Practicing Literary Theory in the Middle Ages

Practicing Literary Theory in the Middle Ages
Author: Eleanor Johnson
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 265
Release: 2013-05-11
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 022601584X

Literary scholars often avoid the category of the aesthetic in discussions of ethics, believing that purely aesthetic judgments can vitiate analyses of a literary work’s sociopolitical heft and meaning. In Practicing Literary Theory in the Middle Ages, Eleanor Johnson reveals that aesthetics—the formal aspects of literary language that make it sense-perceptible—are indeed inextricable from ethics in the writing of medieval literature. Johnson brings a keen formalist eye to bear on the prosimetric form: the mixing of prose with lyrical poetry. This form descends from the writings of the sixth-century Christian philosopher Boethius—specifically his famous prison text, Consolation of Philosophy—to the late medieval English tradition. Johnson argues that Boethius’s text had a broad influence not simply on the thematic and philosophical content of subsequent literary writing, but also on the specific aesthetic construction of several vernacular traditions. She demonstrates the underlying prosimetric structures in a variety of Middle English texts—including Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde and portions of the Canterbury Tales, Thomas Usk’s Testament of Love, John Gower’s Confessio amantis, and Thomas Hoccleve’s autobiographical poetry—and asks how particular formal choices work, how they resonate with medieval literary-theoretical ideas, and how particular poems and prose works mediate the tricky business of modeling ethical transformation for a readership.

Practising Theory and Reading Literature

Practising Theory and Reading Literature
Author: Raman Selden
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 219
Release: 2016-04-22
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1134962665

Practising Theory and Reading Literature provides an accessible introduction to the study of contemporary literary theories and their applications to a range of literary texts. This is an elementary introduction where the emphasis is on practice, and in this respect it complements A Reader's Guide to Contemporary Literary Theory.

Affect Theory and Literary Critical Practice

Affect Theory and Literary Critical Practice
Author: Stephen Ahern
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 261
Release: 2018-12-31
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 3319972685

Affect Theory and Literary Critical Practice develops new approaches to reading literature that are informed by the insights of scholars working in affect studies across many disciplines, with essays that consider works of fiction, drama, poetry and memoir ranging from the medieval to the postmodern. While building readings of representative texts, contributors reflect on the value of affect theory to literary critical practice, asking: what explanatory power is affect theory affording me here as a critic? what can the insights of the theory help me do with a text? Contributors work to incorporate lines of theory not always read together, accounting for the affective intensities that circulate through texts and readers and tracing the operations of affectively charged social scripts. Drawing variously on queer, feminist and critical race theory and informed by ecocritical and new materialist sensibilities, essays in the volume share a critical practice founded in an ethics of relation and contribute to an emerging postcritical moment.

Theory of Media Literacy

Theory of Media Literacy
Author: W. James Potter
Publisher: SAGE Publications
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2004-04-29
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1452245401

Our society has become characterized by aggressive media. Information is constantly at our fingertips – whether it be through the books, newspapers, and magazines we read, the television we watch, the radio stations to which we listen, or the computers that connect us to the world in a matter of seconds. We can try to limit our media exposure, but it is impossible to avoid all media messages. As a result, we psychologically protect ourselves by automatically processing the media to which we are exposed. Theory of Media Literacy: A Cognitive Approach comprehensively explains how we absorb the flood of information in our media-saturated society and examines how we often construct faulty meanings from those messages. In this book, author W. James Potter enlightens readers on the tasks of information processing. By building on a foundation of principles about how humans think, Theory of Media Literacy examines decisions about filtering messages, standard schema to match meaning, and higher level skills to construct meaning. A central theme of Potter′s theory is the locus that governs the degree to which a person is media literate. The locus is enriched by developing skills as well as good knowledge structures on five topics: media effects, media content, media industries, real world parameters, and the self. Key Features Presents the first social scientific theory of the process of media literacy Explores a broad range of literature on media literacy written during the past two decades Focuses on how the human mind works, especially in this mass media-saturated society Theory of Media Literacy is an essential resource to a wide audience within the media discipline. The book provides empirical researchers with direction to test the theory and extend our understanding of how the media affect individuals and society. Practitioners will find it helpful in developing strategies to achieve goals and, at the same time, avoid high risks of negative effects. In addition, new scholars will find it to be an excellent introduction to various media literacy research.

Myth and Literature

Myth and Literature
Author: John B. Vickery
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
Total Pages: 32
Release: 1969-01-01
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9780803252080

This collection of thirty-four major essays devoted to the theories, methods, and problems of myth criticism offers a convenient and substantial introduction to one of the most distinctive trends in contemporary literary study. The essays (many of them previously uncollected) are arranged to lead from general considerations to analyses of specific authors. The four Part I selections constitute an informal survey of the views of myth and ritual taken by disciplines other than literature. In Part II the first six essays relate the concept of myth and ritual to general literary theory, while the final three evaluate the uses of myth in critical theory and practice. The twenty-one Part III essays, which apply myth criticism to individual literary works or authors, afford a representative sampling of the mythopoeic patterns discerned in literature from Home to Faulkner. Among the contributors are: David Bidney, Gäza R¢heim, Joseph Campbell, Clyde Kluckhohn, Stanley Hyman, Philip Wheelwright, Richard Chase, Harold Watts, Northrop Frye, Andrew Lytle, Philip Rahv, Francis Fergusson, Marvin Magalaner, John Lydenberg, and Harry Slochower.

Theorising Media and Practice

Theorising Media and Practice
Author: Birgit Bräuchler
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Total Pages: 364
Release: 2010-11-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1845458540

Although practice theory has been a mainstay of social theory for nearly three decades, so far it has had very limited impact on media studies. This book draws on the work of practice theorists such as Wittgenstein, Foucault, Bourdieu, Barth and Schatzki and rethinks the study of media from the perspective of practice theory. Drawing on ethnographic case studies from places such as Zambia, India, Hong Kong, the United States, Britain, Norway and Denmark, the contributors address a number of important themes: media as practice; the interlinkage between media, culture and practice; the contextual study of media practices; and new practices of digital production. Collectively, these chapters make a strong case for the importance of theorising the relationship between media and practice and thereby adding practice theory as a new strand to the study of anthropology of media.

Media, Society, World

Media, Society, World
Author: Nick Couldry
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 329
Release: 2013-08-29
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0745680763

Media are fundamental to our sense of living in a social world. Since the beginning of modernity, media have transformed the scale on which we act as social beings. And now in the era of digital media, media themselves are being transformed as platforms, content, and producers multiply. Yet the implications of social theory for understanding media and of media for rethinking social theory have been neglected; never before has it been more important to understand those implications. This book takes on this challenge. Drawing on Couldry's fifteen years of work on media and social theory, this book explores how questions of power and ritual, capital and social order, and the conduct of political struggle, professional competition, and everyday life, are all transformed by today's complex combinations of traditional and 'new' media. In the concluding chapters Couldry develops a framework for global comparative research into media and for thinking collectively about the ethics and justice of our lives with media. The result is a book that is both a major intervention in the field and required reading for all students of media and sociology.

Critical Theory and Social Media

Critical Theory and Social Media
Author: Thomas Allmer
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 260
Release: 2015-04-10
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1317612310

Social media platforms such as Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter are enormously popular: they are continuously ranked among the most frequently accessed websites worldwide. However there are as yet few studies which combine critical theoretical and empirical research in the context of digital and social media. The aim of this book is to study the constraints and emancipatory potentials of new media and to assess to what extent digital and social media can contribute to strengthen the idea of the communication and network commons, and a commons-based information society. Based on a critical theory and political economy approach, this book explores: the foundational concepts of a critical theory of media, technology, and society users’ knowledge, attitudes, and practices towards the antagonistic character and the potentials and risks of social media whether technological and/or social changes are required in order to bring about real social media and human liberation. Critical Theory and Social Media examines both academic discourse on, and users’ responses to, new media, making it a valuable tool for international scholars and students of sociology, media and communication studies, social theory, new media, and information society studies. Its clear and interesting insights into corporate practices of the global new media sector will mean that it appeals to critical social media users around the world.

Theory Into Practice

Theory Into Practice
Author: Ann B. Dobie
Publisher: Cengage Learning
Total Pages: 376
Release: 2011-01-03
Genre: Criticism
ISBN: 9781111342081

Beginning with more accessible critical approaches and gradually introducing more challenging critical perspectives, THEORY INTO PRACTICE, International Edition provides extensive step-by-step guidance for writing literary analyses. This brief, practical introduction to literary theory explores core theories in a unique chronological format and includes an anthology of relevant fiction, poetry, and nonfiction to help bring those theories to life. Remarkably readable and engaging, the text makes even complex concepts manageable for those beginning to think about literary theory, and example analyses for each type of criticism show how real students have applied the theories to works included in the anthology. Now updated with the latest scholarship, including a full discussion of Ecocriticism and increased emphasis on American multicultural approaches, THEORY INTO PRACTICE provides an essential foundation for thoughtful and effective literary analysis.