Florence Davies
Florence "Flo" Davies was a British applied linguist and reading specialist associated with the University of Birmingham and, later, the Open University. Her work sits at the junction of ESP/EAP and the teaching of reading in both L1 and L2 contexts. She is best known in ELT as co-author (with Tim Johns) of the 1983 paper that introduced the TAVI / TALO distinction, and as the author of Introducing Reading (Penguin, 1995), a book-length argument for treating reading as a socially situated act rather than a set of mechanical comprehension skills.
Davies's writing treats readers as agents engaged with real texts for real purposes. Much of the pedagogical common sense now taken for granted in EAP reading courses (authentic texts, purpose-driven tasks, close attention to genre and thematic structure) was articulated by Davies before it was absorbed into the mainstream.
Career
- Long association with the University of Birmingham's English for Overseas Students Unit, the same research environment that produced Tim Johns, Tony Dudley-Evans, and the Birmingham school of discourse analysis
- Later work connected to the Open University's reading and literacy projects
- Contributed to the Birmingham tradition of ESP discourse analysis, working on academic texts and the classroom consequences of how they are structured
The TAVI/TALO Paper
With Tim Johns, Davies published Text as a vehicle for information: The classroom use of written texts in teaching reading in a foreign language (1983, Reading in a Foreign Language 1(1)). The paper is a compact manifesto. Against a reading classroom dominated by text-as-linguistic-object exercises, Davies and Johns argue for text-as-vehicle-of-information: reading that starts from the learner's informational purpose, treats the text as something worth understanding for its content, and defers language-focused work until meaning has been secured.
Introducing Reading (1995)
Davies's most accessible single work. The book traces contemporary developments in reading theory and aims, in her phrase, "to socialize and humanize reading and the teaching of reading." Central moves include:
- Reading as an interaction between reader, text, and context, not a generic skill
- Attention to the variety of texts and the correspondingly varied demands they make
- A rejection of reading instruction that strips tasks of purpose
- Applications across L1 teaching, foreign language teaching, and EAP
Academic Discourse Work
Davies also published on academic writing and thematic structure, notably Reading between the lines: Thematic choice as a device for presenting writer viewpoint in academic discourse (1988). This strand links her to the wider Birmingham tradition of text and discourse analysis (Halliday's legacy filtered through Sinclair and Coulthard) and to later EAP work on stance, voice, and writer positioning (Hyland and others).
Influence
- Co-originator, with Tim Johns, of one of the most durable framings in reading pedagogy (TAVI/TALO)
- An important voice for treating reading as a socially situated practice rather than a collection of micro-skills
- Persistent advocate of authentic texts and purpose-driven tasks in ESP/EAP reading courses
Related Notes
- Tim Johns: long-standing collaborator
- TAVI, TALO, TASP: the three reading stances
- ESP, EAP: her primary teaching contexts
- Reading Subskills, Sustained Silent Reading: the skills-work her approach reframes
- Genre: the linguistic backdrop of her academic-text work
References
- Johns, T. & Davies, F. (1983). Text as a vehicle for information: The classroom use of written texts in teaching reading in a foreign language. Reading in a Foreign Language, 1(1), 1–19.
- Davies, F. (1988). Reading between the lines: Thematic choice as a device for presenting writer viewpoint in academic discourse. The ESPecialist, 9(1/2).
- Davies, F. (1995). Introducing Reading. Penguin English.