New Criticism, Readers Response, Structuralist Criticism

New Criticism

a critical theory that is focusing on the text and also known as close reading

Intentional Fallacy

Reject the belief that the author’s intention is the same as the text’s meaning

Authorial Intention

the meaning the author intended the text to have

“the text itself”

New Critical effort to focus our attention on the literary work as the sole source of evidence for interpreting it.

Affective Fallacy

Reader response based on the personal associations. Focus on formal elements such as language, imagery, symbolism, and structure.

Organic Unity

Central concept of new-criticism

Paradox

is the statement that seem self-contradictory but represents the actual way things are

tension

the complexity of the text is created, which, broadly defined, means the linking together of opposites.

Intrinsic Criticism

Interpretation stayed within the context created by text itself

Objective Criticism

encourage to avoid subjective interpretations and instead focus on the text’s formal qualities, based unbiased and factual.

New Criticism

Close reading, textual analysis, focus on form and structure, and emphasis on the work itself.

Reader-Response Criticism

focuses on readers’ responses to literary texts

Transactional Reader Response Theory

coined by Louise Rosenblatt, acts as a stimulus to which we respond in our own personal way.

blueprint

the text acts as a

text

the printed words on the page

Efferent Mode

focusing on the information acquisition

Aesthetic Mode

Emotional and artistic

Affective Stylistic

Coined by Stanley Fish, deals with emotion. Does not consider what was the text says rather the experience of the reader.

Subjective Reader Response Theory

Coined by David Bleich, does not call for the analysis of textual cues

Real Objects

Tangible objects

Symbolic Objects

What we create in our mind

Negotiable

Response statements must be

Symbolization

Our perception and identification of our reading experience create a conceptual or symbolic world in our mind as we read.

Resymbolization

Occurs when our experience of the text produces in us a desire for explanation. (access the text)

Reader Oriented

talk about oneself

Reality Oriented

talk about issues in the world

Experience Oriented

Readers reaction to the text

Psychological Reader Response Theory

Coined by Norman Holland, readers’ motives strongly influence how they read.

Defense Mode

Skipping the scene and hating the character (masking the pain or feelings)

Fantasy Mode

Imagining, creating your own happy ending

Transformational Mode

instead of acknowledging, you tend to see symbolism (symbolize)

Social Reader Response Theory

Interpretative strategies (society), Interpretative community. The interpretation change based on the community.

Informed Reader

Coined by Stanley Fish, you will know the intention of the author based in his writings

Implied Reader

Coined by Wolfgang Iser, based on the intended reader

Informed Reader and Implied Reader

forms of hypothetical readers

Actual Reader

For reader with different perspectives

Structuralist Criticism

Underlying principle or underlying structure. Patterns of action and events of the literary piece

Visible World

Surface phenomena and the actual experience

Invisible World

Structures that underlie and organize all of these phenomena so that we can make sense of them (help you understand the text)

Surface Phenomena

the text itself

Wholeness

function as a unit

Transformation

Dynamic and capable of change

Self-regulation

always belong to the system and obey its law

Ferdinand de Saussure

the father of linguistic

Structuralist Linguistics

Developed by Ferdinand de Saussure, is a theoretical framework that views language as a system of signs

Diachronically

Refers to the study of phenomena, such as language or cultural changes, over time.

Synchronically

The same words can mean differently in different times.

Langue

A French term which means “language”

Parole

A French term which mean “speech”

Binary Opposition

two ideas, directly opposed.

Signifier

the actual thing that we can see (ex. raven > raven)

Signified

the concept that we have in our mind (ex. raven > death)

Structural Anthropology

developed by Claude Levi Strauss, even though there are different events there are underlying patterns and structure

Intertextuality

refer to the other things to relate to the other structure

Index

directly connected to what it signifies

Icon

symbol of a thing

True Symbol

Arbitrary