Philippine Literary History & Critical Theories – Review Flashcards

These flashcards cover critical theories, analytical frameworks, key authors and poems, historical periods of Philippine literature, and major points from Merlinda Bobis’s “The Sadness Collector.”

What does the Mimetic Theory claim about literature’s relationship to life?

It argues that literature imitates or represents life, holding a mirror to nature and the world.

According to the Expressive Theory, what does literature primarily reflect?

The inner soul, feelings, or psyche of the writer rather than the external world.

Which theory views literature as a source of knowledge, insight, and moral instruction, aiming both to teach and to delight?

Didactic Theory (supported by Aristotle and Horace).

Why is Historical-Biographical Theory important for interpretation?

Because understanding the author’s life and the work’s milieu makes the text more meaningful.

What guiding question is central to Formalism?

What makes literary language literary—focusing on devices, texture, and foregrounding within the text itself.

Which theory treats literature as an expression of universal, cross-cultural patterns called archetypes?

Mythological-Archetypal Theory.

In Psychoanalytic criticism, what are literary texts compared to, and why?

Dreams, because they symbolically express unconscious desires and fantasies.

How does Marxist criticism view literary works?

As reflections of social institutions, class relations, and historical material conditions.

What is meant by the ‘death of the author’ in Post-structuralism?

The idea that the author is not the sole source of meaning; interpretation depends on readers and context.

According to Reader-Response Theory, when does a text truly ‘exist’?

Only when a reader actively experiences and interprets it, creating unique meaning.

What central concern unites Feminist literary criticism?

Challenging patriarchal stereotypes, exposing misogyny, and promoting gender equality in literature.

Which theory interrogates fixed gender and sexual categories within texts?

Queer Theory.

Postcolonial Theory examines literature in relation to what major historical condition?

Colonial and imperial power structures and their cultural, political, and economic impacts.

Name the three ‘tiers’ or foci in the first framework for literary analysis.

Author, Text, and Reader.

Which critical underpinning guides Level 1 (Author-centered) exploration?

Historical-Biographical Theory.

What are the two main close-reading techniques in Level 2 (Text-centered) analysis?

Explication (elemental analysis) and Exegesis (clarifying or paraphrasing passages).

Level 3 (Reader-centered) exploration is primarily associated with which theory?

Reader-Response Theory (plus other contextual lenses).

What is the ultimate goal or ‘endpoint’ of the three-tiered framework?

To generate specific themes per level and synthesize a grand, overarching theme.

List the three phases of the second analytical framework.

Phase 1 – Reading for Form; Phase 2 – Reading for Meaning; Phase 3 – Reading for Essence.

What does ‘organic unity’ refer to in Phase 2 of the second framework?

The idea that a text’s parts are interconnected and collectively produce coherent meaning.

Which Chilean poet-diplomat won the 1971 Nobel Prize for Literature?

Pablo Neruda.

Who is Cirilo Bautista, and what major national honor did he receive?

A prize-winning Filipino poet, fictionist, and critic who became a National Artist for Literature.

Identify Angela Manalang Gloria’s academic background relevant to her poetry.

She earned an AB in Philosophy from the University of the Philippines in 1929.

Which Filipino writer of ‘Las Ruinas Del Corazón’ also received a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship?

Mario Eric Gamalinda.

In Neruda’s ‘Tonight I Can Write the Saddest Lines,’ what emotional tone dominates the speaker’s view of his absent beloved?

Ambivalence mixed with sorrow and lingering affection.

Why does Cirilo Bautista’s poem ‘Patalim’ depict love using the image of an edged weapon?

To emphasize love’s potential for pain, conflict, and cutting intensity rather than romantic cliché.

What elemental imagery structures Angela Manalang Gloria’s ‘To the Man I Married’?

Earth, gravity, air, and land are invoked to depict the spouse as the grounding force of love.

In Gamalinda’s ‘Las Ruinas Del Corazón,’ how is the relationship of Juana and Philip characterized?

A love so intense it symbolically unites life (Juana) and death (Philip).

Under a structuralist lens, what do Juana and Philip represent in ‘Las Ruinas Del Corazón’?

Juana symbolizes life, Philip symbolizes death, showing love’s power to bridge opposites.

Give two key features of Philippine literature in the Pre-Spanish era.

It was spontaneous, oral, and used native dialects with forms such as folk epics, lyric poetry, and ritual drama.

How did Spanish colonization influence Philippine literary themes?

Literature became Christian-centered, imitative of Spanish forms, and disseminated through the printing press.

Name one major consequence of American colonization on Philippine literature.

English became the official language, and Thomasite teachers promoted English literary production.

During the Japanese Occupation, what literary trend emerged underground?

Nationalist writings resisting Japanese rule, despite censorship.

What literary movement resurged during the Martial Law years in the Contemporary Period?

A nationalist movement led largely by student writers and activists.

According to Remoto (2015), list one hallmark of 21st-century Philippine literature.

Sensitivity to gender issues, technological allusions, plural cultural perspectives, or questioning of norms.

Who wrote ‘The Sadness Collector,’ and where did she grow up?

Merlinda Bobis, who grew up in Albay at the foot of an active volcano.

In ‘The Sadness Collector,’ who is the Big Lady and why is she invented?

A mythical figure created by Rica’s father to ‘collect’ the family’s sadness while the mother works abroad.

How does the tale of the Big Lady affect the child Rica?

It shapes her emotional and psychological state, becoming both comfort and source of anxiety.

Which literary mode blends realistic settings with fantastical elements in ‘The Sadness Collector’?

Magical realism.

State one advantage and one disadvantage of overseas work as portrayed in ‘The Sadness Collector.’

Advantage: financial support; Disadvantage: emotional distance and family fragmentation.

What does the line ‘as we feed continually, we also acknowledge the perennial nature of our hunger’ suggest?

Human desires are insatiable; fulfilling them only highlights their endless recurrence.

In Reader-Response theory, why are readers considered powerful in constructing meaning?

Because each reader’s experiences, biases, and contexts actively shape the interpretation of a text.

What is ‘foregrounding’ in Formalist criticism?

The deliberate use of literary devices to make language stand out and draw reader attention.

Define ‘archetype’ in Mythological-Archetypal criticism.

A universal symbol, image, or narrative pattern embedded in the collective unconscious across cultures.

What literary idea is captured by the phrase ‘meaning is diffused and can never be settled’?

The Post-structuralist view that texts have multiple, unstable interpretations defined by readers.