"I don't know what the heck he's saying!": a case study of honors students' stances and approaches toward the great works

Students face challenging texts in higher education, from discipline-specific journal articles to great works of literature. Building on research in disciplinary literacy and academic literacies, this case study explores the various stances honors students take when reading challenging texts in a mid-western university’s distinguished humanities sequence. Through an analysis of student interviews, writing, and observations of expert lectures, this research found that honors students fell into one of three stances: Bottom Liners sought the essential meaning of a text, typically through online research; Researchers attempted to alleviate their difficulties by researching context; and Feelers attempted to emotionally connect with the texts’ authors. These findings help clarify how students work within various academic discourses in a single classroom environment.