The institutional repertoire in the hands of ordinary readers: a quantitative analysis of the impact of works from the French and Portuguese school canons on Goodreads

Abstract A growing body of research demonstrates how social networks and other digital platforms are redefining the concept of the literary canon, leading to a disconnect between institutional legitimization and public reception. Framed within systemic theories, this quantitative, non-experimental study seeks to measure the impact of institutional repertoires on ordinary readers by analysing social media platforms for readers, which serve as valuable spaces for examining society’s reading preferences. To this end, the school canons of France and Portugal were selected as institutionally legitimized corpora, as they uniquely prescribe reading lists, unlike those of other countries. Goodreads was chosen as the primary environment for this investigation. A database was subsequently created, incorporating variables related to the works themselves—such as literary genre and internationality—as well as variables related to their impact on Goodreads. Descriptive and inferential statistical analyses were applied to this dataset. The results reveal that the scholarly articles in both countries are well received by ordinary readers and that readers combine traditional labelling methods associated with criticism with other more personalized methods.