CL 390: Twentieth-Century (Western) Theory: An Introduction
Instructor: Katherine Arens
Dept. of Germanic Languages
E.P. Schoch 3.128; 1-4123 (k.arens@mail.utexas.edu)
THEME 1: ONTOLOGY OF THE WORK OF ART -- an ideology of the work
1. Phenomenology/Hermeneutics: The Philosophical Background
Edmund Husserl, "Phenomenology," II: 657-663
Roman Ingarden, "Phenomenological Aesthetics," II: 184-197
E.D. Hirsch, Jr., "Objective Interpretation," IR: 1099-1115
Paul Ricoeur, " Metaphorical Process as Cognition, Imagination, and Feeling," II: 423-434
Martin Heidegger, "Hölderlin and the Essence of Poetry," II: 757-765
Hans-Georg Gadamer, "Truth and Method," II: 839-855
Georges Poulet, "Phenomenology of Reading," IR: 1146-1154
Maurice Blanchot, "The Essential Solitude," II: 823-831
**Background: Kurt Mueller-Vollmer, "Introduction," The Hermeneutics Reader
R. Wellek, History, Vol. 7, Chap. 17
2. Text-Intrinsic Criticism: Sources for the Specific Theoretical Ideology of the auteur and Art
T.S. Eliot, "Tradition and the Individual Talent," "Hamlet and His Problems," IR: 760-766
I.A. Richards, "Practical Criticism," IR: 826-837
W.K. Wimsatt & Monroe C. Beardsley, "The Intentional Fallacy," "The Affective
R.P. Blackmur, "A Critic's Job of Work," IR: 884-896
Kenneth Burke, "Literature as Equipment for Living," IR: 920-924
Cleanth Brooks, "The Heresy of Paraphrase," "Irony as a Principle of Structure,"
**Other readings: John Crowe Ransom, Wallace Stevens, Robert Penn Warren, Murray Krieger
**Background: René Wellek, Vol. 5, Chaps 6-8
René Wellek, Vol. 6, Chaps. 4, 8, 9, 13, 14, 16
2a. Pendants (Varieties of Text-Intrinsic Criticism, including New Critics, Chicago NeoAristotelianism, mythopoetic criticism)
Northrop Frye, "Ethical Criticism: Theory of Symbols," IR: 1045-1072; "The Critical Path," II: 251-264
Ernst Cassirer, "Art," IR: 925-943
E.H. Gombrich, "From Representation to Expression," IR: 1082-1089
Hayden White, "The Historical Text as Literary Artifact," II: 394-407
Meyer H. Abrams, "How to Do Things with Texts," II: 435-449
Frank Kermode, "Fictions," II: 70-78
Stanley Fish, "Is There a Text in this Class?," II: 524-533; "Normal Circumstances, . . . ," IR: 11991209
**Background: Jonathan Culler, The Pursuit of Signs, Chaps. 6 & 8
2b. Formalism/Prague School: An Alternative to Anglo-American New Criticism
Boris Eichenbaum, "The Theory of the 'Formal Method'," IR: 800-816
Jan Mukarovsky, "Standard Language and Poetic Language," IR: 975-982
Mikhail M. Bakhtin, "Discourse in the Novel," II: 664-678; "Epic and Novel," IR: 838-855
Roman Jakobson, "The Metaphoric and Metonymic Poles," IR: 1041-1044
Tzvetan Todorov, Genres in Discourse, 1-49
Tzvetan Todorov, Theories of the Symbol, Chaps. 8-10, 246-284
**Background: J.G. Merquior. From Prague to Paris, Chaps. 1 & 2
F.W. Galan, Historic Structures: The Prague School Project
Victor Erlich. Russian Formalism
R. Wellek, History, Vol. 7, Chaps. 13, 15, 18
Terence Hawkes, Structuralism and Semiotics
Jonathan Culler, Structuralist Poetics
Robert Scholes, Structuralism in Literature
R. Wellek, History, Vol. 7, Chap. 16
Fallacy,"
IR: 960-9
THEME 2: TEXTS AND THEIR USES/USERS: An Ideology of the ideology of class and
consciousnesnss
3a. Marxist Criticisms: First Generation
Karl Marx, "The German Ideology," "A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy," IR: 624-627
Walter Benjamin, "Theses on the Philosophy of History," II: 679-685; "On Language as Such," IR:
742-749
Georg Lukács, "Art and Objective Truth," II: 789-807; "The Ideal of the Harmonious Man," IR: 902908
Leon Trotsky, "The Formalist School of Poetry and Marxism," IR: 792-799
**Background: Walter Cohen, "Marxist Criticism," in Greenblatt and Gunn, eds., Redrawing the
Boundaries, 320-348
Michael Ryan, Marxism and Deconstruction
Raymond Williams, Marxism and Literature
R. Wellek, History, Vol. 7, Chap.7
3b. Marxist Criticisms: Postwar
Louis Althusser, "Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses," II: 238-250
Raymond Williams, "The Country and the City," IR: 1155-1161
John Clarke, et al., ""Subcultures, Cultures, and Class: A Theoretical Overview," IN Stuart Hall and
Tony Jefferson, eds., Resistance through Literature, 9-74
Theodor Adorno, "Aesthetic Theory," II: 231-237; "Cultural Criticism," IR: 1032-1040
Max Horkheimer, "The Social Function of Philosophy," II: 686-696
Nancy Fraser, "What's Critical about Critical Theory?," Feminism as Critique, 31-56
4. Reception Theory
Hans Robert Jauss, "Literary History as a Challenge to L. Theory," II: 163-183
Wolfgang Iser, "The Repertoire," II: 359-380
Thomas S. Kuhn, "Objectivity, Value Judgment, and Theory Choice," II: 381-393
**Background: Robert C. Holub, Reception Theory
Robert Scholes, Protocols of Reading
**Critical Précis Due: Marxist approaches or Reception Theory
THEME 3: TEXTS AND LANGUAGE SYSTEMS -- ideologies of meaning and representation (texts and
minds, often in the singular or abstract)
5. Linguistics/Speech Act: Basis for Performativity
Benjamin Lee Whorf, "Relation of Habitual Thought and Behavior to Language," II:709-23
Noam Chomsky, "Aspects of the Theory of Syntax," II: 37-58
Emile Benveniste, "The Nature of the Linguistic Sign," "Subjectivity in Language," II: 724-732
J.L. Austin, "How to Do Things with Words," II: 832-838
Ludwig Wittgenstein, "Philosophical Investigations," II: 766-788
John R. Searle, "What Is a Speech Act?," II: 59-69
6. Structuralism/Semiotics
Ferdinand de Saussure, "Course in General Linguistics," II: 645-656; IR, 717-726
Charles Sanders Peirce, "Letters to Lady Welby," II: 637-644
Roland Barthes, "The Structuralist Activity," IR: 1127-1130; "Death of the Author," IR: 1130-1133
Claude Lévi-Strauss, "The Structural Study of Myth," II: 808-822
Jonathan Culler, "Beyond Interpretation," II: 321-329
Yurij Lotman & B.A. Uspensky, "On the Semiotic Mechanism of Culture," II: 408-422
Umberto Eco, Limits of Interpretation, "Semiotics, Pragmatics, and Text Semiotics," 203-221
Clifford Geertz, "Blurred Genres: The Refiguration of Social Thought," II: 513-523
**Background: J.G. Merquior, From Prague to Paris, Chaps. 3 & 4
Robert Scholes. Semiotics and Interpretation
Kaja Silverman, The Subject of Semiotics
7. From Post-Structuralism to Deconstructionism/Yale Critics
Friedrich Nietzsche, "Truth and Falsity," IR: 634-639
Sigmund Freud, "Creative Writers and Daydreaming," IR: 711-716
Carl G. Jung, "On the Relation of Analytical Psychology to Poetry," IR, 783-791
Martin Heidegger, "The Nature of Language," IR: 1090-1098
Michel Foucault, "What is an Author?," "Discourse on Language," II: 137-162; "Truth and Power," IR:
1134-1145
Jacques Derrida, "Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences," "Of
Grammatology," "Difference," II: 79-136
Georges Bataille, "The Notion of Expenditure," IR: 856-864
Geoffrey H. Hartman, "Literary Commentary as Literature," II: 344-358
J. Hillis Miller, "The Critic as Host," II: 450-468
Paul De Man, "Rhetoric of Temporality," "Semiology and Rhetoric," II: 198-230; "Semiology and
Rhetoric," IR: 1174-1182
Harold Bloom, "Poetry, Revisionism, Repression," II: 330-343; "The Dialectics of Poetic Tradition,"
IR: 1183-1189
**Background: Deborah Esch, "Deconstruction," in Greenblatt and Gunn, eds., Redrawing the
Boundaries, 374-391
J.G. Merquior, From Prague to Paris, Chap. 5
Richard Harland, Superstructuralism
Gregory L. Ulmer, Applied Grammatology
Christopher Norris, Deconstruction
Jonathan Culler, On Deconstruction
THEME 4: TEXTS, CANONICITY, AND RESISTANCE: An Ideology of Performativity and Resistance
8. The Emergence of Resistance: First-Generation Feminist Criticism
Virginia Woolf, "A Room of One's Own," IR: 817-825
Simone de Beauvoir, "The Second Sex," IR: 993-1000
Sandra M. Gilbert, "Literary Paternity," II: 485-496
Lillian S. Robinson, "Treason Our Text: Feminist Challenges to the Literary Canon," II: 571-582
S. M. Gilbert & Susan Gubar, "Infection in the Sentence," IR: 1234-1244
Elaine Showalter, "Towards a Feminist Poetics," IR: 1223-1233
bell hooks, Feminist Theory, "Black Women: Shaping Feminist Theory," and "Feminism: A
Movement to End Oppression," 1-32
Linda Nochlin, Women, Art, and Power, 1-36, 145-178
Annette Kolodny, "Dancing Through the Minefield: Some Observations on the Theory, Practice, and
Politics of a Feminist Literary Criticism," II:
497-512
Alice A. Jardine, "Gynesis," II: 559-570
**Background: Catharine R. Stimpson, "Feminist Criticism," in Greenblatt and Gunn,
eds., Redrawi
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, "Gender Criticism," in Greenblatt and Gunn, eds., Redrawing
the Boundarie
Hester Eisenstein and Alice Jardine, eds. The Future of Difference.
Marcia Cohen, The Sisterhood
Karen Offen, European Feminisms, 1700-1950: A Political History
9. Psychoanalytic/Post-Freudian Criticism:
From Political Criticism to Identity Politics
Jacques Lacan, "The Mirror Stage," "The Agency of the Letter in the Unconscious or Reason Since
Freud," II: 733-756
Gilles Deleuze & Felix Guattari, "Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism & Psychoanalysis," II: 283-307
Dorothy Leland, "Lacanian Psychoanalysis," Fraser & Bartky, eds., Revaluing French Feminism,
113-135
Additional Reading: Jacques Lacan, Seminar on the "Purloined Letter"
**Background: Meredith Skura, "Psychoanalytic Criticism," in Greenblatt and Gunn,
eds., Redrawi
R. Wellek, History, Vol. 7, Chap. 4
Anika Lemaire. Jacques Lacan
Samuel Weber. Return to Freud: Jacques Lacan's Dislocation of Psychoanalysis
Elizabeth Grosz. Jacques Lacan: A Feminist Introduction
Catherine Clément, The Weary Sons of Freud
10a. Identity Construction/Agency issues: French Feminisms
Hélène Cixous, "The Laugh of the Medusa," II: 308-320
Julia Kristeva, "The True-Real," The Kristeva Reader, 187-237
Luce Irigaray, "This Sex Which Is Not One," "Women on the Market," "Commodities among
Themselves," This Sex Which Is Not One, 23-33, 170-197
Julia Kristeva, "Women's Time," II: 469-484; "From One Identity to Another," IR, 1162-1173
**Background: Toril Moi, Sexual/Textual Politics
John Lechte. Julia Kristeva
Margaret Whitford. Luce Irigaray: Philosophy in the Feminine
Elizabeth Grosz, Sexual Subversions
10b. Identity Politics and the Gaze: The Politics of Spectatorship
Toril Moi, "Appropriating Bourdieu" (CD)
Nancy Fraser, "The Uses and Abuses of French Discourse Theories for Feminist Politics," Fraser &
Bartky, eds., Revaluing French Feminism, 177-194
Judith Butler, Gender Trouble, 1-34
Kaja Silverman. The Acoustic Mirror, 1-71, 187-234
Donna Haraway, Primate Visions, "Teddy Bear Patriarchy," 26-58; "Woman's Place is in the Jungle,"
279-303
**Other readings: Teresa de Lauretis, Alice Doesn't
Laura Mulvey, Visual and Other Pleasures
Diana Meyers, "The Subversion of Women's Agency," Fraser & Bartky, eds.,
Revaluing Fre
Diana Fuss, "Essentially Speaking," Fraser & Bartky, eds., Revaluing FF, 94-112
Paul Smith, Discerning the Subject, "Ideology," 3-23; "Feminism" and
"Responsibiliti
THEME 5: THE EMERGENCE OF CULTURAL STUDIES AND THE DEATH OF LITERATURE -- the
ideology of cultural processes as resistance to social inscription
11a. Marginalization and Post-Colonial Criticism
Edward Said, "From Orientalism," Williams & Chrisman, eds. Colonial Discourse and Post-Colonial
Theory, 132-149
Edward W. Said, "The World, The Text, and the Critic," IR: 1210-1222
Edward W. Said, "Secular Criticism," II: 604-622
Chinua Achebe, "Colonialist Criticism," IR: 1190-1198
Ranajit Guha, "Preface" and "On Some Aspects of the Historiography of Colonial India," R. Guha &
Gayatri Spivak, eds., Selected Subaltern Studies, 35-44; Spivak, "Subaltern Studies," 2-34
Frantz Fanon, "On National Culture," Williams & Chrisman, eds. Colonial Discourse and PostColonial Theory, 36-52
Homi Bhabha, "Remembering Fanon: Self, Psyche and the Colonial Condition," Williams &
Chrisman, eds. Colonial Discourse and Post-Colonial Theory, 112-123
Anne McClintock, "The Angel of Progress: Pitfalls of the Term 'Post-Colonialism,'" Williams &
Chrisman, eds. Colonial Discourse and Post-Colonial Theory, 291-304
Chandra Talpade Mohanty, "Under Western Eyes," Williams & Chrisman, eds. Colonial Discourse
and Post-Colonial Theory, 196-220
Seyla Benhabib, "The Generalized and the Concrete Other," Feminism as Critique, 77-95
Gayatri Spivak, "Can the Subaltern Speak?," Williams & Chrisman, eds. Colonial Discourse and
Post-Colonial Theory, 66-111
Gayatri Spivak, In Other Worlds, "A Literary Representation of the Subaltern," 241-268
**Background: Homi K. Bhabha, "Postcolonial Criticism," in Greenblatt and Gunn, eds.,
Redrawing the
Gerald Graff and Bruce Robbins, "Cultural Criticism," in Greenblatt and Gunn, eds.,
Redrawing the
11b. Other Critiques of Otherness and Marginalization
David Theo Goldberg, ed. Anatomy of Racism
-Frantz Fanon, "The Fact of Blackness," 108-126
-Homi Bhabha, "Interrogating Identity: Post-Colonial Prerogative," 183-209
-Edward W. Said, "Zionism from the Standpoint of Its Victims," 210-246
bell hooks, Feminist Theory: from margin to center , "Changing Perspectives on Power," and
"Rethinking the Nature of Work," 83-105
bell hooks, "Postmodern Blackness," Williams & Chrisman, eds. Colonial Discourse and PostColonial Theory, 421-427
Cornel West, "Marxist Theory and the Specificity of Afro-American Oppression," Marxism and the
Interpretation of Culture, 17-29
Catharine MacKinnon, "Desire and Power: A Feminist Perspective," Marxism and the Interpretation
of Culture, 105-121
**Background: Henry Louis Gates, Jr., "African-American Criticism," in Greenblatt and Gunn, eds.,
Redrawing the Boundaries, 303-319
L. Grossberg & C. Nelson, "Introduction: The Territory of Marxism,"
Marxism and t
12. Globalization, Media Culture
Walter Benjamin, "Theses on the Philosophy of History," II: 679-685
---, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" (CD)
Globalization: A Short Introduction
Additional Reading:
Theodor W. Adorno and Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment
Jürgen Habermas, Theory of Communicative Action
THEME 6: MATERIALIST CULTURAL STUDIES -- the ideologies of texts redefined
13a. New Historicism, 1: History of the Book
Lynn Hunt, "Introduction: History, Culture, and Text," in Hunt, ed., The New Cultural History, 1-22
Robert Darnton, "What is the History of Books?," Finkelstein & McCleery, eds., Book History Reader,
9-26
Jerome McGann, "The Socialization of Texts," Finkelstein & McCleery, eds., Book History Reader,
27-46
Roger Chartier, "Labourers and Voyagers: From the Text to the Reader," Finkelstein & McCleery,
eds., Book History Reader, 47-58
Pierre Bourdieu, "The Field of Cultural Production," Finkelstein & McCleery, eds., Book History
Reader, 77-99
Roland Barthes, "The Death of the Author," Finkelstein & McCleery, eds., Book History Reader,
221-224
Michel Foucault, "What is an Author?," Finkelstein & McCleery, eds., Book History Reader, 225-230
**Background: Louis Montrose, "New Historicisms," in Greenblatt and Gunn, eds., Redrawing the
Boundaries, 349-391
13b. New Historicism, 2: Translation Theory
Edwin Gentzler and Maria Tymoczko. "Introduction." In: Maria Tymoczko and Edwin Gentzler, eds.,
Translation and Power, xi-xxvii
Camino Gutiérrez Lanza. "Spanish Film Translation and Cultural Patronage: The Filtering and
Manipulation of Imported Material during Franco's Dictatorship." In: Maria Tymoczko and
Edwin Gentzler, eds., Translation and Power, 141-59
Edwin Gentzler. "Translation, Poststructuralism, and Power." In: Maria Tymoczko and Edwin
Gentzler, eds., Translation and Power, 195-218
**Background: André Lefevere, Translation, Rewriting, and the Manipulation of Literary Fame (case
studies, passim)
Susan Bassnett, Translation Studies (passim)
14. Memory, Post-Memory, Memorialization
Shoshana Felman and Dori Laub, Testimony: Crises of Witnessing in Literature, Psychoanalysis,
and History.
-Laub, "A Event Without a Witness: Truth, Testimony, and Survival," 75-92
Dori Laub, "Truth and Testimony: The Process and the Struggle." American Imago, 48, # 1 (Spring
1991), 75-91 (CD)
Cathy Caruth, "Introduction." American Imago, 48, # 1 (Spring 1991), 1-12