Intro to Literary Studies – Vocabulary Review

A comprehensive set of vocabulary flashcards covering key terms, movements, and concepts from the lecture on literary studies, poetry, drama, prose, and literary theory.

Literary Theory

The study of the philosophical ideas and methods that shape how we analyze, interpret, and evaluate literature.

Mimesis

Imitation; the representation of reality in art or literature.

Aristotle’s View of Mimesis

Sees literature as an imitation of probable, general truths and therefore superior to history.

Plato’s Critique of Mimesis

Condemns imitation as mere counterfeiting that cannot access true Ideas.

Expressive Theory

Defines literature as the subjective expression of the author’s emotions and imagination (Wordsworth).

Pragmatic Theory

Holds that literature should offer pleasure and/or moral profit, engaging readers imaginatively while acknowledging its fictionality (Horace).

Intrinsic Approach

Analyzes elements within the text itself, treating the work as a self-referential aesthetic object.

Extrinsic Approach

Studies factors outside the text—author, reader, context, or reality—to explain meaning.

Fact vs. Fiction

The blurred boundary between factual and invented writing; both can share strategies of representation.

Aesthetic Experience

The degree of pleasure and insight a reader gains, shaped by individual taste and background.

Hermeneutics

Theory of interpretation stressing the circular movement between prior knowledge and new understanding.

Literary Criticism

Analysis, interpretation, and evaluation of literary works using personal response and theoretical tools.

Canon

The culturally sanctioned selection of ‘important’ authors and texts considered worth studying.

Philology

Text-oriented study focused on reconstructing authentic texts and solving editorial problems.

Formalism

Approach that privileges form over content, emphasizing defamiliarisation, rhythm, rhyme, and structure.

Structuralism

Views literature as part of an underlying linguistic system (langue) that produces texts (parole).

Semiotics

The study of signs, examining how signifiers (sounds/images) relate to signified concepts.

Binary Opposition

Paired, contrastive concepts (e.g., male/female) that structure meaning in structuralist analysis.

New Criticism

Close-reading movement (1930s-60s) seeking unity in a text through paradox, irony, and multiple meanings.

Post-structuralism

Challenges fixed meaning, focusing on the play of signifiers and the instability of language.

Différance

Derrida’s term for how meaning arises through difference and deferral among signs.

Reader-Response Criticism

Theory that meaning is created by the reader in the act of reading; each reading produces a new text.

Implied Reader

The hypothetical reader anticipated and ‘programmed’ by the text’s structures and gaps.

Marxist Literary Theory

Interprets texts in relation to economic conditions, class ideology, and power structures.

Cultural Materialism

Locates texts within their material and social conditions of production and reception.

New Historicism

Studies ‘the historicity of texts and the textuality of history,’ emphasizing power relations of a period.

Cultural Studies

Interdisciplinary field analyzing how social, economic, and political forces shape cultural products.

Feminist Literary Theory

Examines literature in terms of gender representation, authorship, and patriarchy’s influence on the canon.

Écriture Féminine

French feminist idea of a distinctively female mode of writing that resists patriarchal language.

Gender Theory

Explores how texts construct and question gender identities and roles.

Queer Theory

Interrogates fixed categories of sex, gender, and sexuality, highlighting binaries’ instability.

Postcolonialism

Studies the cultural impact of colonialism and the hybridity of post/colonial identities.

Hybridity (Bhabha)

The interdependent, mixed construction of colonizer and colonized identities.

Ecocriticism

Analyzes the relationship between literature and the natural environment, often with activist aims.

Posthumanism

Perspective that decenters humans, viewing them as one force among many in wider systems.

Poetry

Intense, often verse composition marked by rhythm, figurative language, and elevated diction.

Prosody

The systematic study of versification: meter, rhythm, rhyme, and stanza forms.

Scansion

The act of marking stressed and unstressed syllables to identify a poem’s meter.

Meter

Regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in verse.

Foot

The basic metrical unit of a line of poetry (e.g., iamb, trochee).

Iamb

A metrical foot of one unstressed followed by one stressed syllable (da-DUM).

Trochee

A foot of one stressed followed by one unstressed syllable (DUM-da).

Anapaest

Foot of two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed (da-da-DUM).

Dactyl

Foot of one stressed syllable followed by two unstressed (DUM-da-da).

Spondee

Foot of two stressed syllables (DUM-DUM).

Pyrrhic

Foot of two unstressed syllables (da-da).

Catalectic Line

A line missing its final unstressed syllable.

Free Verse

Poetry without regular meter or rhyme but often using repetition and rhythm.

Blank Verse

Unrhymed iambic pentameter, common in English drama since the 16th century.

Rhythm

The patterned flow of sound in poetry, shaped by stress, pauses, and repetition.

Enjambment

The continuation of a sentence beyond the line break without a pause.

End-Stopped Line

A line ending with punctuation, causing a natural pause.

Caesura

A pause within a line of poetry, often marked by punctuation.

Masculine Rhyme

Rhyme ending on a stressed syllable (stand/land).

Feminine Rhyme

Rhyme ending on an unstressed syllable (lighting/fighting).

Slant (Imperfect) Rhyme

Approximate rhyme with close but not exact sound correspondence (worm/swarm).

Consonance (Pararhyme)

Repetition of similar consonant sounds with differing vowels (lad/lid).

Couplet

Two consecutive rhyming lines forming a unit.

Quatrain

A four-line stanza or poem.

Rime Royal

Seven-line iambic pentameter stanza rhyming ababbcc.

Ottava Rima

Eight-line stanza rhyming abababcc.

Dramatic Monologue

Poem in which a single speaker addresses a silent listener, revealing character.

Ode

Formal, often ceremonious lyric poem of praise or meditation.

Villanelle

19-line poem with two repeating refrains and a strict rhyme scheme (e.g., Bishop’s ‘One Art’).

Conceit

An elaborate, often surprising metaphor linking dissimilar ideas, typical of metaphysical poets.

Shaped (Concrete) Poetry

Poems whose visual layout forms a picture related to the subject (e.g., Herbert’s ‘Easter Wings’).

Imagism

Early 20th-century movement favoring clear, concrete imagery and precision (Ezra Pound).

Drama

A work written for performance, combining dialogue, action, and staging elements.

Hamartia

The tragic flaw or error in judgment leading to a hero’s downfall.

Catharsis

The purgation of pity and fear experienced by the audience of a tragedy (Aristotle).

Soliloquy

Speech delivered by a character alone on stage, revealing inner thoughts.

Aside

Brief remark a character makes to the audience, unheard by other characters.

Stichomythia

Rapid, line-by-line dialogue exchange between characters.

Fourth Wall

Imaginary barrier separating performers from audience; ‘breaking’ it addresses the audience directly.

Commedia dell’Arte

16th-century Italian improvised comic drama with stock characters and masks.

Comedy of Manners

Restoration genre satirizing social customs and sexual mores of the upper class.

Melodrama

19th-century ‘music drama’ featuring stock characters, heightened emotions, and moral polarization.

Heroic Couplets

Pairs of rhymed iambic pentameter lines, often used in 17th-century heroic plays.

Freytag’s Pyramid

Classic plot structure: exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, dénouement.

Plot

The structured arrangement of events designed to achieve emotional and artistic effects.

Story

The chronological sequence of events independent of their presentation (plot).

Setting

The location, historical time, and social milieu in which narrative events occur.

Narrated Time (Story Time)

The time span of events within the narrative world.

Narrative Time (Discourse Time)

The time it takes to tell or read the events.

Flat Character

A simple, one-trait figure, often a stereotype or stock type.

Round Character

A complex, fully developed character capable of growth and change.

Unreliable Narrator

Narrator whose credibility is compromised by bias, naivety, or deceit.

Focalisation

Perspective through which narrative events are perceived (Genette).

Zero Focalisation

Omniscient viewpoint where narrator knows more than any character.

Internal Focalisation

Events filtered through the consciousness of a particular character.

External Focalisation

Narrator reports only observable actions, knowing less than or equal to characters.

Free Indirect Discourse

Blends narrator’s and character’s voices, presenting thoughts in third person without ‘he thought’ tags.

Stream of Consciousness

Narrative mode depicting continuous flow of a character’s thoughts and sensations.

Short Story

Brief prose narrative readable in one sitting, aiming at a single, unified effect.

Epic

Long narrative poem recounting heroic deeds and adventures (e.g., Iliad, Beowulf).

Ballad

Narrative verse, often sung, telling dramatic stories in simple language.

Limerick

Humorous five-line poem with 3-3-2-2-3 stresses and an aabba rhyme scheme.

Epigram

Short, witty poem or statement ending with a sharp turn of thought.

Morality Play

Medieval drama using allegory to teach moral lessons; characters personify virtues and vices.

Mystery Play

Medieval play dramatizing biblical stories, performed during religious festivals.