LITERATURE AND CRITICAL THEORYTHEORIES, THEORISTS, AND IMPORTANT TERMS

By: K. Yegoryan

Critical Theory

Greek {kritikos} = judgment – 18th cent

In Literary studies Is a form of “hermeneutics”- the

knowledge via interpretation to understand the meaning of human texts and symbolic expressions

Critical Theory As a term developed from “Frankfurt

School” of theorists in 1923 in the meaning of understanding, criticizing and changing social thinking

1st defined by Marx in 1937 in the essay “Traditional and Critical Theory” as a social theory oriented toward critiquing and changing society as a whole in contrast to traditional theory oriented to understanding and explaining

CRITICAL THEORY AND LITERATURE

Focuses on analysis of texts

Originated in 1960s and has been influenced by European philosophy and social theories

“A true critique ought to dwell rather upon excellences than implications to discover the concealed beauties of a writer and communicate to the world such things as are worth their observations” Joseph Addison

Literary Theory and Schools of Criticism Moral Criticism and Dramatic Construction

(~360BC- Formalism (1930s) Structuralism and Semiotics (1920s) Marxist Criticism (1930s) Psychoanalytic Criticism (1930s) Reader-Response Criticism (1960s) Post-Structuralism, Deconstruction,

Postmodernism (1966) Post-Colonial Criticism (1990s) Feminist Criticism (1960s) Gender Studies and Queer Theory (1970s)

Literary Theory and Schools of Criticism1. Moral Criticism and Dramatic Construction (~360 BC-present)

Plato Republic, Plato may have given us the first literary criticism

through the dialog between Socrates and two of his associates  

Aristotle In Poetics, Aristotle breaks with his teacher (Plato) in the

consideration of art. Aristotle considers poetry and rhetoric To help authors achieve their objectives, Aristotle developed

elements of organization and methods for writing effective poetry and drama known as the principles of dramatic construction 

 

Literary Theory and Schools of Criticism

2. Formalism (1930s-present)

Russian Formalism

New Criticism (USA)

Neo-Aristotelianism (Chicago School of Criticism)

RUSSIAN FORMALISM and NEW CRITICISM Close reading of the work itself

Requires a close focus and analysis of the text

Russian Formalism and New Critics

(American school of thought) claimed:

Meaning exists in the text/on the page

No extra-textual sources to understand meaning

( no author’s intention, biography, hist. era

should be considered for text’s meaning)

DEFAMILIZATION Term by V. Shklovsky ( Russian Formalist)

Instead of seeing Literature as a “reflection” of

the world, the writer must explore new

technique and devices for a renewed perception

( ex. the use of figurative, connotative meaning)

The readers should experience new meanings

and perspectives when seeing the similar in a

different way – “defamiliarized”

3. Structuralism and Semiotics (1920s-present)

STRUCTUALISM Method of Literary interpretation via

structure (human activates are structured and constructed and so are texts)

Structuralism was affected by: Linguistics Social ideology Psychology/anthropology Literary analysis

3. Structuralism and Semiotics (1920s-present)

SEMIOTIC – study of Signs

Studies the signs and types of representation used by humans to express feelings, ideas, thoughts and ideologies.

• Study “texts” (can be images, words, or both)

• Text is an assemblage of signs (words, images, sounds) constructed and interpreted with reference to conventions of a genre and in particular medium.

SEMIOTICS Way to study/read text and images •Denotation & Connotation • Sign = signifier & signified– Depends on social, historical and cultural context – Depends on context of presentation– Depends on viewers reception

Hidden Meanings of famous LOGOShttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_j6ARv10PY&feature=related

Linguistic StructuralismSEMIOTIC – study of Signs

Ferdinand de SaussureA Swiss  linguistand semiotician whose ideas laid a foundation for many significant developments both in linguistics and semiology in the 20th century

Language is based on a– Signifier : the word, sound,

visual appearance of the word – Signified: its meaning, the underlying concept Signs are largely arbitrarySign doesn't’t carry meaning, the meaning comes from the relation of difference (A is A because it’s not B) and nor reference

An American philosopher, logician, known for his contributions in semiotics and as "the father of pragmatism".  

SIGN and MEANINGThere are three relationships between a sign (referent) and its meaning

• Icon (resemblance to actual thing) • Index (connection of facts: often cause-effect) • Symbol (depend on how interpreted)Representation= symbol: to stand for, to suggest an idea, visual image, belief, action  

Charles Sanders Peirce

SEMIOTICS

Semiotics: the study of signshttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEgxTKUP_WI

Semiotics Of The Tiehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeefWS8YrDw

Roland BarthesA French literary theorist, philosopher, linguist, critic, and semiotician. 

‘The Death of the Author’ Meaning exists not only in production but reception The signifier “I” is a ‘shifter’; that moves

from one speaker to the other speaker as each lays claim to it

Linguistically, the author is never more than the instance writing’

Semiotics Barthes’ MYTH

Hidden set of rules and conventions through which meanings, which are specific to certain groups, are made to seem universal and given for a whole society

Is a form of language that creates an alternative reality; is a tool to excess the reality

It converts history into nature. And the task of the mytholographer is to rediscover the element of history that motivates the myth, to elicit what is specific to a given time and place, asking what interests are served by the naturalization of particular convictions and values.

‘Myth Construction’ Innoculation: Acknowledging a small detail

to mask larger problem Prevention of History: Removing an object

from its place and reality and thus its freedom

Identification: sameness and the destruction of difference

Neither-Norism: balance created by weighting 2 sides against each other (nihilism)

MEANING and NIHILISM Nihilism- philosophical doctrine suggesting the

negation of one or more meaningful aspects of life

Moral Nihilists- assert that morality doesn’t inherently exist, and that any established moral values are invented/ brought out by a plan

Nihilism is also associated with Anomia: general mood of despair at the perceived pointlessness of existence that one may develop realizing there are no necessary norms, rules, and laws.

4.Marxist Criticism and Social Ideology (1930s-present)

one type of symbolic system among others

a set of doctrines, beliefs, or ideas that form the basis of a political, economic, or other system which attempts to put the experience of the world into some order. The result in Marxist thought is the distortion of reality to maintain authority over it.

Karl Marx

German philosopher, economist,sociologist, 

“Ruling Class/Ruling Ideas” Ideology is the ideas of the ruling class that are in any epoch the ruling idea; the class which is the ruling material force of society is at the same time its ruling intellectual force 

Louis Althusser

a philosopher, known as “structural Marxist” was critical of many aspects of structuralism.

ISA and RSA ISA- Ideological State Apparatuses RSA Repressive State ApparatusesIn order to produce its productive power, state applies control through ideologies/ rituals (ISA) and if needed through repression/violence (RSA)

Althusser’s Interpellation

A process by which ideology pre-defines individuals/ constructs them (recreation/birth)

Secondary status of subject as mere effect of social relation

Idealized future Identifiable characters

AT & T Ad with Interpellationhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZb0avfQme8