Transcript
Page 1: structuralism, Post Structuralism n Post Modernism

StructuralismStructuralism and Post Structuralism

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Culture Studies and Culture Studies and TheoryTheoryCulture studies – cultural

representations/artifacts, identity, social relations and – negotiations for power

Power relations between – classes, genders, castes, races, nations, ethnicities

Uses aspects of contemporary literary and cultural theory – to analyze power and its manifestations in the cultural domain

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StructuralismStructuralism• Ferdinand De Sassure – Swiss

LinguistCourse de Linguistic Generale (1916)Translated into English - 1959• Diachronic / Synchronic study • Sign - signifier and signified• “A sign is not a link between a thing

and a name, but between a concept and a sound pattern” - Sassure

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No inherent connection between a word and what it designates- meanings to words – arbitrary – maintained by convention

Meanings of words are relational Meaning attributed to the object or

idea by the human mind (terrorist /freedom fighter)

Langue and parole - Study of Semiotics

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Meaning is produced through the syntagmatic and paradigmatic axis

Syntagmatic – linear combination of signs to form sentences

Paradigmatic – field of signs (i.e. synonyms) from which a given sign is selected

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Linguistic Turn – Cultural Linguistic Turn – Cultural StudiesStudiesLanguage is the means and medium

through which we form knowledge about ourselves and the social world.

Language constructs the very nature of our perception of reality.

Language gives meaning to material objects and social practices

Structuralism

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Cultural TextsCultural TextsAnything that generates meaning through

certain forms of representation is a ‘text’Cultural representations- books, music

videos, television programs, sports, politician’s speeches, our identities – become texts – constructed in language through the process of relationality and difference

A wedding or a sport – becomes a text - grammar, difference and relations

Like language – culture works through a system of relations and differences.

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Claude Levi Strauss and Roland Barthes-study of myth (message) – Literature, media, fashion, any social event - becomes a “Text”

Culture made up of structural networks – carries significance – shown to operate in a systematic way

Any cultural act – placed within a wider structure of values, beliefs – key for understanding that particular culture

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Post Structuralism Post Structuralism Emerged in the late 1960’s

Roland Barthes and Jacques Derrida

The Death of the author – The Birth of the reader - readerly /writerly

1966- Derrida – Structure, Sign and play in the Discourse of Human Sciences

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World is constructed through languageReality accessible only through the

linguistic medium Derrida - reality itself is textual - open

to varied interpretations. No ultimate meaning to a word.

Meaning of a word is not only based on difference, but also on deference (respect)

Verbal sign – floats – meanings- fluid – slippage and spillage

Dictionary – stabilizes meanings ?

Similar to

structuralism

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• Binary oppositions – one item privileged over the other – man /woman , master /servant, light/dark , teacher /student

• This hierarchy can be reversed

• Cultural act – structure - structure itself is not fixed – subject to constant interpretations

Intellectual event – rupture – read against

the grain

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Signifier at war with the signified

• Text - looks out for gaps ,inconsistencies – varied interpretations

• A text will always have some elements – which will work against it

• Deconstruction -Oppositional readings – multiple meanings

• Structuralism – constructs a structure - Post – Structuralism – deconstructs and reconstructs that structure

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Modernism and Post Modernism and Post Modernism Modernism Modernism – cultural formations

and cultural experiences of modernity -associated with the enlightenment philosophy of Rousseau, Weber, Habermas- “universal truths through reason”

Post Modernism – Lyotard, Baudrillard, Foucault, Rorty – socio- historical and linguistic specificity of truth

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Industrial revolution - effects

Urban population

Universal Suffrage

• Socialism – trade unions

First and second world wars

Great Depression – 1930

Twentieth centuryTwentieth century Socio-Political Changes Socio-Political Changes

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Modernity and the Modernity and the Enlightenment project Enlightenment project Enlightenment philosophy – writings

of eighteenth century writers – Voltaire , Rousseau, Hume

Enlightenment thought – marked by belief that Reason can demystify and illuminate the world against religion ,myth and superstition

Dismissed religion, tradition & emotion

Stressed on science & rationality

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Modernity –associated with the emancipatory project – enlightenment reason – lead to universal truths – foundation for humanity’s forward path of progress

Enlightenment philosophy and the theoretical discourses of modernity – championed “reason” – source of progress in knowledge and society.

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The Institutions of The Institutions of ModernityModernity• Industrialism - the transformation

of nature ; development of created environment – simple family-centered labor to strict impersonal division of labor – alterations in working habits- time organization – family life – leisure activity- women workers – change in gender roles- shift from rural to urban living

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The Institutions of The Institutions of ModernityModernitySurveillance – control of

information and social supervision - division of labor, supervision of activities, consolidation of hierarchy

Capitalism – Industrial organization of modernity – organized along capitalist lines- capital accumulation - cheap labor – new markets – new sources of profit – globalization – world economic order

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The Institutions of The Institutions of ModernityModernityThe Nation- state and military power

– nation – state is a relatively recent modern contrivance – layman did not participate in the consolidation of the nation- state – container of power – constituted by political apparatus

a.State military power b.Political ambition c.Emotional investments in national

identity

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Modernism and Culture Modernism and Culture Modernism – human cultural forms

bound up with modernizationTradition – values stability and

fixed nature of values ,lifestyle ,idenitity

Modernity is premised on perpetual revision of knowledge –change of values , idenitity – a process

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Characteristics of Characteristics of ModernismModernismThe promise of technological and

social progress

Replacement of old traditions with new ones

Urban development

The unfolding of the self- no specific identity

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Rejection of established formsRadical experimentation with new

forms Arts, architecture , literatureAvant-garde (innovative) literatureFragmentary forms, Discontinued

narration

Aesthetics of Aesthetics of Modernism Modernism

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Prose written like a poem – novel written like a poem – poem – free verse - haiku poems – Sentences ‘plucked ‘ from newspapers

Rejection of chronological plots, closed endings

War literature – ravages of war Existentialism – introspection of self–

Nihilism-sense of nothingness and extreme despair

All these were expressed in art & literature Absurd theatre – Samuel Beckett, Harold

Pinter , - Waiting for Godot – meaningless dialogues, no linearity of plot, cyclic plot

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Russian Formalism- Practical Criticism (England) – New criticism (America) 1920’s – I.A.Richards, William Empson,

Concentrate on the words of the page

Close reading of the textClinical isolation from historical

processes, social or economic condition

Literary CriticismLiterary Criticism

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Critique of Critique of Modernism/Enlightenment Modernism/Enlightenment projectprojectThe idea of universal truth – impossible Nietzsche – reason and truth – only

interpretations – consequence of power – whose interpretation count as truth

Foucault – exploration of historical conditions in which knowledge of a certain field is constructed – discourse – discontinuous – ruptures in the historical understanding of madness, sexuality -examines – prisons, schools, hospitals - operations of power and discipline

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• Modernism faded in the 1930’sIn the 1960’s resurgence – Post

modernism Innovation in arts , architecture,

literatureModernism – tone of lament, pessimism

despairPost modernist – liberating phenomenon,

escape from fixed systems of beliefHabermas, Lyotard,Baudrillard

POST MODERNISMPOST MODERNISM

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Habermas- public sphere, supported intellectuals, project enlightenment

Lyotard-in 1982-wrote fiercely against Habermas’ Enlightenment Project

Jean Baudrillard- distinction btw real and unreal is diminished on-screen with the advent of TV, internet, etc.

This is called hyper-reality Book-Simulacra-Simulations

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• Against traditional authority- power /culture/education/morals/religion

No absolute truth- truth is provisional – facts/falsehood

No grand narrative – pluralistic society A pluralistic society is one which thrives on the theory that reality consists of two or more elements. Pluralists

believe that various religious, cultural, social and racial groups should be allowed to thrive in a single society together.

Against social constructivism. eg. Men can’t cry, women can’t be aggressive, etcAgainst national borders - globalization

Post Modernism – Cultural Post Modernism – Cultural Movement Movement

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Louis Rosenblatt- “The Reader, the Text ,the Poem” – Transactional reading( 1978)

David Bleich – Subjective Criticism (1978) – Negotiations

• Stanley Fish – “Is there a Text in this class?” The authority of Interpretive communities(1980)

• Subjective /subject position -Experiences-perceptions – more informed, more richer

Reader – Response theoryReader – Response theory

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• Beginnings – 1970’s• Our individual selfhood, gender, notion

of literature are all socially constructedAnti – essentialist – no fixed and

reliable truthThinking and investigation are largely

dependent on the ideology of the reader

Interpreting a text - Subjectivity and subject positions of the reader

Underlying Ideas in critical Underlying Ideas in critical theorytheory

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Meaning within a literary work –unstable, multi-faceted ,ambiguous

Distrust Power- centered notionsWhat is literature? – Meaning of

‘text’ Politics is pervasive Language is constitutive Truth is provisional Meaning is contingent Human nature is a myth


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