| The importance of adopting a range of different perspectives in literacy research has been pointed out in order to move away from the simplistic perspectives that have trivialized much of literacy instruction research. However, there has been little research on the reading interpretation of second language readers using the constructivist perspective.;The purpose of this study was to investigate reading interpretation as an integrative process. Specifically, this research examined how first language (L1) and second language (L2) readers construct meaning in a text from the perspective of meaning construction among the reader, the text, and the context and what the relationships are between interpretation and the various stances taken by readers in the meaning construction process.;The methodological approach was qualitative and quantitative using a combination of think-out-aloud (TOL) protocols, open ended dialogues, and written summaries. With a modified version of TOL, participants could report anything they had to say at any time during their reading. After the TOL protocol was completed, the researcher and participant had an open ended dialogue about the story. Finally, the participant was asked to do a written summary of the text in about six sentences. The TOL protocol and open ended dialogues were tape-recorded, transcribed, and analyzed.;The results of this study should that all the eight readers used dialogic practice involving multiple stances. Dialogic practice has been defined as an ongoing struggle between the reader, the text, and the context for meaning construction. The relationships between textual clues and the various stance--affective, textual, social, cultural, philosophical, chronicle--vary depending on which aspects of the text and which aspects of stances a reader focuses on.;The reading process is not a simple word recognition or decoding process but a complex process. The L1 and the L2 readers were not so different in their dialogic practice; the difference was that each reader chose a different path or way of reading to come to an understanding of the story. Therefore, L2 readers should also be viewed as "active theory builders and hypotheses testers" creating their own critical interpretation. |
