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The World of Literary Theory

Psychological. Marxist. The World of Literary Theory. Feminist/Gender. Cultural. Psychological Criticism. Based on Freud’s theory of the unconscious The unconscious is expressed through symbol and dream The conscious mind represses unconscious drives

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The World of Literary Theory

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  1. Psychological Marxist The World of Literary Theory Feminist/Gender Cultural

  2. Psychological Criticism • Based on Freud’s theory of the unconscious • The unconscious is expressed through symbol and dream • The conscious mind represses unconscious drives • Literature is a form of dream which reveals the author’s subconscious inner life • Psychoanalytic principles can reveal inner lives of fictional characters • Psychologically based literary techniques: stream of consciousness

  3. Psychological Criticism • Considers the psychological relationship between the text and the reader: “the text contains a secret expression of what the reader WANTS to hear” (Griffin) • Based on Lacan’s theory: the unconscious is created by language and thus is structured like language

  4. Feminist/Gender • Male literary hegemony ignores women authors and misinterprets women characters • False and stereotypical images of women • New development: focus on masculinity and feminity • Considers female language (gynocriticsim): the language of the mother, female literary forms/styles (circular plots, narratives), rejects the “marriage plot,” the female body and fluidity • Considers the cultural creation of feminine identity: sex vs. gender, normal vs. abnormal

  5. Feminist/Gender • Considers stereotypes of female characteristics/attributes: passive, irrational,subjective, domestic, spiritual, impractical • Considers the differences BETWEEN women in relationship to race, class, and economic status • Delves into the oppression and erasure of women by other women

  6. Marxist • Literature is a product of its environment • Literature reflects societal tensions (bourgeois vs. proletariat) as described by Marx • Awareness of class, race, and sexism • Elucidates HOW social forces operate within the text

  7. Marxist • Offers a critique of capitalism and how it impedes social utopia/wholeness • Focuses on content and not aesthetics • Marxist art must offer social solutions

  8. Cultural/Historicism • Politically oriented with sympathy for marginalized groups • Considers culture, discourse, ideology, the self, and history • The text is society’s system for encoding meaning- everything produced by a society is open to interpretation- there is no HIGH/low art

  9. Cultural/Historicism • Discourses are systems of codes shared by groups, thus sources of POWER • Groups with power impose their ideology on others (hegemony)- such as bourgeois, males, the wealthy, or even nations (colonialism) • Ideology always marginalizes somebody (always an “other”) • Priviliged ideology suppresses contradictory viewpoints without others even recognizing it (hegemony)

  10. Cultural/Historicism • The self is created by culture • Literature must be studied in terms of how it was produced • Literature must be studied in relation to power structures in society

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