English Philology Exam Review: Literary Criticism and History

A comprehensive set of vocabulary flashcards for English Philology students, covering major literary theories, historical movements from Romanticism to Postmodernism, and key conceptual frameworks like intertextuality and the collective unconscious.

Psychoanalytic Literary Criticism

A critical approach based on the theories of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung that focuses on how the unconscious mind, repressed memories, and hidden desires influence literary characters and authors.

Sigmund Freud's Unconscious Theory

The idea that human behavior is influenced by repressed desires, fears, and memories stored in the unconscious mind, often analyzed through the id, ego, superego, and the Oedipus complex.

The Royal Road to the Unconscious

A phrase used by Freud to describe dreams, which psychoanalytic critics interpret as expressions of disguised wishes and inner psychological conflicts.

Marxist Literary Criticism

An approach based on the ideas of Karl Marx that examines literature in relation to class struggle, socio-economics, and how wealth affects characters' identities and opportunities.

Base and Superstructure

A Marxist concept where the economic system (base) shapes the social institutions, including politics, religion, and literature (superstructure).

Collective Unconscious

Proposed by Carl Jung, this is a universal layer of the human mind shared by all people, consisting of inherited patterns of thought called archetypes.

Archetypes

Universal, inherited patterns of thought or character types, such as the Hero, the Mother, the Wise Old Man, and the Shadow, that appear repeatedly in myths and literature.

Feminist Literary Criticism

An analysis of how literature represents gender and how patriarchal societies privilege men, while also seeking to recover the voices of marginalized women writers.

Social Construction of Gender

A core assumption in feminist criticism, as noted by Lois Tyson, asserting that gender roles are determined by society rather than biology.

Critical Race Theory (CRT)

A framework in literary analysis that examines how race and racism shape society and texts, treating racism as a structural system rather than just an individual attitude.

The Journey (Archetypal Event)

A universal archetype symbolizing personal growth, self-discovery, and transformation, exemplified by Huckleberry Finn’s moral development on the Mississippi River.

The Iceberg Theory

Ernest Hemingway's minimalist writing style where the simple, concise surface narrative leaves the deeper, psychological meaning hidden beneath.

American Romanticism

A literary movement ($1820s$ to $1860s$) emphasizing emotion, imagination, nature, and the spiritual dimension of human experience, represented by figures like Edgar Allan Poe.

American Naturalism

A late-$19th$-century movement influenced by Darwinism, depicting humans as shaped by heredity and environment rather than free will, represented by Stephen Crane.

American Modernism

An early-$20th$-century response to industrialization and the First World War characterized by fragmented structure, stream of consciousness, and alienation.

American Postmodernism

A post-Second World War movement characterized by metafiction, irony, and intertextuality that questions objective truth and stable meaning.

Metaphysical Poetry

A $17th$-century English poetic style associated with John Donne, characterized by intellectual complexity and the use of the metaphysical conceit.

Metaphysical Conceit

An elaborate and surprising comparison between seemingly unrelated objects or ideas used frequently in $17th$-century metaphysical poetry.

Intertextuality

As theorized by Julia Kristeva and Gérard Genette, the notion that every text is shaped by, and connected to, other texts through quotation, parody, or allusion.

The Death of the Author

An essay by Roland Barthes arguing that the reader, rather than the author’s intention, creates the meaning of a text.

Contemporary African American Literature

Literature written after the Second World War, represented by authors like Maya Angelou and Colson Whitehead, focusing on identity, trauma, and social justice.

William Shakespeare’s Legacy

His significance as a playwright who created psychologically complex characters and a poet who wrote $154$ sonnets, greatly enriching the English language.

The English Novel

A genre that developed in the $18th$ century (e.g., Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe) focusing on realistic characters, everyday experiences, and psychological realism.

Victorian Novel

A $19th$-century literary form, exemplified by Charles Dickens, that addresses social, moral, and economic changes such as industrialization and class inequality.