGHT THAT CAR and she’s the co-author, with NYT bestseller Catherine Ryan Hyde, of HOW TO BE A WRITER IN THE E-AGE: A SELF-HELP GUIDEYou can find her and Reedsy on Twitter: @annerallen and @reedsyhq​Credit for the header photograph goes to  Christine Ahern  Do you have a blog too? How often do you post and what’s your experience it in terms of dos and don'ts? Make sure to leave us your opinion, or any question you’d like to ask Anne, in the comments below!