The implication of reading competence in developing reflection and thinking is an important issue for student teachers to consider. Reading is also a competence, in which the language at the disposal of a person is included, to use for social development and mutual understanding. This article is based on a case study and is concerned with how some student teachers in South Africa and Sweden conceive of themselves as readers from child to student and the value of language for reading competence. In the article we reflect on different reading practices in the two countries. The data consist of 25 written narratives with the theme, I as a reader, written by student teachers in South Africa and Sweden. By using a socio-cultural basis for understanding reading, one can identify six reading practices concerning the students' reading events in the narratives. One reading practice, critical reading, is more explicit in the South African students' narratives than in the Swedish students' narratives.