The world is fast. Read slowly.

Students sit around a seminar table.

Students in Eleanor Henderson's Slow Read Narrative in the Anthropocene engage in a class on narrative time led by the book's author, Erin James, who visited Ithaca College as the C.P. Snow Scholar.

Each semester, Slow Read seminars are offered across the School of Humanities & Sciences and beyond. Why? Because we believe that an education in the liberal arts is founded on the deep reading and critical inquiry made possible by real human minds in conversation with one another. That takes time.

Inspired by the Slow Food movement, the Slow Read program began at Ithaca College under the guidance of Professor Robert Sullivan. Students read one book together over the course of a semester, led by a faculty member through a rigorous and rewarding seminar experience. From classic novels to contemporary science writing, the texts engage students with a rich range of some of the most essential intellectual ideas of our time.

The Slow Read classes I've taken have been a fantastic opportunity to focus on just one work at a time. Sometimes, in other classes, you move through topics or books quickly, but with Slow Reads, I was able to really delve into one topic over the course of the semester. They helped me engage with the text and understand what I was reading on a much deeper level.

—Justine Reester '27

Spring 2027 Offerings

Next semester we have more Slow Reads than ever. (Plus a mini-course!) Check out our offerings and register!
Slow Road Sign

IISP 28000, sec. 1 (1 cr.)
The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkkien
Dave Brown, Math
Wednesdays 4–4:50
CRN 40018

IISP 28000, sec. 2 (1 cr.)
A World Appears by Michael Pollan 
Dan Visscher, Math
Thursdays 3–3:50
CRN 40019

IISP 28000, sec. 3 (1 cr.)
An Immense World by Ed Yong 
Lisa Corewyn, Biology
Mondays 11–11:50
CRN 40020

IISP 28000, sec. 4 (1 cr.)
Dare to Lead by Brené Brown 
Robin Guiver, Theatre
Fridays 2–2:50
CRN 40021

ENGL 29401 (1 cr.)
Moby-Dick by Herman Melville 
Hugh Egan, Literatures in English
Thursdays, 3–3:50
CRN 41225

WRTG 20700: Slow Read: Special Topics in Power and Resistance (2 cr.)
How to Read Now by Elaine Castillo
Megan Graham, Writing 
Tuesdays 3–4:40
CRN 40234

IISP 11500 
Still a Mystery: Conversations Across Disciplines About What We Don’t Know
Michael Trotti, History
Thursdays 3–4:15
CRN 41764

"Reading Erin James's Narrative in the Anthropocene, both the professor and my peers posed questions that would otherwise never have occurred to me. I got far more out of the book than I would have if I were reading it on my own."

—Jonah Peretz '25

Some Recent Slow Read Texts

  • The Aeneid by Virgil

  • Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dosteyvsky

  • Middlemarch by George Eliot

  • Playing in the Dark by Toni Morrison

  • Narrative in the Anthropocene by Erin James

  • Doppleganger by Naomi Klein

  • Freedom’s Dominion: A Saga of White Resistance to Federal Power by Jefferson Cowie

  • Walden by Henry David Thoreau

Want to take or teach a Slow Read?

Contact Prof. Eleanor Henderson, Slow Read Coordinator, for more information.