This study (part of the FNS-funded project “History of the teaching of literature in Switzerland (mid-19^th-20^th century”, N°100010_197800; for a presentation see Darme, Monnier & Tinembart, 2020) aims at contributing to give elements of answer to the question: what are the functions of reading books (“Lesebücher”, “livres de lecture”) in the context of the school subject mother tongue “German” or “French”, the languages we will look at. This question is very often looked at from the sole perspective of contents of the books in order to analyze de social representations they have to produce in the students: the idea of nation (Cabanel, 2010, in a comparative perspective; Helbling, 1994, for Switzerland which is the focus of the present study) or of genre (Bühlmann, 2009). The present study adopts a didactic perspective in the context of the subject matter “mother tongue”. This later aims more generally to build in the students a relationship towards language which is culturally specific and which strongly evolves through history (for the history of French as a school subject, see Chervel, 2006, for German the still most comprehensive is by Frank, 1972; for reading and literature, see Kämpfer-Van den Boogaart, 2010). The reading book is but one means, but a very central one, of construction of this relationship. This means that the reading book has to be analyzed as a whole (see Schneuwly, 2015) from the point of view of its didactic structure and of the way the texts are chosen and organized the ones in function of the others, what Denizot (2014) calls “amphitextuality”.

In order to explore empirically specific cultural functions of reading books, we adopt a comparative approach, culturally and historically, in taking two cultures in one country: French- and German-speaking regions in Switzerland at the historical periods. Both regions are oriented towards the country that has the same language – France and Germany – and are at the same time relatively autonomous. Comparing German and French reading books Minder (1953, 1992) shows that « the German reading book generally aims at cultivating the mind and the world view », whereas the French one is more oriented towards a more rational and normative relationship towards language. In his history of the German “Lesebuch” Helmers describes six models with different dominant functions, among them, from the end of the 19^th century on, “reading book in the service of a bourgeois education of the mind”. Similarly, Chartier and Hebrard (2000) distinguish three models of the French “livre de lecture” from the middle of the 19^th to the middle of the 20^th century, among them the “cultural model of literary education”

On this background, it seems indeed to be particularly interesting to look at the Swiss situation. While recognizing a certain autonomy in relation to neighboring countries of reference, can we also find a different relationship in French and German-speaking Switzerland with regard to texts and literature and the way it is presented and studied in teaching? How does it evolve historically? What role more specifically does literature play in reading books? What texts and authors are chosen? How are the texts organized? Does this choice an organization tend to create a more analytic or a more emphatic relationship to texts?

In order to give provisional answers to our research question, we have to create a representative corpus of reading books. We have collected the compulsory reading books of three contrasted (urban versus rural; protestant versus catholic) cantons of French and German-speaking Switzerland in two historical periods (end of 19th century – 1930s) for students around 12 to 15 years old. The collection of the six reading books is the following (in parentheses, the number of text for each period): - French speaking cantons: Fribourg (220 – 199) – Geneva (248 – 234) – Vaud (329 – 488). Total of texts: 1718. - German-speaking cantons: Aargau (172 – 138) – Schwyz (213 – 165) – Zurich (138 – 142). Total of texts: 968. 1. These reading books have been analyzed comparatively from a general quantitative point of view: size, number of texts, number of pages, length of texts, literary versus documentary texts, poems. This first very rough analysis gives already some hints concerning our question. 2. The books have been analyzed from the point of view of their structure on the basis of their table of matters; this allows defining a prototype for each period and region; one book of each region and period corresponds best to this prototype and will be analyzed more in detail from the point of view of its general structure. These prototypes will be compared systematically. This allows us to have an idea of the didactic perspective and intent of the books. 3. All texts of all books (more than 2500 as seen above) have been coded in function of different parameters: date, nation of the author, text genre (narration, description, documentary text, poem, etc.), literary reputation (international, regional, local, unknown). These data are analyzed from the point of view of the two factors region and period, and eventually cantons and their characteristics (urban – rural; catholic – protestant). This analysis gives us a more precise idea of each text corpus of each book. The structure of this corpus can be interpreted and described as “models of reading books” following the categorization of Helmers and Chartier/Hebrard.

The analyses – that are still ongoing – show the following main results: - In function of the two periods, the reading books are strongly contrasted from all points of view: materially in terms of size and volume, in terms of the overall structure, in terms of the choice of texts and authors represented. - Despite appreciable variations between cantons, it seems possible to contrast the two regions being compared, French-speaking and German-speaking Switzerland. In the first period, the reading books of the two regions all present, in various forms, a dimension that we have called, "encyclopedic" ("Lesebuch als Sachbuch" says Helmers). As far as other reading texts are concerned, it would seem that the approach in the French-speaking part of Switzerland can be defined as predominantly following a "cultural model of literary reading" (Chartier) and that in the German-speaking part of Switzerland as following a "reading book in the service of the formation of a bourgeois mentality] (Helmers) model”. We say "tendentcally", as both types always include elements of the other model and elements of moralization: reading book in the service of moral education through exemplary stories, says Helmers, educational model of reading as moralization, says Chartier. - -From one period to another, in each region, we observe sedimentation phenomena, such as encyclopedic parts in the second period, as well as the anticipation of certain principles, such as the variation of textual genres. The evolution is always done in the logic of change and continuity, this continuity distinguishing according to similar principles the two regions during the three periods.

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