Use the :mod:`json` module to read in this file as a JSON-formatted data
        structure. Keyword arguments are passed to :func:`json.load`. Returns the
        read-in data structure.

def read_json (self, mode='rt', **kwargs):
        """Use the :mod:`json` module to read in this file as a JSON-formatted data
        structure. Keyword arguments are passed to :func:`json.load`. Returns the
        read-in data structure.

        """
        import json

        with self.open (mode=mode) as f:
            return json.load (f, **kwargs)