We often think with others – “real” others like supervisors, co-researchers and critical friends and “imagined” others like the authors of the texts we are reading and working with.

Sherran Clarence. Making time to think.

Reading academic texts involves engaging with the authors as “imagined others” who serve as more knowledgeable guides, shaping our thinking through their ideas and perspectives. These authors are the more knowledgeable others (Vygotsky, 1978)¹ facilitating our intellectual growth and development through the social process of interpreting their writing.

1. Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in Society: Development of Higher Psychological Processes. Harvard University Press. ↩︎