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Literary Critical Theories:. Ways of Analyzing Text (overview) Mr. Watson, AP Lit & Comp. What are Literary Critical Theories?. Different “schools” of criticism Each emerged at different historical points (almost all in the 20 th century)
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Literary Critical Theories: Ways of Analyzing Text (overview) Mr. Watson, AP Lit & Comp
What are Literary Critical Theories? • Different “schools” of criticism • Each emerged at different historical points (almost all in the 20th century) • Definition: “ideas [that] act as different lenses critics use to view and talk about art, literature, and . . . culture” • Lit Crit is different perspectives of analysis.
Formalism / New Criticism • The work stands alone, outside of author’s experience or historical context. • Concentrates on the formal elements of a work, such as language, structure, style, and tone. • Sample question: How does the work use imagery to develop symbolism?
Psychological/Psychoanalytic • Uses Freudian strategies to analyze work (Oedipus/Electra complex, id/ego/superego, unconscious desires) • Analyzes motivations of characters, psychological symbols; may analyze author’s motivations or a reader’s psychological response to text • Sample question: Are there prominent words or symbols in the piece that could have hidden meanings?
Mythological/Archetypal • Finds “underlying, recurrent patterns in literature that reveal universal meanings and basic human experiences” • Carl Jung (archetypes), Joseph Campbell (Hero’s Journey/Heroic Cycle) • Sample question: How does the main protagonist’s story follow the steps of the Heroic Cycle?
Marxist • Analyzes how text reinforces or portrays: socio-economic class divisions, the conflict between those classes, the “status quo,” and/or who benefits from how story and characters are depicted • More concerned with content and theme than literary form. All texts are “political.” • Sample question: What social classes do the characters represent?
Reader-Response • Focuses on the reader, rather than the work itself • Reading is not passive; it is the reader (not the author or text in a vacuum) that brings meaning to the text. • Sample question: How does the interpretation of the text reveal information about the interpreter (reader)?
Feminist Criticism • Concerned with “the ways … literature … reinforce or undermine the economic, political, social, and psychological oppression of women” • The influence of patriarchy marginalizes women in all aspects. • Biology determines sex (male/female), but feminists examine how culture determines gender (masculine/feminine) • Sample question: How is the relationship between men and women portrayed?
Structuralism vs. Deconstruction • A structuralistlooks for patterns in a design of a text that would reveal “truth” and clear interpretation. However . . . • A deconstrucionist would think seeking a single Truth in a text is absurd; it doesn’t exist.
Deconstruction • Realities are plural; structures are by nature unstable or contradictory. • Most narratives are unrealistic; our experiences are not simply chronological. Post-modern authors exploit this. • The author is “dead,” and matters much less than the reader.
Deconstruction (continued) • Whatever the reader, the author or the text seems to find or say, a deconstructionist can “prove” the opposite. • Sample questions: How does a work fulfill or move outside the established conventions of its genre? What is left out of the text that if included might undermine the goal of the work?
Deconstruction “freeplay” • Jacques Derrida’s “freeplay”: language does not have fixed meaning. • “Time flies like an arrow” means what? • Time (noun) flies (verb) like an arrow (adverb clause): Time passes quickly. • Time (verb) flies (object) like an arrow (adverb clause): Get out your stopwatch and time the speed of flies as you would an arrow’s flight.
Post-Colonial Criticism • Concerned with works produced by colonial powers (formerly or currently) OR by those that were/are colonized. • Analyzes issues such as power, religion, culture, and economics, particularly when viewing the Western colonizers’ control of the colonized. • Sample question: How does post-colonialism affect the work explicitly (ex: plot, character motivation) and implicitly (ex: accurate portrayal of author’s own culture vs. “the other”)?
Other Lit Crit Theories • African-American • GBLTQ / Gender (how is gender and sexual identity portrayed?) • Hispanic/Latino • New Historicism (full historical context: time of setting, time written, time read)
Final Thoughts • There is no one way to interpret text. • Texts may support multiple Lit Crit theories, but rarely can they all be applied well! Usually, a few “naturally” apply. • Recognize how your own personal experience and bias informs your reading. • Use these Lit Crit theories for more ways to discuss, write about, and analyze text.