Edward Said argues that literary criticism has become too focused on "textuality" and isolated from real world contexts and events. He believes criticism should be "secular" by acknowledging social and historical influences on texts. Said critiques how literary theory accepts "noninterference" and considers texts disconnected from specific times and places. Quoting Raymond Williams, Said says criticism belongs in potential spaces of alternative views within society, acting for human freedom against domination. The document outlines exam questions on these topics and the role of the critic.
literary criticism - the -isms of 19th and 20th centuryliisamurphy
The document provides an overview of four literary movements: Modernism, Postmodernism, Postcolonialism, and Feminist Criticism. It discusses some key aspects of each movement, including:
Modernism challenged 19th century traditions and authority in the aftermath of World War I and new scientific discoveries. It used new narrative techniques like stream of consciousness and nonlinear chronologies.
Postmodernism questions meaning and truth, seeing them as relative. It emphasizes intertextuality and the interconnection of ideas.
Postcolonialism examines the impact of colonialism and problems of poverty and social status after independence.
Feminist criticism emerged in the 1980s through movements like Riot Grrrl and
New Criticism was a major literary theory movement of the mid-20th century that advocated for close reading of texts and rejection of biographical or historical context. Key concepts of New Criticism included ambiguity, the intentional fallacy which rejected authorial intent, and the affective fallacy which rejected reader reaction. Prominent figures included I.A. Richards, William K. Wimsatt, Monroe Beardsley, T.S. Eliot, F.R. Leavis, William Empson, Robert Penn Warren, and Cleanth Brooks. New Criticism was criticized for being ahistorical and for isolating texts from their contexts.
Literary criticism is the study, discussion, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. It has existed for as long as literature itself, with important early examples found in the works of Aristotle and Plato from ancient Greece. Literary criticism developed further during the Renaissance and was heavily influenced by Aristotle's Poetics. In the early 20th century, schools like Russian Formalism and New Criticism came to dominate literary study by emphasizing close reading of texts over considerations of authorial intent or biography. Literary theory also grew influential starting in the late 1960s, introducing philosophical and structuralist perspectives. Today, literary criticism incorporates diverse theoretical and historical approaches.
The document outlines several literary criticism approaches: Feminist criticism examines gender relations and patriarchy. Marxist criticism views literature through class struggles. New Criticism analyzes language and form separate from history. Moral criticism evaluates a work's moral message. Psychoanalytic criticism investigates psychology and consciousness. New Historicism places a work in its historical context. Reader response focuses on the reader's experience rather than authorial intent. Colonialism criticism addresses power dynamics between colonizers and colonized peoples.
This document provides an overview of New Historicism and the work of Hayden White. It discusses key ideas of New Historicism, such as reading texts in their historical context and acknowledging the role of power and ideology. It outlines White's argument that history involves narrative structures and literary devices like plots and tropes. White identified four potential plot structures (tragic, comic, romantic, ironic) that correspond to four master tropes (metaphor, metonymy, synechdoque, irony). The document examines White's view that historians construct narratives and meanings from raw data through emplotment, rather than objectively representing reality.
Literary Theories: A Sampling of Literary LensesJivanee Abril
Literary Theories: A Sampling of Literary Lenses
This is merely an introduction to theory so I am just going to provide you with a few of the more common schools of criticism. Remember most of these theories are quite detailed so this is just a very brief overview of their main ideas and some theories have been combined to keep things simple.
This document discusses various concepts related to ideology, subjectivity, and power in media and culture. It provides definitions and explanations of terms from theorists like Marx, Althusser, Foucault, Gramsci and others. Key concepts summarized include ideological domination, interpellation, subject positions, and Foucault's theories of power/knowledge and discourse. Examples are given of various artworks and how they relate to these conceptual frameworks.
This document provides an overview of various schools of literary theory and criticism that have developed over time, including approaches such as Cambridge School, Chicago School, Deconstruction, Feminist criticism, Psychoanalytic criticism, Marxist criticism, New Criticism, New Historicism, and Structuralism. It also defines and explains key literary terms and theories used in literary analysis and interpretation.
literary criticism - the -isms of 19th and 20th centuryliisamurphy
The document provides an overview of four literary movements: Modernism, Postmodernism, Postcolonialism, and Feminist Criticism. It discusses some key aspects of each movement, including:
Modernism challenged 19th century traditions and authority in the aftermath of World War I and new scientific discoveries. It used new narrative techniques like stream of consciousness and nonlinear chronologies.
Postmodernism questions meaning and truth, seeing them as relative. It emphasizes intertextuality and the interconnection of ideas.
Postcolonialism examines the impact of colonialism and problems of poverty and social status after independence.
Feminist criticism emerged in the 1980s through movements like Riot Grrrl and
New Criticism was a major literary theory movement of the mid-20th century that advocated for close reading of texts and rejection of biographical or historical context. Key concepts of New Criticism included ambiguity, the intentional fallacy which rejected authorial intent, and the affective fallacy which rejected reader reaction. Prominent figures included I.A. Richards, William K. Wimsatt, Monroe Beardsley, T.S. Eliot, F.R. Leavis, William Empson, Robert Penn Warren, and Cleanth Brooks. New Criticism was criticized for being ahistorical and for isolating texts from their contexts.
Literary criticism is the study, discussion, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. It has existed for as long as literature itself, with important early examples found in the works of Aristotle and Plato from ancient Greece. Literary criticism developed further during the Renaissance and was heavily influenced by Aristotle's Poetics. In the early 20th century, schools like Russian Formalism and New Criticism came to dominate literary study by emphasizing close reading of texts over considerations of authorial intent or biography. Literary theory also grew influential starting in the late 1960s, introducing philosophical and structuralist perspectives. Today, literary criticism incorporates diverse theoretical and historical approaches.
The document outlines several literary criticism approaches: Feminist criticism examines gender relations and patriarchy. Marxist criticism views literature through class struggles. New Criticism analyzes language and form separate from history. Moral criticism evaluates a work's moral message. Psychoanalytic criticism investigates psychology and consciousness. New Historicism places a work in its historical context. Reader response focuses on the reader's experience rather than authorial intent. Colonialism criticism addresses power dynamics between colonizers and colonized peoples.
This document provides an overview of New Historicism and the work of Hayden White. It discusses key ideas of New Historicism, such as reading texts in their historical context and acknowledging the role of power and ideology. It outlines White's argument that history involves narrative structures and literary devices like plots and tropes. White identified four potential plot structures (tragic, comic, romantic, ironic) that correspond to four master tropes (metaphor, metonymy, synechdoque, irony). The document examines White's view that historians construct narratives and meanings from raw data through emplotment, rather than objectively representing reality.
Literary Theories: A Sampling of Literary LensesJivanee Abril
Literary Theories: A Sampling of Literary Lenses
This is merely an introduction to theory so I am just going to provide you with a few of the more common schools of criticism. Remember most of these theories are quite detailed so this is just a very brief overview of their main ideas and some theories have been combined to keep things simple.
This document discusses various concepts related to ideology, subjectivity, and power in media and culture. It provides definitions and explanations of terms from theorists like Marx, Althusser, Foucault, Gramsci and others. Key concepts summarized include ideological domination, interpellation, subject positions, and Foucault's theories of power/knowledge and discourse. Examples are given of various artworks and how they relate to these conceptual frameworks.
This document provides an overview of various schools of literary theory and criticism that have developed over time, including approaches such as Cambridge School, Chicago School, Deconstruction, Feminist criticism, Psychoanalytic criticism, Marxist criticism, New Criticism, New Historicism, and Structuralism. It also defines and explains key literary terms and theories used in literary analysis and interpretation.
This document discusses literature and female identity. It argues that female identity has been influenced by patriarchal notions that view women as "the other". French feminists view women as the other subject rather than object. The document outlines two modes of feminist criticism - ideological criticism that offers feminist readings, and the study of women writers. It argues that for women to establish their authentic identity, they must actively engage in formulating and analyzing critical theories from a women-centered perspective, independent of male critical theory.
Marxist Literary Criticism analyzes literature through a sociological lens, viewing works as products of their historical/material conditions. It sees what we think of as worldviews as actually reflecting the dominant class's ideology. It focuses on class struggles and power dynamics revealed through literature. Key concepts include commodification, conspicuous consumption, dialectical materialism, material circumstances, and reflectionism. Strengths include encouraging close readings, but it is limited in only examining one aspect and potentially threatening/dismissing aesthetic qualities.
This document provides an overview and definitions of key concepts in lesbian, gay, queer, and feminist criticism. It discusses how lesbian criticism addresses issues of both sexism and heterosexism. Gay criticism often analyzes themes of gay sensibility and experiences of oppression. Queer theory views sexuality as fluid rather than defined categories, and sees it existing on a continuum. The document also defines common textual signs that may indicate homoerotic or queer readings, such as homosocial bonding and same-sex doubles. It concludes by stating that lesbian, gay, and queer criticism rely on analyzing patterns or preponderances of these textual cues.
Gender criticism is an extension of feminist literary criticism, focusing not just on women but on the construction of gender and sexuality, especially LGBTQ issues, which gives rise to queer theory.
This document provides an overview of feminist literary theory and criticism. It discusses the three waves of feminism and how feminist criticism has evolved over time. Feminist criticism examines how literature reinforces or undermines the oppression of women. It aims to uncover women's writing traditions and reinterpret works from a female perspective. The document contrasts feminist assumptions with those of New Criticism, noting that feminist criticism views patriarchy as the primary means of women's oppression and regards gender as culturally constructed.
This document provides an agenda and background information for an EWRT 1C class discussing literary theory, specifically feminist criticism. It begins with an overview of intrinsic and extrinsic literary theories, defining intrinsic as focusing on a work's essence in isolation and extrinsic as relating a work to its external context. It then discusses feminist criticism, which examines how literature reinforces or undermines the patriarchal oppression of women. It provides context on the waves of feminism and objectives of feminist criticism, including developing a female literary tradition.
This document provides an introduction to postmodern literary theory. It begins with an agenda outlining topics such as modernity, liberal humanism, and the differences between modernism and postmodernism. It then discusses several literary theories that developed prior to postmodernism such as New Criticism. The document goes on to explain key concepts of postmodernism such as the rejection of master narratives, skepticism of objective truths, and viewing language and knowledge as social constructs. It concludes by discussing some characteristics of postmodern literature such as experimental forms and integrating pop culture references.
Hua li contemporary_chinese_fiction_by_su_tong_and_yu_hua_sinica_leidensia___...SherrifKakkuzhiMalia
This document provides an introduction to a book that analyzes contemporary Chinese coming-of-age fiction by authors Su Tong and Yu Hua set during the Cultural Revolution. The introduction argues that their works form a type of tragic and parodistic Bildungsroman that deviates from both traditional Chinese coming-of-age stories and the European Bildungsroman genre. It will examine how their young protagonists fail to achieve maturity or find their place in society, in contrast to previous optimistic visions of Chinese youth during this time period. The analysis will be grounded in comparisons to the development of the Chinese coming-of-age genre as well as concepts from Bildungsroman theory.
Literary criticism is the study and interpretation of literature, often informed by literary theory. While criticism and theory are closely related, critics are not always theorists. Literary criticism functions to purge negative emotions from works according to Aristotle, while Plato believed works showing "bad mimesis" should be censored. Romantic theory views literature as an organic unity independent of author or context. Psychoanalytic theory applies Freudian concepts of id, ego and superego to literature. Mythological theory is based on Jung's idea of a collective unconscious expressed through myths. Deconstruction questions texts and reading practices by revealing hidden meanings and flaws. Marxist theory examines the political and economic underpinnings of literature. Feminist theory aims to
Critical Race Theory (CRT) examines how race and racism influence American society. It traces how racism has manifested through history in areas like law, literature, and film. CRT scholars seek to understand how systemic racism affects victims and how they represent themselves in response. They also aim to confront and challenge beliefs and practices that enable racism to persist, in order to work toward liberating society from systemic racism and inequality.
This document provides an overview of several literary theories:
Formalist theory focuses only on the language and elements of the text without considering context. New historicism views history broadly and sees texts as products of social constructs rather than just backdrops. Archetypal criticism sees recurring mythic patterns and archetypes influencing literature. Reader response theory examines how readers interpret and make meaning from texts. Race theory analyzes representations of race/ethnicity and their social implications. Marxist, feminist, and gender/sexual orientation theories view art and literature as political and examine themes of power structures, gender roles, and sexual orientation.
This document provides an agenda and overview of material for a literature theory class. It includes:
- An introduction to literary theory, explaining that it provides lenses to analyze and interpret literature.
- An overview of several major theoretical approaches like formalism, Marxism, structuralism, new historicism, ethnic studies, gender studies, and psychoanalytic criticism.
- Sample discussion questions for different theories like new criticism, deconstruction, and feminist criticism. These questions focus on analyzing texts through the lens of each theory's key concepts.
The document aims to introduce students to the field of literary theory and some of its major schools of thought by outlining the class topics, providing theoretical context, and giving examples of
Marxist literary criticism maintains that a writer's social class and prevailing ideology influences what they write. Marxist critics analyze how economic conditions shape social existence and consciousness, and thus literature. They explore how a work represents class structures and relations, and how social and economic forces from the author's time period are reflected in the literature. The goal is to understand ideology and social conditions through literary analysis.
The document provides an overview and analysis of various critical essays relating to Henry David Thoreau's Walden. It summarizes the key perspectives of different critics. Some critics, like George Sibley, were negative and argued Thoreau's teachings were impractical. Others, like Ronald Schwartz, focused on Thoreau's literary talents. Loren Eiseley attempted to define Thoreau's teachings as a mode of thinking derived from nature. Finally, some scholars, like Judith Saunders and Michael Gilmore, examined Walden as an economic critique, though they disagreed on its implications.
This document provides a summary of the historical development of literary criticism from antiquity to ancient Greek and Roman critics. It discusses how Plato and Aristotle were early critics who debated the purpose and social value of literature. Aristotle established principles of literary criticism in his Poetics. Other ancient critics mentioned include Horace, who wrote on the different genres of poetry, and Quintilian, whose work Institutio Oratoria addressed rhetoric and recommended authors to study. The document also discusses the literary critic Longinus and his work On the Sublime, which defined sublime literature as reflecting the moral and imaginative power of the writer.
Knowing the critic's specific purpose may be to make value judgments on a work, to explain his or her interpretation of the work, or to provide other readers with relevant historical or biographical information and the critic's general purpose, in most cases that is to enrich the reader's understanding of the literary work presented.
The poem "Manggagawa" by Jose Corazon de Jesus depicts the disparity between the wealthy bourgeoisie and the lower class proletariat in a capitalist society through vivid descriptions of the hard labor of workers and the luxuries enjoyed by the rich. It highlights the oppression and control the bourgeoisie have over wealth production as well as the government, reflecting Marx's theories. In the end, the poem calls loudly for equality and due recognition of the working class's contributions to society and the nation's progress.
This presentation was prepared for the workshop at HMP Institute of English Training and Research, Gujarat (INDIA). It deals with some important questions for the preparation of UGC NET / SLET examination for the qalification of Lecturer. It also gives brief introduction about some important books on Literary Theory and Criticism
This document provides an overview of literary criticism as a field of study. It discusses what literary criticism is, the role of a critic, and some of the major figures and theories in the development of literary criticism in the Western tradition. Specifically, it summarizes Plato's theory of mimesis and Aristotle's theory of catharsis. It also outlines some of the major periods and figures in the development of literary criticism from ancient Greece through the 20th century in England.
1. The document summarizes a passage that discusses the dilemma faced by governments who want to improve welfare but find policies incur environmental risks for current and future generations, raising questions of intergenerational justice and relations.
2. It then provides an outline of the passage in point form and a 150-word summary that discusses issues like pollution, depletion of resources, long-term debts, and the need to consider effects of current policies on future generations.
3. The summary discusses the author's perspective on the linguistic conflict faced by post-colonial communities between English and indigenous languages, and different approaches like rejecting one language, appropriating elements of the second language, or finding new discourses through creative tension between languages
This document provides 1000 single-choice questions in English for high school students. It begins with sample questions in formats like fill-in-the-blank and sentence completion. The questions cover a range of English grammar topics like parts of speech, sentence structure, vocabulary in context. Each question is followed by 4 multiple choice answers. The document is 64 pages long and provides questions, answers and explanations to help students practice and test their English skills.
The document is an admission test for an MPhil program in Linguistics and Phonetics. It contains instructions for the test, which has six sections (A-F). Section C contains compulsory short answer questions to be answered directly on the paper. The other sections require longer answers to be written in a separate answer booklet. Sections A, B, D, E, and F each contain multiple choice questions to be answered, choosing no more than two from each section.
This document discusses literature and female identity. It argues that female identity has been influenced by patriarchal notions that view women as "the other". French feminists view women as the other subject rather than object. The document outlines two modes of feminist criticism - ideological criticism that offers feminist readings, and the study of women writers. It argues that for women to establish their authentic identity, they must actively engage in formulating and analyzing critical theories from a women-centered perspective, independent of male critical theory.
Marxist Literary Criticism analyzes literature through a sociological lens, viewing works as products of their historical/material conditions. It sees what we think of as worldviews as actually reflecting the dominant class's ideology. It focuses on class struggles and power dynamics revealed through literature. Key concepts include commodification, conspicuous consumption, dialectical materialism, material circumstances, and reflectionism. Strengths include encouraging close readings, but it is limited in only examining one aspect and potentially threatening/dismissing aesthetic qualities.
This document provides an overview and definitions of key concepts in lesbian, gay, queer, and feminist criticism. It discusses how lesbian criticism addresses issues of both sexism and heterosexism. Gay criticism often analyzes themes of gay sensibility and experiences of oppression. Queer theory views sexuality as fluid rather than defined categories, and sees it existing on a continuum. The document also defines common textual signs that may indicate homoerotic or queer readings, such as homosocial bonding and same-sex doubles. It concludes by stating that lesbian, gay, and queer criticism rely on analyzing patterns or preponderances of these textual cues.
Gender criticism is an extension of feminist literary criticism, focusing not just on women but on the construction of gender and sexuality, especially LGBTQ issues, which gives rise to queer theory.
This document provides an overview of feminist literary theory and criticism. It discusses the three waves of feminism and how feminist criticism has evolved over time. Feminist criticism examines how literature reinforces or undermines the oppression of women. It aims to uncover women's writing traditions and reinterpret works from a female perspective. The document contrasts feminist assumptions with those of New Criticism, noting that feminist criticism views patriarchy as the primary means of women's oppression and regards gender as culturally constructed.
This document provides an agenda and background information for an EWRT 1C class discussing literary theory, specifically feminist criticism. It begins with an overview of intrinsic and extrinsic literary theories, defining intrinsic as focusing on a work's essence in isolation and extrinsic as relating a work to its external context. It then discusses feminist criticism, which examines how literature reinforces or undermines the patriarchal oppression of women. It provides context on the waves of feminism and objectives of feminist criticism, including developing a female literary tradition.
This document provides an introduction to postmodern literary theory. It begins with an agenda outlining topics such as modernity, liberal humanism, and the differences between modernism and postmodernism. It then discusses several literary theories that developed prior to postmodernism such as New Criticism. The document goes on to explain key concepts of postmodernism such as the rejection of master narratives, skepticism of objective truths, and viewing language and knowledge as social constructs. It concludes by discussing some characteristics of postmodern literature such as experimental forms and integrating pop culture references.
Hua li contemporary_chinese_fiction_by_su_tong_and_yu_hua_sinica_leidensia___...SherrifKakkuzhiMalia
This document provides an introduction to a book that analyzes contemporary Chinese coming-of-age fiction by authors Su Tong and Yu Hua set during the Cultural Revolution. The introduction argues that their works form a type of tragic and parodistic Bildungsroman that deviates from both traditional Chinese coming-of-age stories and the European Bildungsroman genre. It will examine how their young protagonists fail to achieve maturity or find their place in society, in contrast to previous optimistic visions of Chinese youth during this time period. The analysis will be grounded in comparisons to the development of the Chinese coming-of-age genre as well as concepts from Bildungsroman theory.
Literary criticism is the study and interpretation of literature, often informed by literary theory. While criticism and theory are closely related, critics are not always theorists. Literary criticism functions to purge negative emotions from works according to Aristotle, while Plato believed works showing "bad mimesis" should be censored. Romantic theory views literature as an organic unity independent of author or context. Psychoanalytic theory applies Freudian concepts of id, ego and superego to literature. Mythological theory is based on Jung's idea of a collective unconscious expressed through myths. Deconstruction questions texts and reading practices by revealing hidden meanings and flaws. Marxist theory examines the political and economic underpinnings of literature. Feminist theory aims to
Critical Race Theory (CRT) examines how race and racism influence American society. It traces how racism has manifested through history in areas like law, literature, and film. CRT scholars seek to understand how systemic racism affects victims and how they represent themselves in response. They also aim to confront and challenge beliefs and practices that enable racism to persist, in order to work toward liberating society from systemic racism and inequality.
This document provides an overview of several literary theories:
Formalist theory focuses only on the language and elements of the text without considering context. New historicism views history broadly and sees texts as products of social constructs rather than just backdrops. Archetypal criticism sees recurring mythic patterns and archetypes influencing literature. Reader response theory examines how readers interpret and make meaning from texts. Race theory analyzes representations of race/ethnicity and their social implications. Marxist, feminist, and gender/sexual orientation theories view art and literature as political and examine themes of power structures, gender roles, and sexual orientation.
This document provides an agenda and overview of material for a literature theory class. It includes:
- An introduction to literary theory, explaining that it provides lenses to analyze and interpret literature.
- An overview of several major theoretical approaches like formalism, Marxism, structuralism, new historicism, ethnic studies, gender studies, and psychoanalytic criticism.
- Sample discussion questions for different theories like new criticism, deconstruction, and feminist criticism. These questions focus on analyzing texts through the lens of each theory's key concepts.
The document aims to introduce students to the field of literary theory and some of its major schools of thought by outlining the class topics, providing theoretical context, and giving examples of
Marxist literary criticism maintains that a writer's social class and prevailing ideology influences what they write. Marxist critics analyze how economic conditions shape social existence and consciousness, and thus literature. They explore how a work represents class structures and relations, and how social and economic forces from the author's time period are reflected in the literature. The goal is to understand ideology and social conditions through literary analysis.
The document provides an overview and analysis of various critical essays relating to Henry David Thoreau's Walden. It summarizes the key perspectives of different critics. Some critics, like George Sibley, were negative and argued Thoreau's teachings were impractical. Others, like Ronald Schwartz, focused on Thoreau's literary talents. Loren Eiseley attempted to define Thoreau's teachings as a mode of thinking derived from nature. Finally, some scholars, like Judith Saunders and Michael Gilmore, examined Walden as an economic critique, though they disagreed on its implications.
This document provides a summary of the historical development of literary criticism from antiquity to ancient Greek and Roman critics. It discusses how Plato and Aristotle were early critics who debated the purpose and social value of literature. Aristotle established principles of literary criticism in his Poetics. Other ancient critics mentioned include Horace, who wrote on the different genres of poetry, and Quintilian, whose work Institutio Oratoria addressed rhetoric and recommended authors to study. The document also discusses the literary critic Longinus and his work On the Sublime, which defined sublime literature as reflecting the moral and imaginative power of the writer.
Knowing the critic's specific purpose may be to make value judgments on a work, to explain his or her interpretation of the work, or to provide other readers with relevant historical or biographical information and the critic's general purpose, in most cases that is to enrich the reader's understanding of the literary work presented.
The poem "Manggagawa" by Jose Corazon de Jesus depicts the disparity between the wealthy bourgeoisie and the lower class proletariat in a capitalist society through vivid descriptions of the hard labor of workers and the luxuries enjoyed by the rich. It highlights the oppression and control the bourgeoisie have over wealth production as well as the government, reflecting Marx's theories. In the end, the poem calls loudly for equality and due recognition of the working class's contributions to society and the nation's progress.
This presentation was prepared for the workshop at HMP Institute of English Training and Research, Gujarat (INDIA). It deals with some important questions for the preparation of UGC NET / SLET examination for the qalification of Lecturer. It also gives brief introduction about some important books on Literary Theory and Criticism
This document provides an overview of literary criticism as a field of study. It discusses what literary criticism is, the role of a critic, and some of the major figures and theories in the development of literary criticism in the Western tradition. Specifically, it summarizes Plato's theory of mimesis and Aristotle's theory of catharsis. It also outlines some of the major periods and figures in the development of literary criticism from ancient Greece through the 20th century in England.
1. The document summarizes a passage that discusses the dilemma faced by governments who want to improve welfare but find policies incur environmental risks for current and future generations, raising questions of intergenerational justice and relations.
2. It then provides an outline of the passage in point form and a 150-word summary that discusses issues like pollution, depletion of resources, long-term debts, and the need to consider effects of current policies on future generations.
3. The summary discusses the author's perspective on the linguistic conflict faced by post-colonial communities between English and indigenous languages, and different approaches like rejecting one language, appropriating elements of the second language, or finding new discourses through creative tension between languages
This document provides 1000 single-choice questions in English for high school students. It begins with sample questions in formats like fill-in-the-blank and sentence completion. The questions cover a range of English grammar topics like parts of speech, sentence structure, vocabulary in context. Each question is followed by 4 multiple choice answers. The document is 64 pages long and provides questions, answers and explanations to help students practice and test their English skills.
The document is an admission test for an MPhil program in Linguistics and Phonetics. It contains instructions for the test, which has six sections (A-F). Section C contains compulsory short answer questions to be answered directly on the paper. The other sections require longer answers to be written in a separate answer booklet. Sections A, B, D, E, and F each contain multiple choice questions to be answered, choosing no more than two from each section.
The document provides answers to frequently asked questions about the BA (Honours) English program at EFL University. It discusses the following key details:
- Last year's entrance exam had a maximum of 90 marks and minimum of 65.5 marks to get in. It included an additional essay worth around 20 marks.
- The course structure is being revamped but previously had four papers each semester from English Language Education, Linguistics, and Literature, along with a Foreign Language requirement for the first four semesters.
- Students have classes from 9am-1pm and 3-5pm three days a week, with evening classes for foreign languages. The workload is described as light, allowing time for other
This document provides a guide for new students at EFLU with information about facilities, shops, and services near the university campus. It includes tips on getting hostel rooms, internet access, mobile networks, transportation options, medical services, banks, grocery stores, movie theaters, and places to buy computer accessories, food, and alcohol. Locations and directions to stores, restaurants, and entertainment venues are given to help new students navigate the area surrounding the EFLU campus.
This document contains an entrance exam for admission to a 5-year integrated Master of Arts program in English. The exam has multiple choice questions and fill-in-the-blank exercises testing knowledge of grammar, vocabulary and a passage on the history and spread of the English language. It discusses how English became a global lingua franca but notes that people still rely on their native tongues for personal communication. The exam also contains a passage on the history of shaving and beards with errors to identify.
Study the literary work’s “point of origin” via biography and bibliography
Consider the expressed intentions of the author
Learn the history of the work’s reception
Evaluate the aims and limitations of the text
Modernism emerged in response to World War I and the disillusionment it caused. It rejects tradition and absolute truths, instead believing that individuals create their own meaning. Modernist works experiment with form and focus on inner experiences like alienation. Some popular British modernists include James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, and T.S. Eliot, whose works abandoned conventions. Postmodernism further questions meaning and embraces multiple interpretations. It blurs genre boundaries and acknowledges fiction's constructed nature.
The article critiques Christopher Lasch's book The Culture of Narcissism, which became a commercial success despite being sharply critical of American culture. The author argues that Lasch's failure to situate the book within an intellectual tradition led to misunderstandings of its political and social implications. By presenting American culture as a unified whole dominated by narcissism rather than recognizing internal conflicts, Lasch's framework encouraged viewing it as an organic entity in decline rather than one challenged by new tendencies. Clarifying the traditions of critical theory that influenced Lasch may have deterred readers from superficial interpretations and better conveyed his implicit socialist commitments.
This document provides an overview of New Historicism and Cultural Materialism critical theories. It defines New Historicism as examining literature within its historical context through parallel readings of literary and non-literary texts from the same time period. Cultural Materialism studies the implications of literary texts in history and takes a materialist approach, seeing culture as the object of study rather than just literature. The document outlines the key influences, characteristics, differences and examples of applying these theories to texts like Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and Othello.
Post-structuralism emerged as a reaction against structuralism in 1960s France. It rejects the idea that there are absolute truths or facts about the world that can be discovered. Post-structuralism views meaning as dependent on the individual reader rather than being inherent in a text or determined by the author's intent. It emphasizes that meaning is unstable and that concepts like identity are socially constructed. Key figures like Derrida, Foucault, and Barthes developed theories like deconstruction that aimed to expose assumptions and destabilize perceived hierarchies in opposing concepts.
The document discusses the topics of an English writing class, including questions about an essay assignment, an overview of intrinsic and extrinsic literary theories, and an in-depth exploration of feminist criticism and theory. It provides details on the key assumptions and goals of feminist criticism, how it analyzes the portrayal and roles of women in literature, and how it has evolved through the three waves of feminism.
Stuart Hall outlines two paradigms in cultural studies: culturalism and structuralism. Culturalism, associated with Raymond Williams and E.P. Thompson, sees culture as the lived experiences and practices of social groups. Structuralism, associated with Levi-Strauss and Althusser, sees culture and experience as the effect of underlying symbolic structures and frameworks. Hall discusses the emergence of cultural studies and how structuralism interrupted the cultural strand, creating stark contrasts around the role of experience.
A CRITICAL FRAMEWORK FOR TEXTUAL ANALYSISBryce Nelson
This document provides an overview of frameworks for analyzing myths and their political, social, and economic dimensions. It discusses several thinkers that influenced the analysis of myths, including Barthes, Marx, Levi-Strauss, and Critical Theorists. The document proposes analyzing myths using a mixed-methods approach informed by these frameworks. It will apply Barthes' concept of myth as a semiotic structure to analyze Plato's Myth of Er and several television comedy programs to reveal their depictions of social class and the natural order.
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Max Weber was a German sociologist born in 1864 who made major contributions to social theory and research methodology. Some key points about Weber:
- He conceived of sociology as a comprehensive science of social action that examines the subjective meanings humans attach to their actions within social contexts.
- While agreeing with some of Marx's structural analysis, Weber rejected economic determinism and believed multiple factors influenced social change.
- He advocated for value-free, objective sociology using clearly defined concepts and qualitative understanding rather than laws or predictions.
- Weber developed ideal types to enable comparative analysis of social phenomena like authority, which he categorized as charismatic, traditional, or rational-legal.
- His theories of
Browse these common theories. When considered singularly and collectively, they're useful approaches to great works of literature for interpreting and finding meaning.
The document provides an overview of literary criticism, beginning with its origins in classical works and early modern critics. It discusses different approaches to literary criticism such as formalism, reader-response criticism, structuralism, biographical criticism, and sociological criticism including feminist criticism and Marxist criticism. The document examines key concepts and theorists associated with different approaches to literary criticism.
Take the quiz to discover what poem you have been assigned to discus.docxbriankimberly26463
Take the quiz to discover what poem you have been assigned to discuss this week;
"On Being Brought From Africa to America" By: Phillis Wheatley
2.Look through the critical approaches in the Week 4 lesson, and CHOOSE 2 that you think could be used to analyze the poem you chose.
Literary Critical Theory:
Interpretive Strategies
1. Historicism considers the literary work in light of "what really happened" during the period reflected in that work. It insists that to understand a piece, we need to understand the author's biography and social background, ideas circulating at the time, and the cultural milieu. Historicism also "finds significance in the ways a particular work resembles or differs from other works of its period and/or genre," and therefore may involve source studies. It may also include examination of philology and linguistics. It is typically a discipline involving impressively extensive research.
2. New Criticism examines the relationships between a text's ideas and its form, "the connection between what a text says and the way it's said." New Critics/Formalists "may find tension, irony, or paradox in this relation, but they usually resolve it into unity and coherence of meaning." New Critics look for patterns of sound, imagery, narrative structure, point of view, and other techniques discernible on close reading of "the work itself." They insist that the meaning of a text should not be confused with the author's intentions nor the text's affective dimension--its effects on the reader. The objective determination as to "how a piece works" can be found through close focus and analysis, rather than through extraneous and erudite special knowledge.
3. Archetypal criticism "traces cultural and psychological 'myths' that shape the meaning of texts." It argues that "certain literary archetypes determine the structure and function of individual literary works," and therefore that literature imitates not the world but rather the "total dream of humankind." Archetypes (recurring images or symbols, patterns, universal experiences) may include motifs such as the quest or the heavenly ascent, symbols such as the apple or snake, or images such as crucifixion--all laden with meaning already when employed in a particular work.
4. Psychoanalytic criticism adopts the methods of "reading" employed by Freud and later theorists to interpret what a text really indicates. It argues that "unresolved and sometimes unconscious ambivalences in the author's own life may lead to a disunified literary work," and that the literary work is a manifestation of the author's own neuroses. Psychoanalytic critics focus on apparent dilemmas and conflicts in a work and "attempt to read an author's own family life and traumas into the actions of their characters," realizing that the psychological material will be expressed indirectly, encoded (similar to dreams) through principles such as "condensation," "displacement," and "symbolism."
5. Femini.
Review of Raymond Geuss, Reality and Its DreamsJohn Rapko
This document provides a review of Raymond Geuss's latest collection of essays titled "Reality and Its Dreams". The review discusses how the essays in this collection expand on Geuss's typical focus to include analysis of contemporary political and artistic phenomena. A key theme discussed across the essays is Geuss's criticism of "normativism", a philosophical orientation that aims to present abstract criteria for evaluating social and political practices. The review provides details on Geuss's definition of normativism and his argument that there has been a "normative turn" in political philosophy analogous to the "linguistic turn" diagnosed by Richard Rorty.
This document outlines the agenda and activities for Class 2 of the EWRT 1C course. It discusses using teams to earn participation points and tracking points using a point sheet. The class will review literary theory, specifically focusing on New Criticism and its key elements - paradox, irony, tension, and ambiguity. Students will work in groups to discuss questions about the readings. The document also mentions that part of each class will be spent completing an online presentation to fulfill the remaining hour of the five unit course.
Postmodernism first entered philosophical discourse in 1979 with Jean-François Lyotard's book "The Postmodern Condition". Lyotard used concepts from Wittgenstein and speech act theory to account for changes in science, art, and literature since the late 19th century. There is no consensus on when postmodernism began, with suggestions ranging from the mid-1960s to the 1980s. Postmodernism rejects universal narratives and values plurality and difference over essentialism. It challenges notions of objective truth and rationality from the Enlightenment era. Major postmodern thinkers include Lyotard, Baudrillard, Derrida, Foucault, and Barthes, who developed concepts like simulation, deconstruction,
The transmission model of communication has some key limitations in fully capturing the process of communication:
- It views communication primarily as a one-way transmission of information from sender to receiver, neglecting the complexities of human interaction that involve feedback, shared meaning-making, and context.
- It assumes a passive audience that simply receives the transmitted message rather than actively interpreting and responding to messages based on their own experiences, perspectives, and circumstances.
- It fails to account for how the medium itself shapes the communication process and alters the message, treating the medium as a neutral conduit rather than part of the context that gives meaning.
- By focusing on transmission efficiency it can undermine understanding the social and cultural dimensions of communication that involve
CARESS-REPORTING about Literary CriticismReyTinajora
The document provides an overview of various approaches to literary criticism, including formalism and close reading, Marxist criticism, feminist criticism, psychoanalytic theory, postcolonial criticism, and integrating critical theory into pedagogy. It defines each approach and provides examples of questions critics may ask and suggested texts to analyze using that lens. The importance of literary criticism is that it expands one's worldview, helps understand literature better, provides opportunities for new writing styles, and supports critical thinking skill development.
The document outlines the agenda and guidelines for an English class, including a review of New Criticism and its key concepts of paradox, irony, tension, and ambiguity. Teams of 3-4 students will work together during class, tracking their participation points. Close reading is emphasized as a foundational skill for literary analysis across different theoretical approaches.
Slide T H E A G E O F C L A S S I C I S M (1700 1784)gueste2476b
The document discusses the Age of Enlightenment in the 18th century, a period defined by the promotion of reason, skepticism of traditions, and advocacy for individual rights and liberties. Classicism in literature during this period was influenced by Greek and Roman works and emphasized form, restraint, and adherence to established genres. The document also provides context on Jonathan Swift and analyzes some of his writings, including "Thoughts on Various Subjects" which satirize human folly and pride.
Similar to Www.efluniversity.ac.in ph d english literature entrance test the english and foreign languages u (20)
Slide T H E A G E O F C L A S S I C I S M (1700 1784)
Www.efluniversity.ac.in ph d english literature entrance test the english and foreign languages u
1. Admit Pass No.
Entrance Tests 2008
PhD (English Literature)
Time: 3 hours Max.Marks: 150
Instructions
1. Write all answers on the answer book provided.
2. Return the question paper along with the answer book at the end of the test.
3. There are three Sections in this paper (A, B and C). Answer ONE question
from each Section.
4. All questions carry equal marks.
Section A
I Answer either (a) or (b) below, i.e. either ONE long essay from question (a) or
TWO short essays from question (b).
(a) Write an essay (1000-2000 words) on any ONE of the following topics:
1. Dissent and Interdisciplinarity in the Humanities
2. Censorship and Self-Expression in Art
3. National Literature
4. Culture and the ‘Masses’
5. Literature and Social Location
OR
(b) Write short essays (500-600 words each) on any TWO of the following topics:
1. Multiculturalism and the Politics of the Secular
2. Postcolonial Shakespeares
3. Representing ‘Tribal’ India
4. The Diasporic Subject in Contemporary Indian Cinema
5. Caste, Gender and Cultural Criticism in India
6. Intertextuality and Contemporary Practices of Reading
7. Women in Romantic Poetry
8. Magic Realism and the Third World Subject
2. Section B
II Read the passage below and answer the questions that follow in not more than
100 words each.
During the late 1960s […] literary theory presented itself with new claims. The
intellectual origins of literary theory in Europe were, I think it is accurate to say,
insurrectionary. […] And yet something happened, perhaps inevitably. From being a bold
interventionary movement across lines of specialization, American literary theory of the
late seventies had retreated into the labyrinth of “textuality,” dragging along with it the
most recent apostles of European revolutionary textuality – Derrida and Foucault – whose
trans-Atlantic canonization and domestication they themselves seemed sadly enough to
be encouraging. It is not too much to say that American or even European literary theory
now explicitly accepts the principle of noninterference, and that its peculiar mode of
appropriating its subject matter (to use Althusser’s formula) is not to appropriate anything
that is worldly, circumstantial, or socially contaminated. “Textuality” is the somewhat
mystical and disinfected subject matter of literary theory.
Textuality has therefore become the exact antithesis and displacement of what
might be called history. Textuality is considered to take place, yes, but by the same token
it does not take place anywhere or anytime in particular. It is produced, but by no one and
at no time. It can be read and interpreted, although reading and interpreting are routinely
understood to occur in the form of misreading and misinterpreting. The list of examples
could be extended indefinitely, but the point would remain the same. As it is practiced in
the American academy today, literary theory has for the most part isolated textuality from
the circumstances, the events, the physical senses that made it possible and render it
intelligible as the result of human work.
Even if we accept (as in the main I do) the arguments put forward by Hayden
White – that there is no way to get past texts in order to apprehend “real” history directly
– it is still possible to say that such a claim need not also eliminate interest in the events
and the circumstances entailed by and expressed in the texts themselves. Those events
and circumstances are textual too (nearly all of Conrad’s tales and novels present us with
a situation – giving rise to the narrative that forms the text), and much that goes on in
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3. texts alludes to them, affiliates itself directly to them. My position is that texts are
worldly, to some degree they are events, and, even when they appear to deny it, they are
nevertheless a part of the social world, human life, and of course the historical moments
in which they are located and interpreted.
Literary theory, whether of the Left or of the Right, has turned its back on these
things. This can be considered, I think, the triumph of professionalism. But it is no
accident that the emergence of so narrowly defined a philosophy of pure textuality and
critical noninterference has coincided with the ascendancy of Reaganism, or for that
matter with a new cold war, increased militarism and defense spending, and a massive
turn to the right on matters touching the economy, social services, and organized labor. In
having given up the world entirely for the aporias and unthinkable paradoxes of a text,
contemporary criticism has retreated from its constitutency, the citizens of modern
society, who have been left to the hands of “free” market forces, multinational
corporations, the manipulations of consumer appetites. A precious jargon has grown up,
and its formidable complexities obscure the social realities that, strange though it may
seem, encourage a scholarship of “modes of excellence” very far from daily life in the
age of declining American power.
Criticism can no longer cooperate in or pretend to ignore this enterprise. It is not
practicing criticism either to validate the status quo or to join up with a priestly caste of
acolytes and dogmatic metaphysicians. The realities of power and authority – as well as
the resistances offered by men, women, and social movements to institutions, authorities,
and orthodoxies – are the realities that make texts possible, that deliver them to their
readers, that solicit the attention of critics. I propose that these realities are what should
be taken account of by criticism and the critical consciousness. […]
Criticism in short is always situated; it is skeptical, secular, reflectively open to its
own failings. This is by no means to say that it is value-free. Quite the contrary, for the
inevitable trajectory of critical consciousness is to arrive at some acute sense of what
political, social, and human values are entailed in the reading, production, and
transmission of every text. To stand between culture and system is therefore to stand
close to – closeness itself having a particular value for me – a concrete reality about
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4. which political, moral, and social judgments have to be made and, if not only made, then
exposed and demystified. If, as we have recently been told by Stanley Fish, every act of
interpretation is made possible and given force by an interpretative community, then we
must go a great deal further in showing what situation, what historical and social
configuration, what political interests are concretely entailed by the very existence of
interpretative communities. This is an especially important task when these communities
have evolved camouflaging jargons.
Were I to use one word consistently along with criticism (not as a modification
but as an emphatic) it would be oppositional. If criticism is reducible neither to a doctrine
nor to a political position on a particular question, and if it is to be in the world and self-
aware simultaneously, then its identity is its difference from other cultural activities and
from systems of thought or of method. In its suspicion of totalizing concepts, in its
discontent with reified objects, in its impatience with guilds, special interests,
imperialized fiefdoms, and orthodox habits of mind, criticism is most itself and, if the
paradox can be tolerated, most unlike itself at the moment it starts turning into organized
dogma. “Ironic” is not a bad word to use along with “oppositional.” For in the main – and
here I shall be explicit – criticism must think of itself as life-enhancing and constitutively
opposed to every form of tyranny, domination, and abuse; its social goals are noncoercive
knowledge produced in the interests of human freedom. If we agree with Raymond
Williams, “that however dominant a social system may be, the very meaning of its
domination involves a limitation or selection of the activities it covers, so that by
definition it cannot exhaust all social experience, which therefore always potentially
contains space for alternative acts and alternative intentions which are not yet articulated
as a social institution or even project,” then criticism belongs in that potential space
inside civil society, acting on behalf of those alternative acts and alternative intentions
whose advancement is a fundamental human and intellectual obligation.
[Extract from Edward Said, The World, the Text, and the Critic]
4
4
5. 1. What does Edward Said mean when he claims that criticism should be “secular”?
2. How does Said explain the relation between representation and social reality?
How does this explanation differ from that offered by the poststructuralist
paradigm of “textuality”?
3. What, according to Said, is the implicit politics of “textuality,” and how does he
critique it?
4. How does the quote from Raymond Williams support or substantiate Said’s
argument about criticism?
5. Do you think that Said’s approach risks reducing literary criticism to political
polemics? Give reasons for your answer.
Section C
III Answer either (a) or (b).
(a) Write a short note (150 words) on any FOUR of the following themes:
1. The Clash of Civilizations Thesis
2. Money in Literature
3. Subaltern History and the ‘Fragment’
4. Blindness and Insight in New Criticism
5. Essentialism versus Constructivism
6. The Nation as Imagined Community
7. The ‘Other’ in the Modern Novel
8. The Quest Theme in Victorian Poetry
OR
(b) Study the painting of M F Hussain attached herewith and answer the following
questions in not more than 150 words each.
1. Comment on Hussain’s use of colour in this painting.
2. What kinds of symbols does he use here?
3. Who do you think are Hussain’s intended viewers here? Does the
significance of this painting change with changing viewers? How?
4. Offer your critical comments on the issue of nudity in art, using this
painting as your point of departure.
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5
6. 1. What does Edward Said mean when he claims that criticism should be “secular”?
2. How does Said explain the relation between representation and social reality?
How does this explanation differ from that offered by the poststructuralist
paradigm of “textuality”?
3. What, according to Said, is the implicit politics of “textuality,” and how does he
critique it?
4. How does the quote from Raymond Williams support or substantiate Said’s
argument about criticism?
5. Do you think that Said’s approach risks reducing literary criticism to political
polemics? Give reasons for your answer.
Section C
III Answer either (a) or (b).
(a) Write a short note (150 words) on any FOUR of the following themes:
1. The Clash of Civilizations Thesis
2. Money in Literature
3. Subaltern History and the ‘Fragment’
4. Blindness and Insight in New Criticism
5. Essentialism versus Constructivism
6. The Nation as Imagined Community
7. The ‘Other’ in the Modern Novel
8. The Quest Theme in Victorian Poetry
OR
(b) Study the painting of M F Hussain attached herewith and answer the following
questions in not more than 150 words each.
1. Comment on Hussain’s use of colour in this painting.
2. What kinds of symbols does he use here?
3. Who do you think are Hussain’s intended viewers here? Does the
significance of this painting change with changing viewers? How?
4. Offer your critical comments on the issue of nudity in art, using this
painting as your point of departure.
5
5