‘Cognitive’ and ‘affective’ objectives in literary education: a false dichotomy

It is commonly claimed by literary theorists, and sometimes by teachers, that reading works of literature educates the emotions. In fact literary education is often held to be concerned with emotional development, while science, mathematics and so on are held to be concerned with the development of understanding.

I pointed out earlier that there is widespread dissatisfaction among English teachers with the teaching of literary criticism. This dissatisfaction with what W. A. Murray calls the ‘sterile cant’ that many English students become practised in for examination purposes often leads to a thorough-going rejection of a literary critical approach to literature in education as being merely ‘cognitive’. This is accompanied by an insistence that it is the ‘experience’ of literature which is important in order to promote ‘the education of the emotions’. The following extract from a recent essay on the teaching of literature is representative of the views of many English teachers.