Abstract
This article extends the idea of media pedagogies to consider how TikTok provides a site of social learning about books and reading. It uses the concept of “peer pedagogies” to identify how the #BookTok hashtag is used to invite book and reading enthusiasts to take up learning positions. The article uses an exploratory approach to identify contrasting videos in which learning about books and reading is made available, and it undertakes an in-depth content and semiotic analysis of three videos to consider how learning is framed in different ways. The article is informed by Bernstein’s theorization of pedagogical classification and framing, which relates to how knowledge and skills are institutionally defined, and how knowledge is made available along a continuum of greater and less formality. This approach enables a consideration of the learning positions available to members of the #BookTok community as they engage with the videos. The article shows how #BookTok creators make deliberate creative and pedagogical choices to use TikTok’s affordances to share knowledge and skills as a form of public media pedagogy and service to the #BookTok community. In addition, it argues that the sharing of knowledge and skills between people who share a passion and interest in books and reading contributes to the videos’ popularity and success.
Introduction
TikTok is a highly popular social media platform that users see as being fun, immersive, and social (Abidin, 2021; Kaye et al., 2022; Schellewald, 2023). A growing body of scholarship aims to understand TikTok as a social network (Guiñez-Cabrera & Mansilla-Obando, 2022), as media content (Faltesek et al., 2023), as sub-cultural participation (Literat & Kligler-Vilenchik, 2023), and as celebrity construction (Abidin, 2021). With some notable exceptions (Vizcaíno-Verdú & Abidin, 2023), there has been less consideration of how TikTok invites learning opportunities. Instead, TikTok has been criticized in public discourse as being trivial (Field, 2024; Wightman, 2024), “addictive” (Abedje et al., 2024; Field & Corfield, 2023), and potentially harmful to young people’s well-being (Paul, 2022; Penberthy, 2024). The misrecognition of the learning that is possible on social media platforms like TikTok is highly reductive because scholarship has long established the importance of media and popular culture as sites for learning (Buckingham, 1998; Giroux, 1994). Social media spaces provide a resource for community connection and participation (Gee, 2018; Ito et al., 2013), engagement with passions and interests (Ito et al., 2013, 2019), and identity formation and expression (Greenhow & Robelia, 2009; Hartung et al., 2022; Literat & Kliger-Vilenchik, 2019). Studies also show that social media affords opportunities to develop knowledge and skills through participation and informal learning (Greenhow, 2011; Greenhow, Galvin et al., 2023; Jenkins, 2006; Literat & Kligler-Vilenchik, 2018; Turner et al., 2020; Vermeire et al., 2024). This article builds on this work, arguing that the artificial boundaries that are often constructed between formal learning in sanctioned spaces such as schools and the interest-driven informal learning that occurs in everyday life elide the rich and varied ways that pedagogical relationships exist on digital platforms. In response, this article centers on the #BookTok hashtag to investigate how TikTok has become a space of pedagogical possibility for book enthusiasts.
The article extends the established idea of “media pedagogies” (Hartley, 2011; Williams, 1968), by considering “peer pedagogies” (Dezuanni, 2020) to investigate how learning may occur on digital platforms. Adding “peer” to pedagogies recognizes that knowledge and skills may be shared between peers, who have less institutionally defined relationships than is generally the case in learning interactions in formal educational settings. To add depth to our analysis of peer pedagogical interactions about books on TikTok, we consider how knowledge and skills are classified and framed (Bernstein, 1973, 2000). Classification relates to knowledge claims—the extent to which knowledge is institutionally defined. Framing refers to how knowledge is made available along a continuum of formality. Pedagogy may be framed, for instance, as a friend casually sharing their thoughts, or alternatively, as an expert didactically presenting knowledge and skills. We show that TikTok’s short-form videos are presented on a continuum from highly classified and framed formal learning opportunities, to loosely classified and framed everyday exchanges of knowledge and skill. It is highly informative to investigate TikTok videos using this approach to better understand how users are invited to take up learning identities on the platform.
TikTok videos using the #BookTok hashtag are an important case for consideration because books and reading are located at a point of tension between formal and informal learning as exemplified by discourses related to reading for literacy development in formal schooling and reading for pleasure and leisure (Jerasa & Boffone, 2021; Turner et al., 2020). In addition, books have long been recognized as symbols of knowledge and learning and associated with the development of cultural capital (Bourdieu, 1986). The article begins by discussing how TikTok may be considered as a teaching and learning platform and how the #BookTok community has emerged as a significant presence on the platform. It then goes on to discuss historical and contemporary literature related to media pedagogies. Next, the article outlines our approach to the selection and analysis of #BookTok videos to further explore how they function as pedagogical resources for learning about books and reading. We then go on to use Bernstein’s concepts of pedagogical classification and framing to analyze how #BookTok videos are constructed as invitations to learning. We argue that rather being trivial or somehow inherently harmful, #BookTok videos provide opportunities for people to learn about books and reading culture on an unprecedented scale.
TikTok, Learning Opportunities, and Bookish Content
To date, limited attention has been given to how TikTok promotes learning, even though the platform includes thousands of highly didactic curriculum-related videos, including mathematics videos (Mathematics Tutorial, 2023), grammar instruction videos (iamthatenglishteacher, 2022), and videos about history, science, and geography (mrs.b.tv, 2024). “How-to” and “life-hack” videos also proliferate on the platform as forms of teaching and instruction, including everything from makeup tutorials to car repair and gardening tips, to music and dance lessons. These various examples are regularly tagged with hashtags such as #LearnOnTikTok, #teachersoftiktok, and #lifehack. Beyond these more obvious examples of “teaching,” the value of many short form videos is that they offer users access to the socially contextualized “funds of knowledge” (Moll et al., 1992) that enable people to successfully participate in their communities, and pursue interests and passions in their everyday lives.
In this broader context, TikTok creators use the #BookTok hashtag alongside other “bookish” hashtags (e.g., #bookrecommendations, #bookworm, and #favouritebooks) to promote videos about books and reading, and to make them more discoverable by both TikTok users and the platform’s algorithm. A significant community and associated subcommunities have formed around these hashtags, making the overall #BookTok community the largest current online gathering of people interested in books and reading. The #BookTok phenomenon has a significant impact on reading culture and the publishing industry (Barnett, 2023; Dezuanni et al., 2022; Martens et al., 2022; Reddan et al., 2024). At the time of writing, the #BookTok hashtag has received over 330 billion views.
The TikTok algorithm functions by presenting highly individualized recommendations to users on the personally tailored “For You” page based on trending content and viral practices (Abidin, 2021; Dezuanni et al., 2022; Martens et al., 2022). Importantly, search practices play less of a role on TikTok, for instance, compared to YouTube, while hashtags play a central role in how the algorithm functions to recommend content to users (Kaye et al., 2022), and how communities form on the platform (Reddan et al., 2024). Therefore, many #BookTok content views are by users who do not purposefully or actively participate in #BookTok communities. Nonetheless, the scale of engagement suggests that there is a large amount of communication about books on TikTok, and potentially a very significant amount of learning that would otherwise be unavailable to people interested in books and reading. Whether users purposely pursue this content or happen upon it due to algorithmic mediation, they are presented with opportunities to learn about books in more and less casual ways. The various genres of #BookTok videos—micro-reviews, book hauls, to be read (TBR) lists, book annotation practices, and emotional-response videos (“I cried when I read . . .”), to name just a few, provide a continuum of practices which are more and less pedagogically framed and classified.
Media Pedagogies, Digital Platforms, and Peer Pedagogies
This article draws on theories of socially situated and material learning practices (Ellsworth, 1997; Gee & Hayes, 2010; Murphy, 1996), which argue that knowledge is developed as much in everyday life—in homes, workplaces, via media experiences, and in the community—as it is in formal educational settings. In contrast, formal definitions of pedagogy tend to be aligned with instrumentalist accounts of learning that emphasize knowledge development as a directed activity centered on teacher expertise, formalized curricula, and institutional legitimacy (Murphy, 1996; Simon, 1983). Shulman’s (1987) theorization of pedagogical content knowledge, for instance, illustrates the expert knowledge teachers develop as masters of both content knowledge and classroom practice. As Alexander (2001) argues, though, pedagogy should more accurately be recognized as connecting “the apparently self-contained act of teaching with culture, structure and mechanisms of social control” (p. 540). That is, pedagogy consists of interactions in sociocultural contexts and within existing power relations. Social understandings of learning identify knowledge and skill exchange as being less scientifically defined, and more locally situated within existing hierarchies and that are messy, artful, and reflective (Lave & Wenger, 1991; Schön, 1987).
Social accounts of pedagogy inform the idea of the pedagogies of everyday life, including public and media pedagogies, a version of which we draw on in our account of the pedagogical practices that take place on digital platforms like TikTok. This approach disrupts the notion that learning occurs only in official settings because such a narrow definition reproduces existing power relations. Freire (1972) challenged the exclusionary structures of institutionalized learning by promoting the role of dialogue, praxis, lived experience, and “conscientization” to address disadvantage and promote social change among economically and socially excluded Brazilians. Giroux (1994, 1997, 2011) drew on Freire to advance the concepts of public and critical pedagogies in his recognition of the pedagogies of everyday life. Giroux (1994) suggests, I no longer believe that pedagogy is a discipline. On the contrary, I have argued for the last few years that pedagogy is about the creation of a public sphere, one that brings people together in a variety of sites to talk, exchange information, listen, feel their desires, and expand their capacities for joy, love, solidarity, and struggle. (x)
Giroux argues that the media are a key pedagogical site of social and cultural contestation. He suggests that “it is precisely in [the media’s] diverse spaces and spheres that most of the education that matters today is taking place on a global scale” (Giroux, 1994, p. x). His insistence that the media and popular culture’s role in learning should be treated seriously is a direct challenge to a long history of dismissing popular culture as being antithetical to learning (Buckingham, 1998; Luke, 1997).
The media’s pedagogical functions were recognized by Eco who declared that “Television is the school book of modern adults, as much as it is the only authoritative school book for our children” (Eco, 1979, p. 22). Williams (1968) asked, “Who can doubt, looking at television or newspapers, or reading women’s magazines, that here, centrally, is teaching, and teaching financed and distributed in a much larger way than is formal education?” (p. 14). In a consideration of how cinema “teaches,” Ellsworth focuses on the similarities between cinema’s modes of address and teachers’ performative pedagogical practices, suggesting that cinematic devices hail and subjectively invite negotiation, in a similar manner to how students are invited to negotiate meaning in the classroom (Ellsworth, 1997). Hartley argues that the internet enables individuals to become media producers on a mass scale that has important implications for literacy, learning, and knowledge development, suggesting that the internet “has rapidly evolved into a new ‘enabling social technology for knowledge’” (Hartley, 2011, p. 109, original emphasis).
This article builds on media pedagogies scholarship to suggest that social media enables “peer pedagogies” (Dezuanni, 2020). Although “peer” is often applied to people of a similar age, it is useful to think about peer relationships as existing between people with similar passions and interests and who gather in shared relationships and communities of interest, such as those available on digital platforms. The concept of peer pedagogies is informed by scholarship about how social learning takes place in digital contexts such as Gee’s and Hayes’ (2010, 2011) conceptualisation of affinity spaces, Ito and others’ work on connected learning (Ito et al., 2019; Kumpulainen and Sefton-Green, 2014), Resnick’s (2017) work on supportive learning communities; and Steinkuehler and Oh’s (2012) investigation of social learning and massively multiplayer online games. Of course, peers learn from each other in everyday life in non-digital spaces, but opportunities for peer interactions in digital spaces are vast and borderless (Buckingham, 2007; Dezuanni, 2020; Ito et al., 2013). The concept has proven to be useful in considering how learning occurs in parasocial relationships on digital platforms, for instance, between Minecraft YouTubers and their fans (Dezuanni, 2020). A key characteristic of peer pedagogies is that they are underpinned by a sense of friendship, trust, and emotional investment, even where individuals have not had one-on-one interactions, as may be the case when viewers feel a personal connection with microcelebrities, and where friendship may be vicarious or a constructed illusion (Marwick, 2013, p. 19). Indeed, microcelebrities actively undertake relational labor (Baym, 2018) to reduce social distance between themselves and their fans to remain peer-like.
Methodology
To undertake our investigation of the peer pedagogies associated with #BookTok, we pursued an exploratory approach which started with a broad focus and then narrowed down to an in-depth analysis of a small number of videos. Exploratory approaches are well established within digital media, platform, and cultural studies (Bruns et al., 2011; Graham & Rodriguez, 2021; Morton et al., 2015; Pearce et al., 2020). Exploratory research is a common approach to TikTok given the challenges presented by the platform and it’s affordances, mainly its seemingly “aggressive” algorithm (Schellewald, 2021; Siles et al., 2024; Siles & Meléndez-Moran, 2021), which is highly tailored to individual use (see Abidin, 2021; Martens et al., 2022; Vaterlaus & Winter, 2021; Vizcaíno-Verdú & Abidin, 2023). It is difficult to search TikTok with any degree of certainty and it is very difficult to replicate processes during data gathering. As this is an exploratory approach, we acknowledge there are limits to replicating the study; however, the general exploratory approach could be undertaken by others to analyze similar content in similiar ways.
Over a 2-week period, we viewed hundreds of TikTok videos that included bookish and readerly content. To inform our study, we relied on hashtags, as descriptive labels of content deemed important by users (Papacharissi, 2015; Zappavigna, 2018), as markers of community, collaboration, and learning (Greenhalgh et al., 2018; Greenhow, Lewin & Staudt Willet, 2023; Krutka & Greenhalgh, 2021; Marcelo-Martínez & Marcelo, 2023; Rosenberg et al., 2016), and as a key communicative function of social platforms like TikTok (Bruns & Burgess, 2015; Kaye et al., 2022; Zappavigna, 2015). Searches were conducted using the hashtag #BookTok alongside other keywords such as #reader, #readmore, #tips, #bookrecommendations, and #nonreaders. We aimed to understand the different kinds of videos tagged with #BookTok, with a focus on genre conventions, stylistic tropes and techniques, narrative commonalities, similarities, and differences in how knowledge and skills are shared and how individuals, books, and reading are represented in the videos. Next, we selected 10 videos for deeper analysis, with a focus on those in which knowledge and skills are shared. While we did not set out to find the most viewed or popular videos, we chose videos where there was a significant amount of user engagement, as evidenced by views and likes (hearts). The overriding factor in our selection was diversity of content where forms of teaching were included. We also looked for diversity in how the TikTokkers approached learning content and where they used different techniques to invite viewers to learn from them. We chose videos representing different kinds of #BookTok videos, which we assumed would appeal to a range of audiences, and which used different stylistic techniques. We also included videos which were self-reflexive about #BookTok as a genre, to reflect a common practice in which BookTokkers critique the kinds of videos that tend to gain popularity on the platform.
We undertook a close content and semiotic analysis of the 10 videos to better understand how they invite learning positions. To achieve this, we considered how the videos use pedagogical classification and framing (Bernstein, 1973, p. 363). Bernstein (1973) argues that pedagogical “classification” is the extent of boundary maintenance of the content being learned—that is, how strictly knowledge is defined and policed via definitional work and assessment practices (p. 366). A “frame” relates to the amount of control “teacher and pupil possess over the selection, organisation, and pacing of knowledge transmitted and received in the pedagogical relationship” (p. 366). We apply these elements to #BookTok videos to consider how knowledge is “classified” in ways that are more or less “school-like.” We ask whether the knowledge is presented as definitive, “true,” and accurate, or whether it invites interpretation and speculation?
We transcribed each video, with an outline of the timing, the words spoken by the TikTokker, on-screen text and imagery, and the use of music and sound. We completed a shot-by-shot analysis of the visual content, including body language, clothing, camera angles, editing techniques, lighting, location, and props (particularly books and bookshelves). For the purposes of this article, we selected three videos as examples of peer pedagogical processes in #BookTok content. Following a semiotic approach to understand the visual components (Barthes, 1957/1994) and the social contexts of the videos, we aimed to describe and then interpret the videos for connotative meaning. Our main goal was to understand the peer pedagogical processes involved in the classification and framing of book-related skills and knowledge to gain insights into how learning opportunities are made available to viewers. We acknowledge that this approach has limitations because we did not interview #BookTok users about their learning on the platform or analyze the comments on the videos to investigate evidence of learning. Nonetheless, the approach provides important insights into the how #BookTok videos are frequently crafted in purposeful ways that invite learning.
Invitations to Learn About Books and Reading on TikTok
In this section, we share three examples to illustrate how viewers are invited to take up learning positions in more and less formal ways. We start by providing analysis of two videos which are more “teacherly”—videos by caitsbooks and books.with.lee. We then provide a contrasting example which is more casual and playful in its pedagogical classification and framing.
caitsbooks
caitsbooks, the TikTok account of Cait Jacobs, has 314.6K followers and 19.6 million likes (at the time of writing). She has been posting book content to TikTok since December 2019 (Jacobs, 2021) and has uploaded over 2000 videos (https://www.tiktok.com/@caitsbooks). Her profile states that she “founded BookTok,” a claim to being one of the original #BookTok hashtaggers.
The video under consideration is titled “just a reminder . . .” (caitsbooks, 2021) with the description: “just a reminder (this is something i always make sure to do, so i want to make sure you guys know too) #books #booktok #reader #caitsbooks #bookish.” The video was posted on the 16 August 2021 and runs for 23 seconds. It has been viewed 32.5K times, and as of May 2024, has 5911 “hearts / likes,” 88 comments, and has been bookmarked 110 times. Table 1 provides a timed breakdown of the video.
A Breakdown of caitsbooks’ Video “Just A Reminder . . .”
The post acts as a warning to viewers that they should not decide to purchase a book based solely on an online recommendation. caitsbooks implores her readers (“I’m begging you”) to undertake research about the book first. It is not immediately clear what the warning relates to, although it is likely that it is a response to books marketed to teens and young adult audiences that feature adult content—often referred to on TikTok as “spicy” books (#spicybooktok) or smut (#smut). Some of these books have been controversial for depictions of sexual activity such as Sarah J. Maas’ (2013) bestselling Throne of Glass series which is marketed as Young Adult Fiction, but which is often associated with a range of trigger warnings, including implied sexual violence. The unspoken knowingness of the video’s subject matter positions caitsbooks as having insider knowledge about potentially age-inappropriate or “triggering” books and the problem of incomplete reviews on #BookTok. The conversation she has with her peers would unlikely occur between adults and teens, particularly in a formal school classroom between a teacher and their students.
caitsbooks positions herself as both a peer and as a friendly authority figure. She comes across as a “polished” older teenager, wearing casual but stylish clothing; she is wearing makeup, and her hair has been stylized. The image is well crafted, with effective composition, key lighting that illuminates the subject and background and presents a setting that establishes caitbooks as a “bookish” person. The impressively full and well-arranged bookshelf in the background features many titles that would be familiar to teen readers and the #BookTok community in general. Overall, the image is aspirational, positioning caitsbooks as a successful young reader who invites her viewers to take her seriously. She speaks in a relatively relaxed way, using informal phrasing, even though her message is direct and provocative. She is peer-like in the sense that she presents as a concerned older sibling or well-informed friend, and she is a recognizably familiar member of the #BookTok community.
In terms of pedagogical framing, the video is quite formal. caitsbooks looks straight into the camera and addresses her viewers in a casual but serious way, using direct statements and appeals to action: “do some research,” “look up the genre,” “look at the age rating,” and “so make sure.” The on-screen text reinforces the formal nature of the framing by pointing to sources of authority including the author’s and publisher’s websites. This is quite “teacherly” and comes from a position of authority as someone who knows about the kinds of books other teenagers are likely to be reading. As someone who critically reflects on book recommendations, she presents herself as being trustworthy, in contrast to other #BookTokkers who may not be as helpful or responsible. By “begging” her viewers, she emphasizes the urgency of her warning about book recommendations, and by equivocating on who can be trusted to recommend books, she establishes the need for ongoing vigilance.
To complement the relatively formal pedagogical framing, information in the video is quite tightly classified as it aims to align to official sources and institutional norms. She draws attention to well-established key elements and resources to look for when deciding about whether to read a book, including genre, official descriptions, and reviews. By pointing viewers to institutional sources of information, she addresses the problem of inappropriate content with official and credible knowledge. Her references to age ratings and trigger warnings reinforce accepted social norms about the assumed maturity necessary to read adult content and themes. The on-screen text points viewers to well-established sources of information about age appropriateness and trigger warnings such as Common Sense Media and Booktriggerwarnings.com. Common Sense Media is a popular online site that provides reviews of children’s and teen’s media and popular culture products and services and is backed by respected organizations associated with large technology companies such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Book Trigger Warnings is a community-led wiki, with well-established community standards and governance. She also suggests some TWs (Trigger Warnings) book blogs, including her own, as being a good source of information. Not only does this elevate her own reviews as being credible and trustworthy, she also suggests that engaging critically with books can lead to more enjoyable reading experiences.
books.with.lee
The second example is a video by Black BookTokker, books.with.lee, who invites peerness through a call for #BookTok viewers to become allies in the cause of creating a more culturally diverse #BookTok. Her profile descriptor says she is a therapist by day and a BookTokker by night, and a mother of two children. She has about 105K followers and she has posted over 250 videos since 2020 which have approximately 1.4 million likes (https://www.tiktok.com/@books.with.lee). Most of her posts focus on diverse books and her broader social media activity demonstrates a strong focus on Asian and African literature. Some of her videos have titles such as “How diverse is your reading?” “Diversifying your reading” “De-influencing BookTok?” and “BookRecs by Black Authors.” The video we focus on is called “Curate your own FYP” (For You Page) (books.with.lee, 2023) and the description beneath the 18 second video says: It’s ridiculous that you even have to dig, but the more you engage, the more of those videos you will see #booktok #blackbooktok #bookrecs #bookishthoughts #books #diversebooks #greenscreenvideo. Table 2 provides a timed breakdown of the video.
A Breakdown of books.with.lee’s Video “Curate Your Own FYP.”
At the time of writing, the video has been viewed 863K times, and has attracted 204.8K likes, 2260 comments, 2932 shares, and 6052 bookmarks. books.with.lee uses the video to challenge her audience to engage with diverse content to “train” the TikTok algorithm to recommend additional diverse content. This is in response to the widely accepted problem that #BookTok videos lack cultural diversity because of algorithmic bias, leading to predominantly caucasian BookTokkers and books being featured on the platform (Amarikwa, 2023; Harris et al., 2023; Jerasa & Burriss, 2024; Zhao & Abidin, 2023). The video uses on-screen text to rhetorically ask “BookTok is the same 20 books?” which invites viewers to consider the idea that the platform’s algorithm continually promotes similar content, featuring a small range of non-diverse genres, authors, and stories. books.with.lee encourages her audience to search wider and to engage with content created by a diverse range of authors and it is implied that this will “train” the algorithm to subsequently recommend more diverse content which will enable viewers to have control over their own FYP.
The video invites viewers to become allies to Black, Indigenous and other people of color, and other marginalized groups. books.with.lee sits in a casual manner with her legs crossed on what appears to be her living room floor. She uses relatively casual language; her body language is open, and she is holding a cup of coffee. She symbolically places herself on the same level as her viewers, reducing distance between herself and her audience. Like caitsbooks, she positions herself as a friendly authority figure. Also similar to caitsbooks, the image is well composed with key lighting that effectively illuminates the subject and background, placing emphasis not just on the BookTokker, but on her surroundings. books.with.lee wears casual but fashionable clothing and she is stylishly presented. Her living room is very well arranged with contemporary furniture, it is uncluttered and has a “light and airy” feel about it. The overall setting is aspirational and invites books.with.lee’s viewers to see her as a successful authority figure, but someone who is approachable and friendly. Despite the somewhat relaxed and inviting setting, books.with.lee speaks in a direct manner and strongly urges her viewers to change their BookTok search habits.
The video is pedagogical because it aims to teach viewers how to avoid cultural sameness by using search techniques to train the TikTok algorithm. books.with.lee frames herself casually, but seriously. The setup is more akin to a small group session or get-together than it is a conventional classroom. It is not hard to imagine that the video has been recorded as part of a conversation, but one directed by books.with.lee. For much of the video, she is superimposed over the top of a scrolling background of examples of the culturally problematic BookTok content she is referring to, placing her in a position of authority over the content, as an observer and analyst. The videos serve as evidence of the cultural sameness she is referring to when she asks “Who decided whiteness is the default?” She also uses direct statements: “this is why,” “this is what you get,” “you shouldn’t have to,” “so engage with.” The video acts as an appeal for audience members to join a community of concerned fellow BookTokkers: “When we say you need to curate your own FYP this is why.” The “we” in this case represents culturally diverse BookTokkers and their allies.
Information in the video is highly classified in the sense that books.with.lee speaks with certainty and draws on established knowledge about the problem of lack of diversity on social media platforms and within the mainstream book industry. The video is an invitation to take up a critical disposition, or a form of critical literacy, toward #BookTok’s whiteness. It encourages critical thinking about BookTok and it is a call to action to change both BookTok and reading behavior. Her “lesson” is quite didactic in that it suggests that there is an answer to a specific problem. She does not invite a conversation or debate by raising a question for consideration, but rather speaks with certainty and authority about the existing problem.
munnyreads
The final example is a video by munnyreads, a 20-something secondary school art teacher living in the United States who has posted approximately 380 videos since 2020, attracting over 17 million likes and just over 341K followers (https://www.tiktok.com/@munnyreads). Her videos include a combination of familiar #BookTok genres, including micro-reviews, reading lifestyle videos, bookmarking practices, and TBR lists. Her videos are distinguished by their inclusion of self-effacing humor through which munnyreads refuses to take herself seriously. Paradoxically, although she is a classroom teacher, her approach is the least “teacherly” of the three videos we discuss in this article. We focus on the 40 second video, “Hey! Are you trying to read more?” (munnyreads, 2020), which includes the description: “Based on a kinda true story. Follow me for more tips. [sunglasses emoji] #booktok, #bookish #read #readmore #tips #ImAGhost #lol #PersonalFinance.” The video has been viewed more than 263K times, and has attracted 81.6K likes, 664 comments, 1,263 shares, and 7,258 bookmarks. Table 3 provides a timed breakdown of the video.
A Breakdown of munnyreads’ Video, “Hey! Are You Trying to Read More?”
munnyreads uses the video to provide her audience with a tip about how to read more, which consists of her randomly placing a bookmark in a future page of the book, and then using that marker as a goal for the reading session. She suggests her audience read until at least the beginning of the chapter the bookmark appears in. She constructs the video in a humorous way by using a sports coaching metaphor, in which the coach (herself) becomes more extreme as she encourages her viewers to reach the finish line, finally becoming a caricature, and she ends the video by laughing in a self-effacing way. She also uses hyperbole to parodically suggest that through discipline, and her simple technique, her viewers can become book consumers, BookTokkers, the President, and ultimately, readers. She uses humor and exaggeration to purposely undercut any sense that she is being the “serious teacher” and in doing so she remains accessible and relatable and invites her viewers into a peer-like relationship.
The video shows munnyreads to be a fun and she comes across more like a big sister than a teacher. She is a peer in the sense that she is clearly a reader, as indicated by the full bookcase behind her, but she is easy going and accessible. By sharing her tip, she reveals that she also sometimes struggles to read as much as she would like to. She begins the video by saying “Hey!,” the way you might greet a friend, and this is reinforced by her use of other casual language such as, “You can do it!,” “You’re gonna open that book up,” “Shove that bookmark in there.” She uses purposely self-effacing humor to reduce social distance between herself and her viewers. She doesn’t take herself seriously and she avoids talking down to her audience. This is supported by the overall style of the video which is playful, fast-paced, and engaging, even though it is not polished or professional looking. This is a significant contrast with both caitsbooks’ and books.with.lee’s videos which are presented much more formally.
From a pedagogical perspective, the video does not aim to share institutionally recognized or sanctioned knowledge. Her tip is not a proven technique for reading more, although it may encourage some viewers to read more precisely because it is presented in such a fun way. By parodying sports coaching and through comically exaggerating the potential benefits of her tip, munnyreads purposefully undermines formal coaching techniques and performance goals. Through her caricature of the overzealous sports coach, she positions herself in direct contrast with formal instruction, perhaps to deliberately step out of her professional role as a classroom teacher. She undercuts any opportunity for her message to align to formally classified knowledge about the benefits of reading, and she actively undermines any claim to personal authority about reading or teaching. In this sense, the loose classification of knowledge reinforces that she is a peer with her viewers because she associates reading with being playful and fun, rather than connecting it to learning or self-improvement.
The video’s message is reinforced through its pedagogical framing. munnyreads sits in front of a full bookcase, just as caitsbooks does, but in this case the lighting is poor, and we cannot see the books due to the frequent and often jarring movement of the handheld camera work. While she looks directly into the camera to address her audience, the frequent quick edits and jolting zoom shots from medium to extreme close-up undercut any sense of serious authority. The style of the video is purposely over-the-top and invites the audience to participate in the joke, while simultaneously inviting them to take the tip. The consequence is that the audience has the freedom to take the tip seriously or to simply see it as part of the gag. While caitsbooks “begs” her viewers to take her message about book content seriously, and books.with.lee conveys a powerful message about the need to read more diversely, munnyreads provides a tip about reading goals, which her audience can take or leave.
Conclusion
Analysis of the three videos illustrates that far from being trivial or somehow inherently harmful (Field, 2024), the #BookTok “corner” of TikTok provides varied opportunities for young people to take part in book and reading culture in a way that was simply impossible in the pre-digital age. That is, due to TikTok, there is more readily available discourse among young people about books and reading than has ever previously been possible. In particular, the article illustrates two key points about how learning on TikTok results from creator intent and community expectations.
The first is the deliberate choice by #BookTok creators to use TikTok’s affordances to share knowledge and skills as a form of public media pedagogy. Each of the three videos may be considered as a carefully constructed teaching episode. Each is the result of a considerable amount of creator labor (Abidin, 2021; Baym, 2018; Reddan et al., 2024), involving the development of a script, consideration of the setting, careful lighting (for the first two), elaborate camera movement and editing (the third video), and on-screen text. The videos reveal that each BookTokker has spent a large amount of time participating in the BookTok community to develop an understanding of their audience’s expectations, and they have invested significant time in understanding the books they read. Therefore, whether the videos have more, or less, knowledge classification and framing, they are the product of a significant investment of time and effort on the part of the BookTokkers. The number of videos uploaded by each (caitsbooks >2,000, books.with.lee 250, and munnyreads 380) represents a very considerable contribution to other community members’ opportunities to learn how to successfully participate in books and reading culture. Framed in this way, learning on the platform is not random or the result of happenstance but the consequence of significant time and effort.
The second point is that at least for the videos we discuss in this article, and for many other #BookTok videos we analyzed for our larger project, the invitation to learn seems central to the videos’ success. Peer pedagogical practice—sharing knowledge and skills between people who share passions and interests—seems important to the amount of engagement with the videos, including views and likes. Recognizing this is important because it is often assumed that young people watch short videos for “mindless” entertainment or to switch off, and as a break from the responsibilities of school and formal learning. We do not believe there is anything wrong with watching video content purely for entertainment and research shows that young people often benefit from relaxing with screen-based entertainment (Ito et al., 2013; Jenkins, 2006). Our article shows, though, that young people who frequent videos tagged with #BookTok have opportunities to learn while they are relaxing and having fun on the platform. And we expect that many other videos on TikTok would provide similar opportunities in a range of fields and interests. In this sense, TikTok may be considered as much a learning platform as it is an entertainment platform. BookTokkers are teaching peers about reading identities, critical thinking in book selection, goal-setting for reading, pleasure in reading, and, importantly, the value of media entertainment in encouraging reading.
This article has some important implications. The first is that the peer pedagogies approach provides a framework for thinking about social learning on all digital platforms where content and skills are exchanged. The approach has the potential to add an important dimension to considerations of the value offered to users of social media platforms and an important counter to claims that social media are trivial, addictive, and harmful to young people’s well-being. Such an approach would be further enhanced by investigating not just the invitations to learning made available on these platforms—which is a limitation of this article—but by considering how these opportunities are taken up by users. This approach would provide important insights into the broader pedagogical function played by digital media platforms.
The second implication is that it is essential to consider how peer pedagogies may lead to undesirable outcomes. As books.with.lee illustrates, #BookTok has the potential to reinforce dominant and harmful social and cultural norms and there is no assurance that quality or ethical standards are applied within the #BookTok community, or any other online community. In this article, we have chosen to share three examples that we consider to be helpful and pro-social learning opportunities. However, the invitation to learn on digital media platforms and in online communities also includes opportunities to take up learner identities which may reinforce hateful and harmful ideas such as the spread of misinformation, conspiracy theory content, and forms of toxic masculinity. Gaining deeper insights into how these forms of destructive content are structured and offered to users as learning opportunities would equally provide essential new insights. Whether the peer pedagogies approach is utilized to investigate socially helpful or harmful learning opportunities, the approach outlined in this article contributes to broader efforts to understand how learning occurs on digital media platforms as part of everyday life.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The authors acknowledge the support of the Australian Research Council who funded the research informing this article through the ARC Linkage scheme (Project: Discovering a Good Read: Pathways to Reading for Australian Teens in a Digital Age. LP180100258).
Ethical Approval
The project was conducted with ethical approval from the Queensland University of Technology Research Ethics Committee, with social media data collected following guidelines related to waiver of consent (project ID: 3277).
