Beginning Theory : An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory

by Peter Barry

ISBN13:

9780719043260

ISBN10:

0719043263

Format:

Trade Paper

Pub. Date:

10/15/1995

Publisher(s):

Manchester University Press

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Summary

In this second edition ofBeginning Theory, the variety of approaches, theorists, and technical language is lucidly and expertly unraveled and explained, and allows readers to develop their own ideas once first principles have been grasped. Expanded and updated from the original edition first published in 1995, Peter Barry has incorporated all of the recent developments in literary theory, adding two new chapters covering the emergent Eco-criticism and the re-emerging Narratology.

Acknowledgements

Introduction

(1)

About this book

(5)

Approaching theory

(3)

Stop and think: Reviewing your study of literature to date

(1)

-- My own stock-taking

(2)

Theory before `theory' -- liberal humanism

(28)

The history of English studies

(5)

Stop and think:

(5)

Ten tenets of liberal humanism

(5)

Literary theorising from Aristotle to Leavis -- some key moments

(10)

Liberal humanism in practice

(1)

The transition to `theory'

(2)

Some recurrent ideas in critical theory

(2)

Selected reading

(3)

Structuralism

(22)

Structuralist chickens and liberal humanist eggs

(2)

Signs of the fathers -- Saussure

(5)

Stop and think

(1)

The scope of structuralism

(3)

What structuralist critics do

(1)

Structuralist criticism: examples

(10)

Stop and think

(2)

Stop and think

(2)

Stop and think

(3)

Selected reading

(1)

Post-structuralism and deconstruction

(20)

Some theoretical differences between structuralism and post-structuralism

(4)

Post-structuralism - life on a decentred planet

(5)

Stop and think

(2)

Structuralism and post-structuralism - some practical differences

(3)

What post-structuralist critics do

(1)

Deconstruction: an example

(6)

Selected reading

(2)

Postmodernism

(15)

What is postmodernism? What was modernism?

(4)

`Landmarks' in postmodernism: Habermas and Baudrillard

(6)

Stop and think

(1)

What postmodernist critics do

(1)

Postmodernist criticism: an example

(3)

Selected reading

(2)

Psychoanalytic criticism

(25)

Introduction

(2)

How Freudian interpretation works

(4)

Stop and think

101

(1)

Freud and evidence

102

(3)

What Freudian psychoanalytic critics do

105

(1)

Freudian psychoanlytic criticism: examples

105

(3)

Lacan

108

(7)

What Lacanian critics do

115

(1)

Lacanian criticism: an example

115

(3)

Selected reading

118

(3)

Feminist criticism

121

(18)

Feminism and feminist criticism

121

(3)

Feminist criticism and the role of theory

124

(2)

Feminist criticism and language

126

(4)

Feminist criticism and psychoanalysis

130

(4)

Stop and think

133

(1)

What feminist critics do

134

(1)

Feminist criticism: an example

134

(2)

Selected reading

136

(3)

Lesbian/gay criticism

139

(17)

Lesbian and gay theory

139

(1)

Lesbian feminism

140

(3)

Queer theory

143

(5)

What lesbian/gay criticis do

148

(2)

Stop and think

149

(1)

Lesbian/gay criticism: an example

150

(3)

Selected reading

153

(3)

Marxist criticism

156

(16)

Beginnings and basics of Marxism

156

(2)

Marxist literary criticism: general

158

(1)

`Leninist' Marxist criticism

159

(2)

`Engelsian' Marxist criticism

161

(2)

The present: the influence of Althusser

163

(4)

Stop and think

166

(1)

What Marxist critics do

167

(1)

Marxist criticism: an example

168

(2)

Selected reading

170

(2)

New historicism and cultural materialism

172

(19)

New historicism

172

(2)

New and old historicisms - some differences

174

(1)

New historicism and Foucault

175

(2)

Advantages and disadvantages of new historicism

177

(2)

Stop and think

178

(1)

What new historicists do

179

(1)

New historicism: an example

179

(3)

Cultural materialism

182

(2)

How is cultural materialism different from new historicism?

184

(3)

Stop and think

186

(1)

What cultural materialist critics do

187

(1)

Cultural materialism: an example

187

(2)

Selected reading

189

(2)

Postcolonial criticism

191

(11)

Background

191

(2)

Postcolonial reading

193

(5)

Stop and think

197

(1)

What postcolonialist critics do

198

(1)

Postcolonialist criticism: an example

199

(1)

Selected reading

200

(2)

Stylistics

202

(18)

Stylistics, a theory or a practice?

000

(204)

A brief historical account: from rhetoric, to philology, to linguistics, to stylistics, to new stylistics

204

(3)

How does stylistics differ from standard close reading?

207

(2)

The ambitions of stylistics

209

(4)

Stop and think

212

(1)

What stylistic critics do

213

(1)

Stylistics: examples

214

(4)

Selected reading

218

(2)

Appendices

220

(7)

1 `The oval portrait'

220

(3)

Edgar Allan Poe

2 `A refusal to mourn'

223

(1)

Dylan Thomas

3 `The castaway'

224

(3)

William Cowper

Where do we go from here? Further reading

227

(6)

General guides

227

(1)

Reference books

227

(1)

General readers

228

(1)

Applying critical theory: twelve examples

229

(2)

Against theory

231

(2)

Index

233

Beginning Theory : An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory

9780719043260

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Table of Contents