structuralism as a critical approach to texts a comparative review

1. Northrop Frye offers
literature as
displaced version of religion
Containing myths related to life

2. In The Critical Path (1971)
 conservative “myths of concern” and
liberal “myths of freedom” each alone ,
won’t work.
Solution: an equable balance between the two
Which would result in: “position somewhere
between liberal Republican and conservative
Democrat”

3.  Since the desired equable balance is the best
structure to stick to:
Any attempt to re-shape or re-structure is like a
naïve act of revolutionary that might stupidly:
Mistake myth for reality or a historical goal to
achieve, like a child who mistakes an actress for
a real princess!

4. Literature was able to severe from any sordid concern; so
can be trusted to:
 Show us the way
 Who to vote
 Help us constitute a society that is:
Free Classless urbane
Classless:
“subscribing to his own middle-class liberal values”

5. Northrop Frye's work Vs.
Structuralism
Similarities:
 being contemporary with the growth of
'classical' structuralism in Europe
 Being concerned with structure and general laws
 Tending to reduce individual phenomena

6. But besides a few similarities:
 Structuralism :
 Contains a distinctive doctrine which is not to
be found in Frye.
 Finds the MEANING of individual units of any
system IN THEIR RELATIONS to one
another.

7.  Examines a literary work as a whole, STRUCTURALLY
and then treats each of its items as CONTAINERS of
MEANING.
Example:
 A poem has the words “sun” & “moon” :
* What matters is how the two images fit together to make
a STRUCTURE
* No knowledge of OUTER suns and moons
is needed
* Sun and moon have NO “substantial” meaning BUT
“relational”

8. Another example
 A boy quarrels with his dad.
Leaves home.
Walks through the forest.
Falls in a deep pit.
Father searches for him.
It is dark. father can’t see the pit.
It gets light. Sun rays help him see the deep pit.
He rescues his son.
They both go home.
Live happily ever after!

9. A psychoanalytical critic
 Detects Oedipus complex
 Falling into the pit means unconsciously wished
punishment
 symbolic castration
 symbolic recourse to his mother's womb

10. A humanist critic
 Finds in the work:
dramatization of the difficulties implicit in human
relationships
And
…
…
…

11. Another kind of critic
 Might find within the work:
Word-plays here and there!
Like son / sun
And
…
…
…!!

12. A STRUCTURALIST CRITIC:
 SCHEMATIZE the story in
DIAGRAMMATIC form
 BOY quarrels with FATHER  replaceable
with  LOW against HIGH
 boy's walk to the forest = horizontal # vertical
 FALL into PIT = LOW # zenith of SUN =
HIGH
 SUN shines into PIT = HIGH struck LOW

13.  FATHER’S reconciliation with SON and their
walk back home TOGETHER = an
EQUILIBRIUM between LOW and HIGH =
suitably achieved INTERMEDIATE state
 AND THE CRITIC MOVES ON LIKE
THIS…

14. This kind of analysis is notable
because:
 Actual CONTENT of the story is bracket off
(formalistic)
 Entire concentration is on the FORM
 STRUCTURE of RELATION between individual units
is EXTRACTED like (father & son) (pit & sun)
 As long as this STRUCTURE of relations is preserved
REPLACEMENT is POSSIBLE
Like with (mother & daughter) (bird & mole)

15. psychoanalytical or humanist
readings require:
 Certain INTRINSIC significance arisen by
those units WITHIN US & OUR
KNOWLEDEGE of the world OUTSIDE the
text.
 Being engaged with the CONTENT but NOT
the FORM

16. The Internal Relation
between Units:
 Parallelism
 Opposition
 Inversion
 Equivalence
 As long as kept intact, units are replaceable.

17. Three Important Points:
1- Structuralism is INDIFFERENT to cultural value of text.
Any thing from War And Peace to War Cry will do.
2- Structuralism REFUSES to seek for OBVIOUS meaning and
DOES NOT take text at FACE VALUE.
It isolates a DEEP structure in the texts and cares NOT about the
SURFACE structure or meaning.
3- If the particular contents of the text are REPLACEABLE 
CONTENT of the narrative is its STRUCTURE.
IT MEANS: NARRATIVE is about ITSELF and its SUBJECT is
in its OWN INTERNAL RELATIONS.

18. Literary structuralism (1960s)
 The founder: Ferdinand de Saussure
 Course in General Linguistics (1916)
 His central positions :
 Language: System of Signs
 To be studied SYNCHRONICALLY  as a
complete system at a given point in time
 NOT diachronically  in a historical
development

19.  Each SIGN
Signifier
Signifie
d
sound-image
Or
graphic
equivalent
Concept
Or
Meaning
Evoked in
mind

20. Example:
The black marks c , a , t
Are a signifier (both in written form & out loud)
that evoke a signified in an English mind.
 The relation between signifier and signified :
ARBITRARY  no inherent reason why these
three mean CAT , just cultural and historical
conventions.

21. Signifier Signified
arbitrary
The whole Sign
What it refers to
REFERANT
C , A , T WRITTEN & OUT LOUD
PLUS ITS MEANING IN MIND REAL FOUR-LEGGED FURY CREATURE

22.  A Sign in a System has a MEANING only because of
its DIFFERENCE with other Signs.
 Cat is Cat because it is NOT Rat or Bat.
 Until a SIGNIFIER preserves its DIFFERENCE with
any other SIGNIFIERS it can be altered, pronounced
or written in another accent or way. Like CHAT in
French.
 The MEANING of a SIGN is NOT mysteriously IN it,
but emerges from the DIFFERENCES between other
SIGNS.

23. What Saussure Avoids:
 Actual speech = What people Said = parole
 Langue that is the Objective Structure of Signs
,
is what matters in the first place; since it is what
makes the speech POSSIBLE.
 The real object (referent) of a sign

24. Structuralism In General:
 Applies this linguistic theory to
OBJECTS
And
ACTIVITIES
Other than
LITERATURE.

25.  A structuralist analysis isolates the underlying set of
laws by which these SIGNS from
a myth
wrestle match
or a painting
are combined into MEANINGS.
It IGNORES what the signs SAY.
CONCENTRATES on their INRERNAL RELATIONS.

26. Russian Formalism Vs.
Structuralism
 Formalism is influenced by Structuralism.
 But it’s NOT exactly a structuralism.
Similarities:
 views literary texts structurally
 suspends attention to the referent
 examines the sign itself

27.  Differences :
Formalism is NOT concerned with:
 The meaning AS DIFFERENTIAL
 The DEEP LAWS and STRUCTURES
underlying literary texts

28. Roman Jakobson
 The Russian linguist who LINKS Formalism
to modern-day Structuralism.
 leader of the Moscow Linguistic Circle (1915)
 Migrates to Prague (1920)
 Becomes a theoretician of Czech structuralism
 Founds Prague Linguistic Circle (1926)
 Survives till the outbreak of the Second World War
 Migrates to America
 Meets French anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss
 This intellectual relationship gives birth to MODERN
Structuralism

29. Jakobson’s Main Contribution
To:
Formalism
Czech Structuralism
Modern linguistics
BUT MAINLY TO: POETICS
The 'poetic' consisted above all in language's being placed in
a certain kind of self-conscious relationship to itself.

30. Poetic Function Of Language:
1- promotes the palpability of signs
2- material qualities > using them as counters in
communication
3- the sign is dislocated from its object (Referent)
4- relation between Sign & Referent is
disturbed  Sign gets an independence as an
Object of Value in ITSELT.
(regardless of what it refers to)

31. Communication for Jakobson:
Involves SIX elements:
1- An addresser  from his P.O.V language is emotive or
expressive
2- An addressee  from his standpoint it is conative or
waiting for an effect
3- A message  passed between them
4- A shared code  makes the message intelligible
5- A contact  physical medium of communication
6- A context  to which the message refers

32. ANY of the SIX elements may DOMINATE the
COMMUNICATIVE act & specify its
Language FUNCTION
 Addresser { Emotive }
 Addressee { Conative }
 Context { Referential }
 Code itself { Meta linguistic }
 Contact itself { Phatic }
 Message itself { Poetic }
Consists above all
Other
Functions of language
What is said by whom for what purpose in what situation < words themselves

33. Jakobson’s distinction between :
Metaphorical and Metonymic
One Sign
SUBSTITUTED
WITH
Another Sign
One Sign
ASSOCIATED
WITH
another Sign
contiguitysimilarity
Wing & Aircraft
e.g. Realist Prose
Love or Passion & Flame
e.g. Romantic or Symbolic Poetry

34. Speaking or Writing Daily:
 Sign selection & combination is from a possible
range of equivalences.
In Poetry however:
 Sign selection & combination is done with extra
attention + semantically or rhythmically or
phonetically or in some other way equivalent

35. Poetic Function for Jakobson:
 'The poetic function projects the principle of equivalence from the axis of selection
to the axis of combination.
Or in other words :
 In poetry Similarity is Super Induced upon Contiguity :
Words are NOT Strung for the THOUGHTS they CONVEY, but with
ATTENTION paid on:
Similarity
Opposition
Parallelism created by their Sound
Meaning
Rhythm
Connotation

36. The Prague school of linguistics
 Jakobson
 Jan Mukarovsky
 Felix Vodicka
Maintained TRANSITION from FORMALISM to modern
STRUCTURALIM by:
1- Elaborating the ideas of the Formalists
2- Systematizing them based on Saussurean linguistics
3- Signifiers and Signifieds & Single Complex Set of
Relations
….

37. ….
4- Signs studied in their OWN right, NOT as
reflections of an External Reality.
5- Sign / Referent relationship  Arbitrary
6- Detaching the Text from its surroundings.
YET
The last point seems quiet NOT totally possible
because:
The formalist concept of  Defamiliarization

38. Defamiliarization :
 ART
1- Estranges
2- Undermines
conventional sign-systems
3- Compels our attention to
material process of language itself
4- Renews our perceptions
In not taking language for granted,
5- Transforms our consciousness

39. What makes this Deformation possible:
 Keep in mind that we are being concerned with NOT just
Formalism but its transition to Czech Structuralism that insisted
on:
 Structural Unity of Work
 The Six Elements mentioned
 Each Element at particular Level of Text (dominant)=
Function of a Dynamic Whole
IS
The determining influence which DEFORMS or
DEFAMILIARIZES