UTS Theory of Literature

Name  : Baiq Ayu Ida Kholida

NIM    : 2313034

1.    Marxist Theory

a.    Definition  : Culture theory that embodies a set of social, economic and political ideas that its follower believe will enable them to interpret and change their world.

b.   History       :

History is marked by the growth of human productive capacity, and the forms that history produced for each separate society is a function of what was needed to maximize productive capacity.

The beginning of Marxist thought came about through Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels’ The Communist Manifesto during the late 19th century. In the 20th century, the “Russian Revolution Architects” headed by Leon Trotsky applied Marx’s ideas to literary texts. Trotsky was exiled by stalin, however, and Theodor Adorno helped form the core of early Marxist critics. The Frankfurt School then attempted to reconstruct the theory to enable it to withstand totalitarian corruption. The criticism reached its peak during times of economic tragedy and, consequently, following the Great Depression, faded away. Marxism then resurfaced again years later in the 1960s during the time of politically tumultuous events such as the Vietnam War and the Cuban Missile Crisis.

c. Famouse people :

-   Karl Heinrich Marx (1818-1883)

ü   Born in Trier, Germany in 1818

ü   German philosopher who rejected the tenets of Romanticism in favor of philosophy of dialectical materialism.  

ü   Criticized the injustice inherent in the European class/capitalist system of economics operating in the 19^th Century. 

ü   Believed that capitalism allowed the bourgeoisie to benefit at the expense of the workers. 

ü   The Communist Manifesto. 

ü   Das Kapital, analyzes the capitalist form of wealth production and its consequences for culture.

-       Friedrich Engles (1820-1895)

ü   German Writers, Philosophers, Social Critics

ü   Coauthored The Communist Manifesto

ü   Declared that the capitalists, or the bourgeoisie, had successfully enslaved the working class, or the proletariat, through economic policies and control of the production of goods

ü  REFERENSI

ü  Creft, Cross. 1997. Literature, Criticism and Style. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

ü  Perrine, Laurence. 1983. Literature: Structure, Sound and Sense. New York: Harcourt Brace Javanovich.

2.    Feminism

a.    Definition  : Theory that men and women should be equal politically, economically and 

               socially

b.    History       : Feminism itself has grown since its initial emergence; it is divided into three waves, the first wave was in 1848-1920, the second wave was in 1960-1990 and the third wave was in 1990-present. Each wave fought for different things, the first wave fought for the rights of women to vote in general election, because at that time women were not allowed to vote. While in the second wave, feminism fought for economic and social equality, and in the third wave, is to be determined.

     (http://www.umsl.edu/~keelr/3210/3210_lectures/feminism.html)

c.    Famouse people    :

—  Dorothy E. Smith (1926)

ü   Earned BA from London School of Economics

ü   Earned PhD in sociology from University of California at Berkeley

ü   Husband left her with two children

ü   Worked at Berkeley (where most professors were male) and in England as a lecturer

—   Sandra Harding (1935)

ü  Professor of women’s studies at UCLA

ü  Directs Center for the Study of Women

ü  Author or editor of ten books

ü  Given over 200 lectures at universities and conferences

ü  Written in such areas as feminist theory, sociology of knowledge, and methodological issues related to objectivity and neutrality

—   Patricia Hill Collins (1948)

ü  BA from Brandeis, MA from Harvard, and PhD from Brandeis

ü  Associate professor of sociology and African American studies at University of  

     Cincinnati

ü  Outsider within – one is part of a group but feels distant from that group

3.    Culture study

a.    Definition  : Related to New Historicism but with a particular and cross-disciplinary emphasis on taking seriously those work traditionally marginalized by the easthetic ideology by white european males. It examines social, economic and political condition that effect institution and product such as literature and question traditional value hierarchies. 

Cultural studies is politically engaged. Cultural critics see themselves as “oppositional,” not only within their own disciplines but to many of the power structures of society at large.

b.   History       :

Ø  50's-- Socialist humanism;  (or Marxism) -- Richard Hoggart , Raymond Williams, and Edward Thompson.

ü  The assumption of cultural studies that industrial capitalist societies are unequally divided along class, gender and ethnic lines is drawn from Marxism. But cultural studies goes further in contending that culture is the main arena where this division is established and fought for, where subordinate and marginalized groups resist the imposition of meanings which reflect the interests of the dominant groups.

• Ø  60's -- Culturalist -- Richard Hoggart , Raymond Williams, and Edward Thompson.
•   Culturalism focuses on meaning production by human actors in a historical context.
•  Culturalism stresses history.
•  Culturalism focuses on interpretation as a way of understanding meaning.

Ø  70‘s --  Structuralist marxism; Semiotics;

E.g. Ferdinand de Saussure ; Louis Althusser ; Roland Barthes

•   Structuralism points to culture as an expression of deep structures of language that lie outside of the intentions of actors and constrain them.
•   According to Louis althusser, structuralism has two crucial aspects, they are:                              à The recognition that differential relations are the key to understanding culture and society  à As a result, structure is not prior to the realization of these relations
• Structuralism is synchronic in approach, analyzing the structures of relations in a snapshot of a particular moment. As such, it asserts the specificity of culture and its irreducibility to any other phenomena.
• Structuralism has asserted the possibility of a science of signs and thus of objective knowledge.

Ø  mid-70’s  - Post structuralism
-- Derrida  
-- Foucault and discursive practices

Ø  mid- 80's -- postmodern debate

             Thus, postmodernism argues that knowledge is:

—  Specific to language-games

—  Local, plural and diverse.

Ø  90‘s – regional Cultural Studies (e.g. that in Taiwan, or inter-Asia Cultural Studies)

ü  During the Thatcher years (1979-90), British cultural studies began to fragment and leave the shores of Britain. Cultural studies migrated to the United States, Canada, Australia, France and India.

ü  In certain locations, it became less political and more concerned with aesthetic and textual analysis. In other regions, it became more political and involved with the plight of the marginalized and discourses of the periphery.

ü  Cultural studies became highly diversified

C.        Famous People

Ø  Richard Hoggart

ü  Richard Horgart started his academic career as an adult education tutor at the University of Hull.

ü  As professor of English literature at Birmingham University, he founded the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies.

ü  His book The Uses of Literacy (1957) gave cultural studies its first identifiable, intellectual shape.

ü  Basing his work on F.R. Leavis's (1895- 1978) ideas on literary criticism,

ü  Hoggart argued that a critical reading of art could reveal "the felt quality of life" of a society. Only art could recreate life in all its rich complexity and diversity.

Ø  Raymond Williams

ü  Raymond Williams also started his academic career as an adult education tutor

ü  He taught at Oxford University from 1946 to 1960.

ü  His books Culture and Society (1958) and The Long Revolution (1961) draw on two traditions within Marxism.

ü  For Williams, culture is an all-inclusive entity, a "whole way of life, material, intellectual and spiritual".

ü  He traces the evolution of culture through its various historical conditions towards a "complete" form.

ü  Williams sees the emergence of a "general human culture" in specific societies where it is shaped by local and temporary systems.

REFFERENCES

ü  Castle, Gregory.2007.The Blackwell Guide to Literary Theory. USA: Blackwell Publishing   Ltd.

ü  Daiches, David. 1956. Critical Approaches to Literature. London: Longman Group Limited.