scholarly journals The Answer is Paracritical: Caribbean Literature and The Limits of Critique

Humanities ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 126
Author(s):  
Jay Rajiva
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Reader Response ◽  
Caribbean Literature ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Reading Experience ◽  
Black Art ◽  
Caribbean Art ◽  
Modes Of Engagement ◽  
Academic Discourses

I argue that both Rita Felski’s postcritical model (as articulated in The Limits of Critique) and its academic reception are made possible only by ignoring or erasing African-American and Afro-Caribbean modes of engagement with art that predate and complicate the critical-postcritical binary. To counteract the vanguardism of this trend in literary studies, I pair Caribbean philosopher-poet Edouard Glissant’s meditation on the origins of Creole speech as an indirect language of “detour” with Nathaniel Mackey’s theorizing of black art as “paracritical”—a mode that assimilates performance and critique, language and metalanguage, and that sits adjacent to (and not against or behind) traditionally academic discourses of engaging with literature. If Glissant provides the cultural and philosophical frame for an Afro-Caribbean way of reading literature, Mackey supplies the artistic metaphor par excellence of the paracritical hinge, voiced in the idioms of jazz and blues. Finally, I examine how Glissant and Mackey’s ideas find formal and aesthetic expression in Trinidadian-Canadian author Dionne Brand’s 2005 novel What We All Long For, paying attention to the reader response engendered by the adjacencies of violence, empowerment, possibility, and desire in the novel. In order to analyze What We All Long For, we must promote the liveliness and vivacity of the reading experience and put the text under ethical scrutiny, evincing the paracritical faculty that Afro-Caribbean art demands: commingling the twin pleasures of reading and interpretation, establishing a counter-hegemonic model of literary engagement that implicates the reader without stripping away reading’s pleasure.

scholarly journals Powerful Prose

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Reader Response ◽  
Literary Fiction ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
Long Term Effects ◽  
Reader Response Theory ◽  
Reading Experience ◽  
Reader Responses ◽  
Short And Long Term ◽  
Psychological Features

What makes a reading experience »powerful«? This volume brings together literary scholars, linguists, and empirical researchers to elucidate the effects and reader responses to investigate just that. The thirteen contributions theorize this widely-used, but to date insufficiently studied notion, and provide insights into the therefore still mysterious-seeming power of literary fiction. The collection investigates a variety of stylistic as well as readerly and psychological features responsible for short- and long-term effects - topics of great interest to those interested or specialized in literary studies and narratology, (cognitive) stylistics, empirical literary studies and reader response theory.

scholarly journals Black Lives Matter in Brother: A Postcolonial Perspective

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Eman Hussam
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Black People ◽  
Postcolonial Studies ◽  
Caribbean Literature ◽  
Black Diaspora ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Black Lives Matter ◽  
White Males ◽  
White Person

This study aims to examine how the lives of blacks are reduced and eliminated in Brother (2017) by David Chariandy. Black Lives Matter is a hash tag that appears after the killing of Trayvon Martin (17 years old African American) in 2012 by the savage hands of George Zimmerman (white person). This hash-tag has become a social movement that calls for equality in order to stop the violence against black people because their live is as valuable as white’s. The movement comes into being to highlight the “hypocritical democracy in service to the white males whose freedom are openly depended upon the oppression of blacks” (Lebron, 2017, P. 1). Those who have started this movement try to redeem a state and its arbitrary actions against black who are exterminated since the slavery. Alicia Graza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi have established this movement to reveal the suffering of the blacks who have no rights to live their life. Chariandy is a Canadian writer who specialized in Caribbean literature, black diaspora, and postcolonial studies. The novel is analyzed through Kimberlé Crenshaw’s concept (intersectionality) to show how the race, gender, and class are intersecting together to emphasize how the human beings will be treated accordingly.

scholarly journals “Looking ‘Foreword’ to Milton in Toni Morrison’s Paradise”

Religions ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 562
Author(s):  
Reginald A. Wilburn
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Literary Criticism ◽  
John Milton ◽  
Paradise Lost ◽  
American Studies ◽  
17Th Century ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Literary Influence ◽  
Reading Experience

Prior to the 2014 republication of Toni Morrison’s, Paradise, the novelist had not published any commentary about the role of literary influence John Milton might have had on her fictional writings. In a foreword to the republication of her 1997 novel, Morrison offers her first published acknowledgement of Milton’s influence on any work in her canon. My essay contends this Miltonic revelation constitutes a groundbreaking event in literary criticism. I explore the critical significance of this revelation by explicating the foreword, Milton’s significance within it, and its implications for reading the 17th-century epic writer’s (in)visible influential presence throughout Paradise. Placing particular emphasis on the interpretive significance of Morrison’s womanist critique of Milton’s portrayal of Eve, my essay turns to a focus on the Convent women as interrogated replicas of the first mother presented in Paradise Lost. This analysis of the novel enlarges the grounds of contention in Milton and African American studies, providing a richer interpretive reading experience that has never been cited or examined in existing literary criticism prior to now.

scholarly journals The Relevance of the Reading Process in the Context of Estonian Literary Criticism

2020 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 332-347
Author(s):  
Susanna Soosaar
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Reader Response ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
Reading Process ◽  
Reading Experience ◽  
Time Reading ◽  
Anglo American ◽  
Reading Response ◽  
Estonian Language

The importance of the reading experience has been accepted in literary studies ever since the advent of reading-response theories in the 1970s-1980s. Several notable scholars have stressed that meaning is created through the interaction between reader and text, highlighting the significance of the reader. Even though the main principles of reader-response have become commonplace, for some time, reading theories remained relatively stagnant. In the 2000s, however, the topic of reading was rediscovered as new perspectives for examining the reading experience and the reader’s relationship with the text were offered. These new theories shed new light on the figure of the reader and on the work that goes into the process of reading. While the question of the experience of reading has been under discussion in the Anglo-American context, it has never been widely discussed in Estonia. The purpose of this article is to give an overview of well-known reader-response theories that became popular in the 1970s. In addition, examples of a renewed interest in reader-response theories in recent decades are presented. Finally, the article will also examine how Estonian-language literary criticism has engaged with reader-response theories.

Tanggapan dan Horizon Harapan Pembaca terhadap Le Petit Prince Karya A. De Saint-Exupery: Tinjauan Resepsi Sastra

Metahumaniora ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 300
Author(s):  
Tania Intan ◽  
Trisna Gumilar
Keyword(s):  
Research Data ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Data Sources ◽  
The Internet ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Literary Reading ◽  
Reading Experience ◽  
Reader Responses ◽  
Qualitative Descriptive ◽  
Research Type

AbstrakPenelitian ini bertujuan untuk (1) mendekripsikan tanggapan pembaca terhadap novel Le Petit Prince (2) mendeskripsikan horizon harapan pembaca terhadap novel Le Petit Prince, dan (3) mendeskripsikan faktor-faktor penyebab perbedaan tanggapan dan horizon harapan pembaca. Penelitian ini termasuk jenis penelitian deskriptif kualitatif. Data penelitian berupa teks yang memuat tanggapan pembaca novel Le Petit Princeyang terdiri dari 20 orang, sedangkan sumber datanya berupa artikel dan makalah yang dimuat di media massa cetak dan elektronik termasuk internet. Instrumen penelitian berupa seperangkat konsep tentang pembaca, tanggapan pembaca, dan horizon harapan. Teknik pengumpulan data dengan cara observasi dan data dianalisis dengan menggunakan teknik deskriptif kualitatif. Hasil penelitian yang didapat sebagai berikut. (1) Seluruh pembaca menanggapi atau menilai positif unsur tema, alur, tokoh, latar, sudut pandang, gaya bahasa, teknik penceritaan, bahasa, dan isi novel Le Petit Prince. (2) Harapan sebagian besar pembaca sebelum membaca novel Le Petit Prince sesuai dengan kenyataan ke sembilan unsur di dalam novel Le Petit Prince, sehingga pembaca dapat dengan mudah menerima dan memberikan pujian pada novel Le Petit Prince. (3) Faktor penyebab perbedaan tanggapan dan horizon harapan pembaca selain perbedaan stressing unsur yang ditanggapi juga karena perbedaan pengetahuan tentang sastra, pengetahuan tentang kehidupan, dan pengalaman membaca karya sastra.Kata kunci: tanggapan pembaca, horizon harapan, Le Petit PrinceAbstractThis study aims to (1) describe reader’s responses to the novel Le Petit Prince (2) to describe the reader's expectations horizon of Le Petit Prince's novel, and (3) to describe the factors causing differences in responses and the horizon of readers' expectations. This research is a descriptive qualitative research type. The research data consist of a set of paragraphs that contains readers' responses to Le Petit Prince's novel, while the data sources are articles and papers published in print and electronic mass media including the internet. The research instruments are a set of reader concepts, reader responses, and expectations horizon. The technique of collecting data is observation and data are analyzed by using qualitative descriptive technique. The results obtained are as follow: (1) All readers respond and valuethe theme elements,plots, characters, background, point of view, language, titles, storytelling techniques, language, and extrinsic novel Le Petit Prince positively. (2) The expectations of most readers before reading Le Petit Prince's novels are in accordance with the nine facts in Le Petit Prince's novel, so readers can easily accept and give prise to Le Petit Prince's novel. (3) Factors causing differences in responses and horizon of readers' expectations other than the stressing differences of the elements being addressed also due to the differences in knowledge of literature, knowledge of life and literary reading experience. Keywords: readers responses, expectations horizon, Le Petit Prince

Reading Beyond the Code

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Relevance Theory ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Human Communication ◽  
Communicative Acts ◽  
Face To Face ◽  
Code Model ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Central Claim

This book explores the value for literary studies of relevance theory, an inferential approach to communication in which the expression and recognition of intentions plays a major role. Drawing on a wide range of examples from lyric poetry and the novel, nine of the ten chapters are written by literary specialists and use relevance theory both as an overall framework and as a resource for detailed analysis. The final chapter, written by the co-founder of relevance theory, reviews the issues addressed by the volume and explores their implications for cognitive theories of how communicative acts are interpreted in context. Originally designed to explain how people understand each other in everyday face-to-face exchanges, relevance theory—described in an early review by a literary scholar as ‘the makings of a radically new theory of communication, the first since Aristotle’s’—sheds light on the whole spectrum of human modes of communication, including literature in the broadest sense. Reading Beyond the Code is unique in using relevance theory as a prime resource for literary study, and is also the first to apply the model to a range of phenomena widely seen as supporting an ‘embodied’ conception of cognition and language where sensorimotor processes play a key role. This broadened perspective serves to enhance the value for literary studies of the central claim of relevance theory: that the ‘code model’ is fundamentally inadequate to account for human communication, and in particular for the modes of communication that are proper to literature.

Responses of Arab teachers of Hebrew in Israel to an Israeli novel on Jewish-Arab relations

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Shai Rudin
Keyword(s):  
Boarding School ◽  
Educational Systems ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Reading Experience ◽  
Political Views ◽  
Arab Students ◽  
Complex Integration ◽  
Education College ◽  
Arab Sector

Purpose This study aims to examine the responses and perceptions of Israeli Arab teachers toward multicultural and educational issues concerning Jewish–Arab relations. Design/methodology/approach This study is a qualitative research. The study included 44 novice Arab teachers, who teach Hebrew in the Arab sector and are currently studying toward their masters’ degree at a teacher education college in northern Israel. The teachers were asked to read the novel Nadia by Galila Ron Feder–Amit. Published in 1985, the novel describes the complex integration of Nadia, an Arab village girl, into a Jewish boarding school, and it is narrated in first person. After having read the novel, the teachers were requested to answer the writing task, which addressed the character of the protagonist, the issue of teaching the novel in the Jewish and Arabic educational systems and the anticipated responses of Jewish and Arab students to the novel. Findings Phenomenological analysis of the teachers’ responses found that the reading experience was complex and resulted in a variety of responses toward the protagonist. Some were based on identification and appreciation, while others on criticism and judgment of the heroine’s restraint vis-a-vis the racism that she was experiencing. However, most of the teachers demonstrated moral courage and thought that the novel should be taught, as they viewed it as a bridge leading to understanding between the two nations. The teachers anticipated conflicting responses of Jewish and Arab students to the novel, according to the students’ political views and values. Practical implications These findings indicate that the educational system should include political texts relating to the Jewish–Arab schism, especially texts that voice the Palestinian narrative. This view differs from the current situation in both sectors, whereby the tendency is to avoid political texts while ignoring the Palestinian narrative. Originality/value The study shows that the reading experience of a political novel affords various and often contrasting responses with the teachers facing the didactic challenges. The teachers who participated in the study anticipated complexity of the reading and teaching process, yet were not deterred by it, particularly in view of the novel’s messages – striving to understand the “other” and to bridge a discourse between the nations.

Black Art: Ancestral Legacy: The African Impulse in African-American Art

African Arts ◽  
1992 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 28
Author(s):  
Freida High W. Tesfagiorgis ◽  
Robert V. Rozelle ◽  
Alvia J. Wardlaw ◽  
Maureen A. McKenna
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
American Art ◽  
African American Art ◽  
Black Art

COMPARATIVE LITERATURE: EAST AND WEST STUDIES

2021 ◽  
Vol 02 (09) ◽  
pp. 8-14
Author(s):  
Aziza Komilovna Akhmedova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Literature ◽  
Professional Ethics ◽  
Research Work ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
The Novel ◽  
World Science ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
Aesthetic Ideal ◽  
The Ideal

The article analyzes the results of the research on the representation of the aesthetic ideal through the image of the ideal hero in two national literatures. For research purposes, attention was paid to highlighting the category of the ideal hero as an expression of the author's aesthetic views. In Sinclair Lewis’s “Arrowsmith” and Pirimkul Kodirov's “The Three Roots”, the protagonists artistically reflect the authors' views on truth, virtue, and beauty. In these novels, professional ethics is described as a high noble value. The scientific novelty of the research work includes the following: in the evolution of western and eastern poetic thought, in the context of the novel genre, the skill, common and distinctive aspects of the creation of an ideal hero were revealed by synthesis of effective methods in world science with literary criteria in the history of eastern and western literary studies, in the example of Sinclair Lewis and Pirimkul Kodirov.

Biblical Criticism and the Challenge of Postmodernism

1995 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Terence J. Keegan
Keyword(s):  
Reader Response ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
Biblical Criticism ◽  
The Church ◽  
The Way

AbstractPostmodernism involves recognizing that the objective certitude sought by modern scientific and humanistic methods is not possible. Deconstruction paved the way for postmodernism in literary studies, but it is most evident in the work of some reader-response critics. Many reader-response critics utilize the indeterminacy of postmodern insight but are hesitant to accept its subjectivist implications. Biblical scholars tend to prefer methods that yield verifiable results, but some have successfully used postmodern approaches. Christian scholars, though committed to an idea of transcendence to which postmodernism seems to deny access, can still profitably use postmodern approaches but must be prepared to deal with such questions as inspiration and the relation of scholarship to the Church.

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