Group 01

Theory of Literature and

GROUP MEMBERS:
Literary Criticism
1. Made Evania Althea
Holy (2001541079)
2. . Ida Ayu Gede
Laksemi Dewi
(2001541081)
3. Fawzia Putri Salsabila
(2001541085)
Topics
1 The Definition of Literary Theory

2 Archetypal Criticism

3 Feminist Criticism

4 Marxist Criticism

5 Reader-Response Criticism

6 Deconstruction

7 Formalism

8 Psychoanalytic Criticism

9 Postcolonial Criticism

10 Queer Theory

11 New Historicism
Chapter I The Definition of Literary
Theory
Literary Theory

Literary theory, according to Brewton (2006), is For example, a psychoanalytic theorist might

further defined as particular form of literary examine and interpret a literary text through the

criticism in which particular academic, scientific, theoretical point of view of psychoanalysis and

or philosophical approaches are followed in a psychology and, in turn, gives an interpretation

systematic fashion while analyzing literary texts. or reading of a text that focuses entirely on the
psychological things of it.

Furthermore, Brewton also emphasizes that

literary theory refers to any principles come
from internal analysis of literary texts or from
external knowledge that can be applied in
multiple interpretive situations.

Source: Brewton, V. 2006. Literary Theory.

Archetypal Criticism
Archetypal Criticism

Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961), the Swiss creator of analytical

psychology, popularized archetypal theory and critique in
twentieth-century literary theory and criticism. Carl Jung
proposed that humanity possesses a "collective
unconscious," a form of common psyche that manifests
itself in dreams and myths and contains ideas and imagery
that we all inherit. As a result, literature imitates not the
world but the "whole dream of humankind," and Jung
referred to mythology as the "textbook of the archetypes"
A picture of Carl Jung.
(Walker, 2002: P. 17).

Source: Walker, S. F. (2002). Jung and the Jungians on Myth. NY: Routledge.
 Archetypal Criticism

The archetypal similarities within these diverse phenomena

are held to reflect a set of universal, primitive, and
elemental patterns, whose effective embodiment in a
literary work evokes a profound response from the reader.
The death-rebirth theme is often said to be the archetype
of archetypes. Other archetypal themes include the heroic
journey and the search for a father figure. Archetypal
images include the opposition of heaven and hell, the river
as a sign of life and movement, and mountains or other
high places as sources of enlightenment. Characters can
be archetypal as well; some examples are the rebel-hero,
the scapegoat, the earth goddess, and the femme fatale.

Source: Appleman, D., 2014. Critical encounters in secondary English:

Teaching literacy theory to adolescents. Teachers College Press.
Feminist Criticism
Feminist Criticism

Feminist literary criticism recognizes that Feminist critique is a type of literary criticism
literature both reflects and shapes founded on feminist views. It is roughly
stereotypes and other cultural defined as feminism's politics, and it employs
assumptions. Thus, feminist literary feminist ideals to criticize male-dominated
criticism examines how works of literature literature. The oppression of women in social,
embody patriarchal attitudes or undercut political, economic, and psychological
them, sometimes both happening within literature is the fundamental cause of this
the same work. style of critique.

Source: https://www.thoughtco.com/feminist-literary-criticism-
3528960#:~:text=Feminist%20literary%20criticism%20recognizes%20that,happening%20within%20the%20same%20work.
 Feminist Criticism

Feminist theory can be traced to the theories of Simone de

Beauvoir in The Second Sex (1929), though in 1919, Virginia Woolf
also formed the foundation of feminist criticism in her seminal
work, A Room of One’s Own. Feminist criticism, or gender
studies, focuses on the role of women (or gender) in a literary
text.

According to feminist criticism, patriarchy, in its masculine-

focused structure, socially dictates the norms for both men and
women. Feminist criticism is useful for analyzing how gender
itself is socially constructed for both men and women. Gender
studies also considers how literature upholds or challenges
those constructions, offering a unique way to approach literature.

source: https://writingcommons.org/section/research/research-methods/textual-methods/literary-criticism/feminist-criticism/
Marxist Criticism
 Marxist Criticism

Marxist literary theory starts from the The most direct form of Marxist criticism, what
assumption that literature must be has been called 'vulgar' Marxism, takes the
understood in relation to historical and view that there is a straightforward
social reality as interpreted from a Marxist deterministic relation between base and
standpoint. The fundamental Marxist superstructure, so that literary texts are seen
postulate is that the economic base of a as causally determined by the economic base.
society determines the nature and The selection from Christopher Caudwell's
structure of the ideology, institutions and Illusion and Reality adopts this position in
practices (such as literature) that form the discussing Victorian poetry.
superstructure of that society

Source: Newton, K.M. (1988). Marxist Criticism. In: Newton, K.M. (eds) Twentieth-Century Literary Theory. Palgrave,
London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-19486-5_7
Marxist Criticism

Marxist criticism supposes that literature can be analyzed

through the social and material conditions that it was
created. So a writer’s social situation determines what
characters, political ideas, and economic declarations will
develop in their text.
The Hunger Games has strong Marxian undertones. Most of
the population is beset with poverty and scarcity. And while
the districts (the proletariat) have varying levels of wealth,
they are ultimately at the mercy of the Capitol (the
bourgeoisie). The plot centers on the struggles between
these two sides and the social transformation it will bring.

Source: https://www.tckpublishing.com/literary-theories/
Reader-Response Criticism
Reader-Response Criticism

Reader-response criticism is a theory which gained prominence in the late

1960s, that focuses on the reader or audience reaction to a particular text,
perhaps more than the text itself. Reader-response criticism can be
connected to poststructuralism’s emphasis on the role of the reader in
actively constructing texts rather than passively consuming them.

Unlike text-based approaches such as New Criticism, which are grounded

upon some objective meaning already present in the work being
examined, reader-response criticism argues that a text has no meaning
before a reader experiences—reads—it.
Source: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/reader-response-theory
 Reader-Response Criticism

The reader-response critic’s job is to examine the scope and variety of

reader reactions and analyze the ways in which different readers,
sometimes called “interpretive communities,” make meaning out of both
purely personal reactions and inherited or culturally conditioned ways of
reading.

The theory is popular in both the United States and Germany; its main
theorists include Stanley Fish, David Bleich, and Wolfgang Iser.

Source: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/reader-response-theory
Deconstruction
Deconstruction

Deconstruction is a form of philosophical and

literary analysis, derived mainly from work
begun in the 1960s by the French
philosopher Jacques Derrida, that questions
the fundamental conceptual distinctions, or
“oppositions,” in Western philosophy through
a close examination of the language and
logicof philosophical and literary texts.

Source: https://www.britannica.com/topic/deconstruction
Deconstruction

In the 1970s the term was applied to work by Derrida, Paul de Man, J. Hillis
Miller, and Barbara Johnson, among other scholars.

In the 1980s it designated more loosely a range of radical theoretical

enterprises in diverse areas of the humanities and social sciences, including—
in addition to philosophy and literature—law, psychoanalysis, architecture,
anthropology, theology, feminism, gay and lesbian studies, political theory,
historiography, and film theory.

Source: https://www.britannica.com/topic/deconstruction
Deconstruction

In polemical discussions about intellectual trends of the late 20th-century,

deconstruction was sometimes used pejoratively to suggest nihilism and
frivolous skepticism. In popular usage the term has come to mean a critical
dismantling of tradition and traditional modes of thought.

Source: https://www.britannica.com/topic/deconstruction
Formalism
Formalism

Formalism refers to a style of inquiry that focuses, almost exclusively, on

features of the literary text itself, to the exclusion of biographical, historical, or
intellectual contexts. The name "Formalism" derives from one of the central
tenets of Formalist thought: That the form of a work of literature is inherently
a part of its content, and that the attempt to separate the two is fallacious. By
focusing on literary form and excluding superfluous contexts, Formalists
believed that it would be possible to trace the evolution and development of
literary forms, and thus, literature itself.

Source: https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Formalism
Formalism
In simple terms, Formalists believed that the focus of literary studies should
be the text itself, and not the author's life or social class. Art is produced
according to certain sets of rules and with its own internal logic. New forms of
art represent a break with past forms and an introduction of new rules and
logic. The goal of the critic is to examine this feature of art. In the case of
literature, the object of reflection is the text's "literariness," that which makes it
a work of art and not a piece of journalism. This attention to the details of the
literary text was an attempt on the part of literature to turn its discipline into a
science.
Source: https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Formalism
Psychoanalytic Theory
Psychoanalytic Theory

Psychoanalytic Theory was found by Sigmund Freud. It's a

method for treating mental illness and also a theory that
explains human behavior. This theory is the idea that what
happens to people during childhood can have an impact on
the way they work in the coming years of their life. The
purpose of this theory is to understand what drove
personality, thinking, behavior, and to help those who are
afflicted with mental problems.

Source: https://www.simplypsychology.org/Sigmund-Freud.html
Postcolonial Theory
Postcolonial Theory

Edward Said is the the founder of Postcolonial Theory. His book

Orientalism in 1978 is considered the foundational work on which
post-colonial theory developed. Said's theory of postcolonialism is
mainly based on what he considers the false image
of the Orient or the East that has been fabricated by western
explorers, poets, novelists, philosophers, political theorists,
economists, and imperial administrators since Napoleon's
occupation of Egypt in 1798 (Hamadi: 2014).

Source: https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/328024387.pdf
Postcolonial Theory

This theory also examine ways in which the

literature of the colonial powers is used to justify
colonialism through the perpetuation of images of
the colonized as substandard. However,
postcolonial theory have proved controversial, and
some writers have strongly critiqued the whole
concept.

Source: https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/328024387.pdf
Queer Theory
Queer Theory

Teresa de Lauretis organized the first queer theory conference in

1990. This theory explores the representation of gender and
sexuality in literature. Queer theory is used to explore and challenge
how activists, artistic texts, and the media perpetrate gender- and
sex-based binaries, and its aim is to revoke hierarchies and fight
against social inequalities.

Source: https://www.browndailyherald.com/article/2022/07/how-queer-theory-has-shaped-the-literary-canon
New Historicism Theory
New Historicism Theory

This theory first developed in the 1980s, primarily

through the work of the critic Stephen Greenblatt.
New Historicism theory acknowledges that literature
isn’t only influenced by the history of the author, but
also that of the critic. The aims of this theory is to
understand intellectual history through literature, and
literature through its cultural context.

Source: https://literariness.org/2016/10/16/new-historicism-a-brief-note/
REFERENCES

• MAMBROL, N., 2022. New Historicism: A Brief Note. [online] Literary Theory and Criticism. Available at:
<https://literariness.org/2016/10/16/new-historicism-a-brief-note/> [Accessed 14 September 2022].

• The Brown Daily Herald. 2022. How queer theory has shaped the literary canon - The Brown Daily Herald. [online]
Available at: <https://www.browndailyherald.com/article/2022/07/how-queer-theory-has-shaped-the-literary-canon>
[Accessed 14 September 2022].

• SAUL, M., 2022. Sigmund Freud's Theories. [online] Simplypsychology.org. Available at:
<https://www.simplypsychology.org/Sigmund-Freud.html> [Accessed 14 September 2022].

• Newworldencyclopedia.org. 2022. Formalism - New World Encyclopedia. [online] Available at:

<https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Formalism> [Accessed 14 September 2022].

• Encyclopedia Britannica. 2022. deconstruction | Definition, Philosophy, Theory, Examples, & Facts. [online] Available
at: <https://www.britannica.com/topic/deconstruction> [Accessed 14 September 2022].
 REFERENCES
• Poetry Foundation. 2022. Reader-response theory | Poetry Foundation. [online] Available at:
<https://www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/reader-response-theory> [Accessed 14 September 2022].

• Salao, C., 2022. 10 Literary Theories for Understanding Literature - TCK Publishing. [online] TCK Publishing. Available at:
<https://www.tckpublishing.com/literary-theories/> [Accessed 14 September 2022].

• Newton, K., 1988. Marxist Criticism. Twentieth-Century Literary Theory, pp.85-97.

• Writing Commons. 2022. Feminist Criticism. [online] Available at: <https://writingcommons.org/section/research/research-

methods/textual-methods/literary-criticism/feminist-criticism/> [Accessed 14 September 2022].

• ThoughtCo. 2022. What Is Feminist Literary Criticism?. [online] Available at: <https://www.thoughtco.com/feminist-literary-criticism-
3528960#:~:text=Feminist%20literary%20criticism%20recognizes%20that,happening%20within%20the%20same%20work> [Accessed
14 September 2022].

• Appleman, D., 2014. Critical encounters in secondary English: Teaching literacy theory to adolescents. Teachers College Press.

• Walker, S. F. 2002. Jung and the Jungians on Myth. NY: Routledge.

• Brewton, V. 2006. Literary Theory. [online] Available at: <http://www/iep.utm.edu/literary/> [Accessed 14 September 2022].
 GROUP 01

Thank you for

listening