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'APPLYING' THEORIES IN LITERARY RESEARCH

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 LangLit
IMPACT FACTOR – 5.61 ISSN 2349-5189

An International Peer-Reviewed Open Access Journal

‘APPLYING’ THEORIES IN LITERARY RESEARCH
DR J. JOHN SEKAR,
MA, MPhil, PGDTE (CIEFL), PGDHE (IGNOU), PGDCE (UH), PhD
Professor
Research Department of English
Former Dean of Academic Policies & Research
The American College
Madurai – 625 002
India
ABSTRACT
Methods and methodologies are equally important for literary research as its
tools. Being a qualitative research type, literary research requires an
objective research tool for analysis and assessment of texts in a disinterested
manner. Appreciation of texts is secondary while interrogation of texts is
primary to unfold the writers’ ideological agenda. Every person including
writers is made up of ideologies. Language serves as a vehicle for
indoctrination of ideologies. In fact, language carries thousands of ideologies
that compete for space and prominence. The ultimate purpose of literary
research is also knowledge-production. In addition to it, it is a demonstration
of ideological identification and affirmation. This article argues that methods
are personal while methodologies are communal, and that individual
researchers invent their own methods but only out of a methodology.
Methodology is theoretical and ideological. Unless researchers are convinced
by a particular methodology, they cannot derive their methods out of it.
Literary theories are understood as methodologies and theories of reading. It
also argues that all literary theories are critical, provocative, self-reflexive,
multi-disciplinary, and trans-disciplinary.

Keywords: Critical Theories, Methods, Methodologies, Reading Theories, Poststructuralism

Introduction

The main purpose of research is to create new knowledge about the hidden ideologies
in the text. So, the question is: how to create it? This question becomes more relevant in
literary research which is text-based, and qualitative. Texts require interpretation since
literature is not an autonomous entity, but it is an entity that is implicated within socio-
political, cultural, ideological, and aesthetic contexts. These contexts condition texts’
reception at different moments and in different cultures. Hence, researchers need research
tools for objective analysis of texts. These tools are known as methodologies or theories of
reading, or approaches in literary criticism. Tools in literary research are approaches to
literary research. Approaches are characterized by a set of theoretical assumptions drawn
from the fields other than literature. These constitute what is academically knowns as literary
(critical) theories. These assumptions constitute the very nature of critical practices
(methods). Literary theories per se are not methods to be followed as often misunderstood or
misperceived or misconceived.

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IMPACT FACTOR – 5.61 ISSN 2349-5189

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This article aims at establishing literary theories as methodologies and theories of
reading and methods as personal inventions of researchers. Theories are brought to bear upon
our reading texts and identifying the hidden ideologies. All serious literary reading that leads
to research is deconstructive in nature. It also demonstrates that there should not be any
dichotomy between what readers do with the text in the fictional world and how they live a
life in this world. Hence, it addresses the questions how to distinguish between critical
practices (methods) and theoretical and ideological apparatuses (methodologies) and how
methods are personal while methodologies are communal.

Discussion
It is nearly two decades since literary theories were institutionalized within Indian
literary academia. Initial reactions were not only very vague but also negative. Not many not
many universities came forward to offer theories as curricular subjects even at postgraduate
level; nor many teachers volunteered to teach them. Even teachers who were ready to teach
them had to self-learn these theories without having been subjected to testing after a formal
course. Such a situation led to the mushrooming of several misconceptions, misperceptions,
and confusions over the comprehension and relevance of them to literary studies. They were
not even sure of the term to be used in the singular or the plural. Those who opposed formed
the majority and they held that

i. literary theories had nothing to do with literature;

ii. they were all non-literary stuff coming from every other field except literature;
iii. theorists’ names were even unpronounceable, and concepts were very difficult to
comprehend;
iv. they interfered with the appreciation of literary texts; and
v. they have no practical application value.

These initial reactions were not without any valid ground. Indian literary academia
faced a piquant situation which the US literary academia not only faced but also resisted in
the 1970s. Paul de Man’s “Resistance to Theory” deals with the historical reasons that are
convincing. Hence, it is undeniably true that the true nature of literary theories is something
that is provocative. They provoke the readers. If readers are not provoked, then they are not
theories. They are difficult to read and understand because they are inter-disciplinary and
trans-disciplinary. The readers, who were used to reading literature as a fictional discourse
without any reference to non-literary discourses such as, philosophy, psychology, linguistics,
feminism, and Marxism, were disturbed with these theories as a new kind of discourse.
Innocent research supervisors never dreamt that these theories would act as reading theories
or methodologies, and methods would be derived from them. Thematic analysis of the chosen
texts was the best-known critical mode. Thus, there was a huge chasm between what students
learn in theory classes and what researchers were doing in research without theories. They
did not perceive any link between theories and literary texts as objects of research.

Now, in the twenty-first century, it is a settled fact that we cannot study literature
without literary theories (Klages, 2008; Bressler, 2003). Studying literature is an
institutionalized affair. Reading literature is a private affair. However, irrespective of if we
are reading literature, or studying literature, or researching literature, we are all influenced by
these theories. As human beings, we are all influenced by (human) theories. In fact, these

Vol. 8 Issue 2 19 November, 2021

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theories form our world outlook first before they enable us to interpret fictional events. Our
world outlook is conditioned by these theories. These theories provide us new critical idioms
to read the texts of the past as well.

Literary theories, which are different manifestations of poststructuralist thinking, are

now used as methodologies (not methods) of reading and theories of reading. Reading is not
necessarily confined to (literary) texts. Julian Wolfreys (2001: 4) rightly points out that
reading suggests “a manner of interpreting our world and the texts which comprise that
world.” Hence, it is inevitable and natural for researchers to interpret literary texts with some
theories that inform them intellectually and epistemologically about what is happening in
their lives first, and in the fictional world next. Method is the ‘practical’ application of doing
something and methodology is the ‘theoretical” and “ideological” application of these
methods. Hence, theories are understood as methodologies of reading and not methods.
Methodology must come before method.

Hence, research methods in literary research are supported by literary theories.

Methods in literary research are individual but methodologies are communal. Method is
different from methodology. While method is a step-by-step procedure of carrying out
research, methodology is theoretical and ideological. Method is by and large an individual
accomplishment that may or may not be replicated by other scholars. For example, how a
scholar deconstructs a poem is a method while deconstruction is methodology.
Methodologists cannot prescribe methods for others to strictly adhere to. Methods require
ingenuity/inventiveness/creativity/originality of scholars. Methods are not necessarily meant
for replication; they may be informative to other scholars. Each scholar invents a method of
using a particular methodology (literary/critical theory). However, new scholars are learning
how different methods grow out of a particular methodology (theory).

Literary theories help readers/researchers learn see themselves and their (fictional)
world in valuable new ways. The new ways influence them as individuals, parents, and
teachers. They help them how they watch television programmes, how they read newspapers,
how they behave as voters and consumers, how they react with people whom they disagree
on issues related to society, religion, culture, and politics, and how they deal with their own
motives, fears, and desires. In turn, these new ways condition readers’/researchers’ responses
to fictional events presented in literature. Theories strengthen their ability to think logically
and creatively with fresh insights. In the words of Gloria Anzaldua (2012), “Theory produces
effects that change people and the way they perceive the world.”

No interpretation of the world in which we live, and of literature is non-theoretical.

All our personal or natural interpretations of our worldly and fictional experiences are not
something unique since they are, in fact, based on our certain assumptions and our ways of
seeing the world that guide our thinking though we are not aware. We may tend to think that
our interpretations of literature without literary (critical) theories are personal and
spontaneous. However, this perception is not true since our interpretations are based on
certain beliefs that we have imbibed in ourselves from childhood. These beliefs are about
education, culture, literature, language, self, character, life, death, God, writer, reader, text,
and so on. If some readers think that the primary purpose of reading literature is appreciation
of literature, they will eventually realise that their acquaintance with critical theories

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 LangLit
IMPACT FACTOR – 5.61 ISSN 2349-5189

An International Peer-Reviewed Open Access Journal

increases rather than decreases their appreciation of literature. The more they experience in
life, the more they are able to experience in fictional world.

Scholars find literary theories/concepts/thoughts as a means to critique the fictional

events as much as they respond to real life events and happenings. In fact, theories enable a
broad appreciation of literature. They provide new perspectives when scholars interrogate
texts. They improve the quality of texts for both authors and readers. They facilitate our
challenging the texts. Thus, deconstruction becomes the bedrock of critical reading of, and
reflecting over texts which are the first two stages in the ‘appreciation’ of the fictional world.

Next, how a literary/critical theory should be brought to bear upon the interpretation
of a chosen text or texts is another problem that many researchers confront. In fact, it
becomes a dilemma for most scholars. They often ask how they should choose a theory to
interpret the chosen text. It is an incorrect assumption that scholars choose a theory for
interpretation only after having read a text, and therefore their dilemma to fix a theory as a
tool. It is true that a particular theoretical concept chosen as a research tool is thoroughly
discussed as part of the introductory chapter. However, the decision about the choice of the
tool (theory) is not taken after having read chosen texts. On the other hand, while the scholar
is reading a text or a set of texts, a particular theory in preference to others might strike them.
Either unconsciously or subconsciously, they are reading and interpreting a text from a
particular theoretical (methodological) perspective. It is because their mental and intellectual
make-up is already critical (theoretical). They are already familiar with the basic tenets of the
various theories before they start choosing and reading texts of their choice. It is assumed that
scholars have done a course or two on literary/critical theories as part of coursework, or they
have reading experience in the realm of critical theories.

The other possibility is that while reviewing the literature in the field, scholars learn
how a particular theory has already been used on texts. Thus, the review activity not only
familiarizes researchers with the content-knowledge but also methodology-knowledge.
Researchers can thus benefit from the literature review in several ways as far as
methodology-knowledge is concerned. One, they become familiar with what theoretical
concepts have already been used. Two, they learn what methods have already been
exhausted. The reviewing scholars can either replicate the methods for their chosen texts, or
evolve their own methods. Three, the-scope-for-further-research sections in articles and
theses can also suggest a set of theoretical concepts to be applied on the chosen texts or in the
related fields. Finally, the delimitation-of-the-study section can also provide some clue about
the methodology chosen or omitted.

Moreover, scholars should have been familiar with the bird’s eye-view of all possible
theories, if not with minute details. In real life too, we are conversant with plenty of concepts
that subconsciously and involuntarily influence us while dealing with the various issues. This
application is not something conscious or deliberate. Our world-view is influenced by our
knowledge of these concepts/theories. Hence, familiarity with literary/critical theories is part
of our intellectual and educational growth. It is an undeniable fact that theories have an
indispensable, shaping influence on readers including theorists and critics. The rate of
intellectual growth is rather more accelerated in the case of those who critically reflect over
theories than in those who are simply and forcibly exposed to curricular requirements. Thus,

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theories are bound to bring about real-life changes first in readers’ personal lives, and then in
their responses to fictional events. There is no dichotomy in their responses between fictional
world and real world. Their cognitive and metacognitive skills improve over a period of time.
They acquire the required amount of intelligence for research. While reading literary texts,
their cognitive and metacognitive systems naturally enable them to deconstruct them from
their repertoire of critical/theoretical perspectives.

A knowledge of theories influences our lives first, and literary reading next. It is a
matter of conviction and honesty to oneself. Readers expect in the fictional world what they
have accepted in life. So, their accepted values in life would be expected and appreciated in
literature as well. For example, if readers entertain the traditional image of women in life,
they will not accept feminist concepts in the literary world. If readers are not having
postmodernist attitudes in life, they cannot bring in the notion of postmodernity while reading
fiction. Readers, who believe in the traditional concept of mimesis/representation/re-
presentation, cannot bring psychoanalysis to their reading of literary characters. Readers, who
believe that writers are conscious of their artistic representation with authorial domination,
cannot accept the claims of psychoanalytic theories that literature is an irrational activity.
People, who believe in the representation theory of literature, cannot deconstruct texts. If they
do, then they are living a kind of Dr Jekyll-and Mr Hyde life. They are not basically honest to
themselves first and to others next. Moreover, these theories have literally replaced Scott’s
five approaches since the concept behind them itself has been questioned. For example, the
idea of historicity is preferred to that of history.

Therefore, poststructuralist literary/critical ideas provoke readers and bring about

changes in their (meta)cognition first. For example, psychoanalytic theories advocate a kind
of dream interpretation of the neuroses and psychological states of characters in literature to
know a text’s meaning. Marxist theories influence us to interpret texts in terms of class
relations and socialist ideals. Postmodernist theories simply reject modernist ideas of unified
narrative in order to showcase the fractured and dissonant experience of twentieth-century
life. Post-structural theories question all assumed ‘universal truths’ as reliant on social
structures that influenced these truths. Deconstructionist theories teach us to locate within
texts contradictions that render any singular reading of a text impossible. Postcolonial
theories challenge the Eurocentric Western thought in literature and about literature, and
examine the impacts of colonialism. Feminist theories including their branches lesbian and
gay theories and queer theories interrogate gender roles through the lens of sexual orientation
and gender identity. All these critical notions challenge our traditional epistemology to the
extent that we feel insecure and therefore we either ‘avoid’ or ‘resist’ theories as interpretive
tools in life first, and in literary texts next. Thus, scholars are deconstructionists,
psychoanalysts, feminists, Marxists, postcolonialists, post-structuralists, and postmodernists
both in fictional/critical and real worlds. Humanists’ dichotomy is thus resolved.

Twenty-first century researchers in literature are intellectually poststructuralists and

postmodernists simply because they live in the age of poststructuralism and postmodernism.
They cannot even wish to go back to the age of humanism. Poststructuralist and
postmodernist theoretical discourses are characterized by certain common intellectual
predispositions such as self-reflexivity, tentativeness, slipperiness, ambiguity, and complex

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IMPACT FACTOR – 5.61 ISSN 2349-5189

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interrelations/interconnections of texts and meanings. Thus, poststructuralists and
postmodernists

1. REJECT totalizing, essentialist, and foundationalist concepts.

i. The totalizing concept puts all phenomena under one explanatory concept. For
example, when something happens contrary to our expectations, we tend to
attribute it to the will of God. Thus, there is no other explanation possible.
ii. An essentialist concept suggests that there is an independent, objective reality
beneath or beyond language and ideology. For example, we tend to believe
that there is such a thing called femininity, or beauty, or truth. The essentialist
concept does not accept that reality is constructed.
iii. A foundationalist concept suggests that all signifying systems are stable and
they represent the world of facts unproblematically. This world of fact is
isomorphic with human thought. For example, the dagger Macbeth sees
floating before him (hallucination!) does not require any proof to understand
what it means; or the image one sees with one’s eyes closed after staring at a
bright light (afterimage). These are called sense data and self-evident truths
which do not need support from other beliefs. On the other hand, beliefs about
material objects or theoretical entities of science are not regarded as basic or
foundational.
iv. For poststructuralists, reality is constructed.

2. CONTEST the concept of man as developed by the enlightenment thought and idealist
philosophy. Enlightenment thought and idealist philosophy hold that the individual is
sacred, separate, and intact; that the individual’s mind is the only true realm of
meaning and value; that the individual’s rights are unique and inalienable; and that the
individual’s value and nature are rooted in a universal and transhistorical essence.
However,
i. Poststructuralists hold that individuals are culturally and discursively
structured; created in interactions as situated, symbolic beings.
ii. The common terms used to refer to a person/individual is a subject. Subjects
are material beings. They are embodied and present in the physical world.
They are entrenched in the material practices and structures of society like
working, playing, procreating, or living as parts of the material systems of
society. They are not metaphysical.
iii. Subjects are social in their origin. In other words, they take meaning, value,
and self-image from their identity groups, from their activities in society, from
intimate relations, from multiple pool of common meanings, symbols, and
practices that they share with their sub-cultural groups and with their society
as a larger unit.

3. VIEW reality as much more fragmented, diverse, tenuous, culture-specific than

structuralists. Such an understanding has the following consequences:
i. Poststructuralism pays greater attention to specific histories, to the details and
to contexts.
ii. It stresses discourse and cultural practices.

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iii. It considers the role of language and textuality in our construction of reality
and identity.

4. REJECT the traditional aesthetic phenomenalist assumption that language is a

transparent medium of communication of thought and emotion unproblematically
because subjects live in a linguistic universe. We call this world as a linguistic
universe since reality is only mediated reality. What is mediated is governed by
i. the way language works (for example, through difference);
ii. the world of discourse which, in turn, governs our knowledge; in other words,
we can speak of only what we have language for, and we can speak only in
ways the rules of discourse allow us to;
iii. the working of master figures of speech (metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche &
irony);
iv. the structure of ideology which attempts to naturalize power relations;
v. the idea that any cultural construction of meaning or value privileges some and
deprivileges others;
5. BELIEVE that humans live in a world of language, ideology, and discourse. None of
them is transparent, but all of them structure our sense of being and meaning.
6. ASSERT that all meaning is textual and intertextual. In the words of Derrida, “there is
nothing outside of the text.” Everything subjects know is constructed through signs
which are governed by the rules of discourse for a particular area of knowledge.
Every text exists only in relation to other texts.
7. THINK what is meant is different from what appears to be meant. In other words,
meaning disguises itself. For example, Derridean ‘differance,’ Freudian supposition,
repression, displacement, condensation, substitution that Marxist ideas highlight.
8. PROVE that texts are marked by surplus of meaning. They demonstrate that different
readings are inevitable. The surplus is attributed to the polysemous nature of language
and rhetoric. A text comes into being as it is read.
9. DEMONSTRATE that discourse is a material practice. Humans are rooted in
historicity and live through the body. In Foucault’s terms, the production of discourse
(the way we know our world) is controlled, selected, organized, and distributed by
certain procedures. They also hold the idea that discourses are multiple,
discontinuous, originating, and disappearing through chance. What happens is mainly
by chance. There is no great causal flow, or plan or evolution of history.
10. PREFER the term ‘historicity’ to ‘history,’ since the former implies that what subjects
conceive of as history is tentative, situated, and contingent whereas the latter suggests
an objectively existing, cognitively available reality.

Conclusion
In literary research, method is different from methodology. While method is personal,
methodology is communal. Methodologies are essential since methods are derived from
them. Without methods and methodologies, knowledge cannot be identified, ascertained, and
produced in literary research. Novice researchers can familiarize themselves with the
methods already used by previous researchers through the literature review and the scope-for-
further-research section. As far as methodologies are concerned, they should learn them
through conscious efforts by way of doing courses on theories and through indiscriminate
readings.

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