BSEE 36: SURVEY OF ENGLISH AND AMERICAN LITERATURE
LEARNING MATERIAL 2: INTRODUCTION TO LITERARY THEORIES AND CRITICISM
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R This learning material will give the students an understanding to the different literary
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theories and criticisms and different strategies in interpreting the literary texts.
I This learning material is prepared by ARIEL RIVERA, subject instructor, with the
M supervision of the department chairperson, director for curriculum and campus
I administrator.
N The list of references, books and textbooks used are all reflected in the REFERENCE
A section of this learning material.
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This aims to satisfy the stipulated learning objective of the course and syllabus and this
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module.
OBJECTIVES
After the completion of the unit, students will be able to:
1. define and explain the different literary theories and criticisms; and
2. determine the different strategies in interpreting the literary texts.
Lesson Proper:
INTRODUCTION TO LITERARY THEORIES AND CRITICISM
A reader of a literary selection uses literary theories and criticisms to create an interpretation,
analysis, classification and ultimately the judgment of literary works. Criticism may examine a particular
literary work, or may look on author’s writing as a whole.
It does NOT mean to criticize as in complain or disapprove. It is often referred as a secondary
source. Literary criticism is also a study, discussion, evaluation, and interpretation of a literary text.
On the other hand, literary theory is the capacity to generalize about phenomena and develop
concepts that form the basis for interpretation and analysis – in this instance, of a “literary” text.
1. Literary Theory
- in reading and analyzing literature, literary theories are needed to support the reader in
understanding the texts.
- generally, literary critics clustered theories and approaches into five (5) groups. (__.PNU
Teachers’s Guide)
a. Mimetic Theory – based on the classical Aristotelian idea that literature imitates or reflects the real
world or the world of ideal concepts or things from which the subjects of literature is derived.
b. Authorial Theory – holds that the author is the sole source of meaning. One studies literature with
one eye set on the literary text and another eye on the author’s biography. The work in relation to its
author insists on a very private expression of the writer’s feelings, imagination, inspiration and intention.
c. Reader’s Response Theory – is also called as affective or pragmatic theory. Some call it as the
work and its readers. This theory permits varied and numerous interpretations of the literary texts from
as many readers.
d. Literary Tradition Theory – relates the work to its literary history by identifying the tradition its
belongs.
e. Textual Analysis Theory – this theory is also known as an entity in itself.
*Dones, M., 2009, p. 7
2. Literary Criticism
-refers to individual’s way of reading a literary text.
a. New Criticism of Formalist Criticism (considered new in the 1930s)
Seeks to make literary criticism a scientific study
Insists that each literary work shows function as a harmonious possessing a universal meaning
which suggests that there is only “correct” way of reading.
Meaning is revealed by “dissecting” a literary work, by examining the literary elements and by
determining how it contributed to the essential unity of a literary piece.
Strength: calls for a careful and thorough reading of the text
Weakness: ignores the relationship of one story to another, the interconnection of literature, the
influence of society to literature, and the importance of author’s individualism.
b. Archetypal Criticism (influenced by Carl Guztav Jung’s belief in the collective unconscious of all the
people of the world.
Identifies certain archetype, which are simple repeated patterns or images of human
experience: the changing seasons, the cycle of birth, death, rebirth, and heroic quest.
Depends heavily on symbols and patterns operating on a universal scale.
c. Historicism examines the culture and society from which literature is produced, and how these
influences affect literature.
Who is the author, where did he/she came from, and what was his/her objectives in writing?
How did the political events influence what the writer’s wrote?
What is the predominant philosophy that influenced the work?
Were there any special circumstances under which the work was written?
Strength: enriches one’s understanding of literature because a knowledge of the historical times
in which a piece is written.
Weakness: overlooks the literary elements and structure as well as author’s individual
contribution
d. Marxist criticism has the longest history being a 20th century phenomenon.
Argues that literature is a product of real, social, and economic existence.
Views literature to be ideologically determined, usually of the dominant social class.
Insists that literature must be used to challenge class oppression.
Strength: provides functional cultural and political agenda of literature
Weakness: opens up the possibility of prioritizing content over form, ideological criterion over
artistic.
e. Feminist criticism combines several critical methods while focusing on the questions on how
gender affects literary work, gender, or reader.
How are woman portrayed in the work? As stereotypes? As individuals?
How is the woman’s point of view considered?
Is male superiority implied in the text?
In what way is the work affected because it is written by a woman?
Strength: enriches a reading by showing awareness of the complexity of human interaction
Weakness: ultimately becomes cultural criticism
f. Structuralism is based on the linguistic theories of Ferdinand de Saussure and cultural theories of
Claude Levi-Strauss
Language is a self-sustained system of signs
Culture, like languages, could be viewed as systems of signs and could be analyzed in terms of
the structural relations among their elements (Levi-Strauss)
Views literary text as systems of interlocking signs which are arbitrary.
Seeks to make explicit the grammar (the rules and codes or system of organization)
Uses the concept of binary oppositions (sign-signifier, parole-langue, performance-competence)
Believes that a sign (something which stands for somebody for something) can never have a
definite meaning, because the meaning must be continuously qualified.
Strength: allows the extratextuality and links literary texts to systems of signs that exist even
before the work is written.
Weakness: denies the author’s individual contribution
g. Deconstruction was initiated by Jaques Derrida in late 1960s
Assumes that language refers only to itself rather than to an extratextual reality
Asserts multiple conflicting interpretation of a text
Base interpretations on the philosophical, political, or social implications of the language in a
text rather than on the author’s intentions.
Involves the questioning of many hierarchical opposition (binary oppositions) in order to expose
the bias of the Perivale terms.
Take apart the logic of language in which author’s make their claims.
Reveals how all texts undermine themselves in that every text includes unconscious “traces” of
other positions exactly opposite to that which is sets out to uphold.
Strength: debunks the idea of the arbitraries of the verbal sign and loosens up language from
concepts and referents
Weakness: views that the “meaning” of text bears only accidental relationship to the author’s
conscious intentions.
*Dones, M., 2009, p. 7-9
READING AND INTERPRETING THE LITERARY TEXT
WAYS OF LOOKING AT LITERATURE
The Triangle Approach
Literary Work
Writer Reader
CRITICAL PERSPECTIVE ON LITERATURE
life Ideas
previous
Characters
interpretation
THE WRITER
CONNECTIONS
THE WORK
historical content
culture
artistic/literary
structure
culture
THE READER
life
CATEGORIES OF OBSERVATION Kinds of Questions and Comments
THE WRITER
The Writer’s Life Who wrote this? / What kinds of person was he or she?
How old was the writer when the selection was written?
In what place and time was it written? /What was going on at
The Writer’s Culture that time? / What events and ideas were important? /
What was the world view?
THE WORK
Structure, Technique How many parts are there to this work?
How are they related?
What key words, images, figures of speech are important?
Characters or Speaker Who is talking here? To whom? / What is their relationship
like? / What motivates them? / What conflict do they have?
Ideas, Lessons, Philosophy What ideas or lessons are expresses or implied here? What
values? What forces have determined these events? What
are we supposed to learn?
THE READER
Yourself as a Reader How does it make me feel? What features of the work stand
out? What in me those features stand out? What happens to
me I read this?
Your culture What is the present world view in the place? Where I am
situated? What events and ideas are important?
CONNECTIONS
Historical Perspectives Does this refer to historical events? Is it about something or
somebody in the past?
Artistic/Literary Tradition What does this remind me of? How is it related to other
works, storyline, character, or myths?
*Dones, M., 2009, p. 9-11
THREE BASIC APPROACHES TO INTERPRET A LITERARY TEXT
1. Text – Oriented Approaches a reader may analyze a work of literature as complete in
Itself without relating it to the outside world
2. Author – Oriented Approaches a reader may study an author's life, time and culture to
better understand the author’s work. This approach
requires research.
3. Reader – Oriented Approaches each reader brings a unique set of experiences and
expectations to literature in its extreme form
*Dones, M., 2009, p.11
References:
Dones, M. (2009). Philippine Literature: A Student Guide. Mindshapers Co., Inc., Intramuros, Manila
Valdez, S. & Dianco, D. (2009). Understanding Literary Arts and Appreciating Literatures of the World. .
Mindshapers Co., Inc., Intramuros, Manila
