A Reflection on Booktok
Media no doubt impacts our perspectives and tastes, as we naturally want to fit in and find recommendations and communities online to participate in. Booktok, a portmanteau of book and Tiktok, refers to the specific community on the app that is dedicated to reviewing novels and recommending to both new and experienced readers. Definitely something that I would have loved as a kid, I feel like a wrong turn has been taken, and want to reflect if booktok boom in popularity has done more harm or good.
I want to start off this reflection by saying reading is so important. As an English tutor, I've seen firsthand the impact that a loss of passion for reading can cause on writing and media analysis skills. Students often aren't as able to connect the texts they are assigned in class to news and other literature, as they just aren't spending the time consuming literary media. By making small conversation at the beginning of class, a lot of them are more interested in social media and gaming rather than taking the time to sit and read. The thing is, I can understand why! Games and their phones are brightly flashing, constantly changing, mindlessly entertaining methods of consuming. They are meant to attract kids and appeal to their attention spans greatly. I'm sure if the highly addictive media that is available today existed when I was younger, I would be in the same boat.
So this is exactly why I originally thought the booktok boom was going to be amazing. It would be making reading trendy and interesting again, and take down the notion that reading is nerdy. However, it's been taken in a direction that I think is causing its own harms. Some of the largest concerns are the mainstream and most popular videos harm on the same 30 romance novels, filled to the brim with unnecessary sticky notes and annotation, and people who own perfect bookshelves and an ever-growing stack of books that they don't read. I genuinely do not want to gatekeep reading as a hobby, as I want to discover more small authors and want others to find joy in this amazing and productive pastime, but it's clear that Tiktok has transformed reading from a hobby to a lifestyle. There are people who read now, and as Stephanie Danler writes in 2022, Tiktok is primarily an entertainment app that wants you to buy, buy, buy, and post, post, post. There is a certain connection to performance in reading now; coffee, tote bags, books on the subway, and hauntingly angsty beautiful women.
I want to start off this reflection by saying reading is so important. As an English tutor, I've seen firsthand the impact that a loss of passion for reading can cause on writing and media analysis skills. Students often aren't as able to connect the texts they are assigned in class to news and other literature, as they just aren't spending the time consuming literary media. By making small conversation at the beginning of class, a lot of them are more interested in social media and gaming rather than taking the time to sit and read. The thing is, I can understand why! Games and their phones are brightly flashing, constantly changing, mindlessly entertaining methods of consuming. They are meant to attract kids and appeal to their attention spans greatly. I'm sure if the highly addictive media that is available today existed when I was younger, I would be in the same boat.
So this is exactly why I originally thought the booktok boom was going to be amazing. It would be making reading trendy and interesting again, and take down the notion that reading is nerdy. However, it's been taken in a direction that I think is causing its own harms. Some of the largest concerns are the mainstream and most popular videos harm on the same 30 romance novels, filled to the brim with unnecessary sticky notes and annotation, and people who own perfect bookshelves and an ever-growing stack of books that they don't read. I genuinely do not want to gatekeep reading as a hobby, as I want to discover more small authors and want others to find joy in this amazing and productive pastime, but it's clear that Tiktok has transformed reading from a hobby to a lifestyle. There are people who read now, and as Stephanie Danler writes in 2022, Tiktok is primarily an entertainment app that wants you to buy, buy, buy, and post, post, post. There is a certain connection to performance in reading now; coffee, tote bags, books on the subway, and hauntingly angsty beautiful women.
"Being visible on these apps is antithetical to the act of writing. The former breaks down the precious isolation required for the latter. It breaks the spell of possession our characters cast over us. It forces us to become a perceived object (in essence to objectify ourselves) instead of lingering in the emptying of identity and ego that normally accompanies writing," Danler writes. It puts unnecessary pressure on the process of reading, and promotes the lifestyle rather than actually consuming and criticizing literary fiction. However, my personal reflection is that though this has it's harms, I'm still very thankful for the way it is pushing reading as something that is enjoyable and desirable.
The very novels that become popular too are more pressing part of the problem for me. Much of the recommendations have been "troped", or advertised as a certain subsection of romance rather than for a unique plot or good characters. "Friends to lovers", "enemies to lovers", "arranged marriage"...these formulaic new novels have little-to-no love or thought behind them and serve more as intense self-inserts. This is not to say that these types of stories haven't existed since forever, it's just personally concerning that they are placed on the pedestal that they are and more of the same type are being churned out. It is a symptom of the increasing capitalistic monoculture in North America, where there are fewer places for creative media that isn't owned or crushed by some corporation.
I hope that the main focus of booktok begins to shift away from solely strange romances and more into the indie publishing scene. I'm recommending a few of my favourite accounts
@maliterary for a wide range of novels / @baker.reads for horrors with weird plots / @cybrgloss.jpg / @nicolereads98 / @readerskorner / @coolmilleniumbooks
The very novels that become popular too are more pressing part of the problem for me. Much of the recommendations have been "troped", or advertised as a certain subsection of romance rather than for a unique plot or good characters. "Friends to lovers", "enemies to lovers", "arranged marriage"...these formulaic new novels have little-to-no love or thought behind them and serve more as intense self-inserts. This is not to say that these types of stories haven't existed since forever, it's just personally concerning that they are placed on the pedestal that they are and more of the same type are being churned out. It is a symptom of the increasing capitalistic monoculture in North America, where there are fewer places for creative media that isn't owned or crushed by some corporation.
I hope that the main focus of booktok begins to shift away from solely strange romances and more into the indie publishing scene. I'm recommending a few of my favourite accounts
@maliterary for a wide range of novels / @baker.reads for horrors with weird plots / @cybrgloss.jpg / @nicolereads98 / @readerskorner / @coolmilleniumbooks
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A Reflection on Booktok | Emily Zhao's Bookshelf
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