How to Read an Academic Article

Introduction:
 Academic articles are written by scholars to share ideas within specific disciplines.
 Scholars assume readers possess specialized background knowledge and jargon.
 Students may find academic texts challenging but are supported in their understanding.
 Academic reading requires patience, practice, and critical analysis to understand and engage with scholarly
texts effectively.

Approaching a Scholarly Text:

1. Finding the Claim:
 Look for the author's original contribution to the subject matter.
 Pay attention to subtle rhetorical signs indicating the main argument.
 Questions to guide:
 What question does the author imply?
 Where is the primary argument stated?
 Why is the argument significant? What context is provided?

2. Assessing the Strength/Validity of the Argument:

 Close reading is necessary to evaluate the argument's effectiveness.
 Consider how evidence is presented and if counterarguments are addressed.
 Questions to guide:
 What evidence supports the author's position? Analyze its nature and persuasiveness.
 How are counterarguments handled? Were they convincingly refuted?
 Assess the overall effectiveness of the article, including readability and relevance.
3. Effectiveness
 What were the strengths of the article?
 Was it difficult to read and understand? If so, why? If not, why not?
 Were you able to follow the moves of the article from thesis to evidence, for example?
 Did the structure of sentences and paragraphs and the overall organization guide you and
 help you follow the author's intent?
 Did all the material seem relevant to the points made?
Conclusion:
 Mastering academic reading takes time and practice.
 Encouragement to be patient with oneself and strive for improvement.
 Improving critical reading skills can enhance writing abilities.
WHAT IS LITERARY THEORY

Introduction to Literary Theory

 Literary theory is a set of diverse answers to questions about the meaning, function, and effect of a text.
 Each school of literary theory represents a group of thinkers sharing particular approaches to understanding
the world.
o Example: Notable theorists offer varied responses to a simple question like "Why did the chicken
cross the road?" illustrating the diversity of perspectives in literary theory.

Nature of Literary Theory

 Literary theories provide unexpected and complex insights into texts, offering different perspectives on what
a literary text is, its issues, and its writing style.
 Early theories like formalism and structuralism focus on language and reading practices, while
poststructuralism and postcolonial theory engage with broader concerns.
 Some theories, like psychoanalytic and Marxist theory, stem from other disciplines but are applied to
literature.

1
Interconnection with Critical Theory
 Literary theory is often synonymous with critical theory, offering tools not only for interpreting literature but
also for analyzing broader questions across disciplines.

Scope and Evolution of Literary Theory

 Literary theory encompasses a range of ideas from semiotics, philosophy, politics, and psychoanalysis,
evolving to include cultural interpretations.
 The evolution reflects changes in reading practices, becoming more contextually aware since the 1940s.

Defining Literary Theory

 Literary theory includes texts or ideas associated with literature but not exclusively concerned with it, shaping
literary analysis.
 encompasses a wide array of perspectives and influences from various disciplines.

Utility of Literary Theory

 Literary theory facilitates new interpretations of texts by providing tools to analyze language, form, and themes
such as gender, sexuality, race, and class.
 It complements personal responses to texts, expanding and supporting interpretations.
 Theory should not overshadow the discussion of the text but inform it, balancing personal engagement with
theoretical insights.

Role in Originality
 Literary theory enhances originality in interpreting literature by offering numerous texts to incorporate into one's
response.
 Despite initial challenges, literary theory opens doors to illuminating fields of knowledge, enabling unique and
compelling interpretations.

Literary Theory: An Introduction by Terry Eagleton

Overview of the Book
 explores the evolution of literary theory, focusing on the development from before the Romantic movement
to the post-structuralism of the 20th century.
 emphasizes the interconnectedness of literature with the public sphere, arguing that understanding a period
requires engagement with its literature and vice versa.

Defining Literature
 Eagleton challenges the notion of a singular definition of literature, highlighting its fluidity shaped by people,
opinions, and social constructs.
 He explores various definitions proposed by different discourses, questioning and deconstructing each in
turn.

Literature and Power Structures

 Eagleton illustrates how literature is inseparable from dominant power structures in society, examining its
history from Romanticism to post-structuralism.
 He critiques the Romantic view of literature as a product of creative imagination, arguing that art and artists
are embedded within society, blurring the gap between vision and reality.

Russian Formalism's Perspective

 Eagleton discusses the Formalist perspective, which prioritizes language, structure, and form over content in
defining literature.
 He critiques this limited definition, asserting that language is complex and manipulated according to readers'
needs, as exemplified in the poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins.

2
The Role of Reception
 Eagleton emphasizes the significance of the reader's perspective, background, and context in interpreting a
text.
 He argues that readers ultimately hold authority in interpreting texts, challenging the notion of fixed literary
theories and definitions.

Political Nature of Literary Theory

 Eagleton contends that literary theory is inherently political, highlighting biases even within post-structuralist
theories like Deconstruction.
 He concludes that literature is too idiosyncratic to be definitively defined, emphasizing its fluid and subjective
nature.

Basic Concepts:
Mimesis, Author, Interpretation, Canon

Origins of Western Literary Criticism

ANCIENT GREECE
- 1st written texts – 6th, 5th c. BC
- Prose literature developed – 5th, 4th BC
- 4th C. BC – 1st Greek kritai (judges, critics)

IMPORTANT QUESTIONS
- Fiction/world relation:
What is fictional representation & how does it differ from the real world?
Provides focus on the difference btw fiction and reality

- Fiction/truth relation:
Can fiction tell the truth? What is the nature of fictional truth?
Plato says it cannot tell the truth.

- Text/audience (reader) relation:

How does the reader or audience affect the reception of artistic texts?

- Value of lit. texts

Who decides which texts are good, on what grounds?
We need clear criteria in order to assess something

- Definition of literary text: aesthetic object vs. socio-political discourse

aesthetic object or socio- political discourse?

MIMESIS: PLATO
- Athenian philosopher – the 4th c. BC
- 1st to examine lit. texts of the Greek tradition
- Terms:
- MIMESIS (i.e. miming, imitation) = artistic representation (visual/verbal) of the world; used the word
in the meaning that could be captured in the word representation
- Fiction/world relation; fiction/truth relation
- AUDIENCE’S MIMESIS – understands this more in line with miming/imitating – text/audience
(reader) relation

3
 - What is the nature of this artistic representation?
- Lit. does not depict reality but only how reality appears to us
- Reality and fiction are ontologically different (have 2 different essences) because reality is something
else
- The nature of artistic representation is a subjective and expressive process wherein artists, through
deliberate choices of form, style, and symbolism, convey their unique perspectives and emotions,
inviting viewers to interpret and derive meaning based on their own experiences and cultural
contexts.

- Plato’s understanding of reality

- There is a vast gap between mimesis and true reality- literary texts offer nothing but fantasy and
illusion.
- True reality – resides in a metaphysical, divine sphere above and beyond the human sphere
- Our reality – the physical world = an imperfect copy of an ideal divine world of ideas/ideal forms 
world of appearances (receive it through senses)
- Allegory of the cave

- Plato’s understanding of the work of art and artist

- Artistic mimesis represents things in the realm of appearance – not true reality
- Artist’s work – twice removed from the world of truth and ideal perfection
- Vast gap between mimesis and true reality- literary texts offer nothing but fantasy and illusion.
- Plato evaluates literary text in terms of truth and falsehood, right and wrong. Art is not separate from
the socio-political sphere.

- Philosopher vs. artist

- Philosophers - use logic and reason to discover divine truth
- Artist
- evoke emotions by making representations of the world appearance
- Do not represent the truth but a false view of the world

Plato’s audience’s mimesis

Work of art (e.g. drama) – encourages audience to sympathize/identify with a lit. character

Internalization of “alien” voices and the value systems that they represent

The active imitation in real life of the false system of beliefs

Plato’s understanding of literature as a socio-political discourse

- Creates a basis for moral criticism
- Focus o content is more important than form (aesthetic form)
- The questions about good/bad influence of the ideas/values represented in the text

MIMESIS: ARTISTOTLE
- Follower of Plato (4th c. bc)
- 1st work devoted fully to literary criticism – poetics
- (in Poetics) – separates literature from ethics and politics
- Literature should be evaluated primarily in aesthetic terms.
- Terms:
- mimesis – fictional rep. of the world. Fiction/world relation
- Catharsis –
- (purgation, purification)
- audience sympathise with the hero but does not identify with him  Text/ audience relation

4
UNDERSTANDING OF REALITY
- The ever-changing world of appearances and perceptions; the ordinary world of things and events
- Philosopher’s truth – resides in discovering the rules and principles that govern how things work and take on
meaning

NATURE OF ARTISTIC REPRESENTATION

- Aristotle articulates the notion of fiction and fictionality for the first time in Western thinking.
- NOT a copy of the world, but a fictitious representation that features characters and events that resemble
those in the real world
- Inhabits an aesthetic sphere that has its own rules and standards
- question good/bad – relevant only in respect to lit. technique/form
- Literature – not treated as a political mode of discourse

UNDERSTANDING OF FICTION/TRUTH RELATION:

- Artistic truth
- Art isn’t a simple copy of life: art and life (the world) occupy separate realms
- Art doesn’t lie, it reveals truth

UNDERSTANDING OF THE ROLE OF ARTIST IN SOCIETY

- Philosopher and artists both impose order on what may seem as a chaotic world: events, phenomena,
sensory experiences
- Philosopher – rational, scientific thinking/categorization
- Artist (e.g. in literature) – a narrative order (beginning, middle, end) – organizes events of the world
- Artists – important for society
- Creative order and system  help us find pleasure in the representation of an understandable and
meaningful reality

ARISTOTLE’S CATHARSIS (purgation, purification

- Audience sympathies with the characters
- Intellectual clarification- audience learns something about humanity and learning procedures pleasure –
cognitive experience
- Purgation of emotions – a release of strong feelings that leaves us feeling drained but also relieved
(pleasure) – emotional experience

II. AUTHOR: EXPRESSIVITY – the romantic theory of authorship (Wordsworth, Coleridge) – 18 th, 19th
century

Basic idea = literary work is fundamentally expressive of the author

- Rejected at the beginning of the 20th century, lit. schools said it wasn’t a scientific way to read texts

1. Communication (author/reader)
- effected by means of translation or emission from inside (the author’s mind) to outside (in language towards
an interlocutor)
- Wordsworth: a poet is a man speaking to man; the importance of the language of common speech

2. language is a copy of the thought or the feeling

- literature can capture truthfully through language the pre-linguistic content (an idea or an emotion) of the
author’s mind
- many different words to capture the feeling of happiness (romantic writers believed that they could choose
the perfect word to capture that emotion and that the readers would then feel it)
3. language is made up of 2 intimately connected elements
- an original abstracts sense or meaning and its formulation in words

5
DOMINANT CONCEPTS
- confession – the revelation of an authentic voice, identity, experience
- composition – the importance of the immediacy and spontaneity of poetic creation, rep. of the poet’s mind
in the moment of creation
- Inspiration – poetry arrives spontaneously there is no effort of composition, poet inspired by divine forces:
poetry = kind of religion
- Imagination – the special part of the poet’s min inspired at the moment of composition. According to
Coleridge: imagination is a human version of the creative power of God – poet = creative genius

- Expressive theory of authorship reduces the text to no more than an index of the consciousness of the
authorial subject.
- Interpretation = an analysis of what the author meant to say, of authorial intention
- Strong criticism of this approach by 20th century theoreticians

III. INTERPRETATION: HERMENEUTICS

- Theory of interpretation (origins 18th and 19th c.) – interpretation of the Bible

What does it mean to ‘understand’ a text?

- comprehending its words, grasping the author's intended meaning, and making connections to personal
experiences while recognizing broader themes.
- The text on its own – or in its historical, biographical context, or should we measure it against contemporary
knowledge?

How can genuine understanding overcome the obstacles of both distance in historical time and often distance in
culture between the text and its reader?
- Genuine understanding overcomes historical and cultural distance by contextualization, empathy,
comparative analysis, critical thinking, and education, allowing readers to bridge gaps and appreciate the
text's nuances.

HERMENEUTICS IN THE 20TH CENTURY: INFLUENCED BY Hans-Georg Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur
- Developed their ideas from philosophy of Martin Heidegger (Being and Time (1927).
- difference btw understanding of natural sciences and understanding of literary texts
- Sciences do not present exclusive models of knowledge – they should not have sole authority as means of
truth over practical expertise or the arts
- Rejection of the inevitability of having a scientific method in the search for truth

Gadamer Truth and Method, 1960

‘When we are interpreting a text, it is not to prove ‘scientifically’ that this love poem belongs to the genre of love
poems, but to understand this love poem, on its own and in its unique relation to the common structure of love
poems.’

HERMENEUTIC APPROACH TO THE TEXT

- Hermeneutics is a process of a conversation with the text, not a process of objectifying the text
- Conversation depends on the presence/lack of a common horizon that we share w/ the text: a
shared language, mutual tradition, common set of interests and ideas
- if we deal w/ old texts, our horizon and the horizon of the text can be very different

ART and TRUTH:

- art is a mode of truth but what kind of truth?
- Artistic truth is not the text’s verifiable correspondence to some objectively given reality but
increases self-knowledge and insight on the part of the reader
- We should respond to the text as it were a partner in conversation with us.
- Important concept: common horizon

6
 FORMALISM
Historical Background
 Early 20th century saw a surge in interest in decadent and modernist poetry, influencing literary studies
worldwide.
 Formalism emerged in response to prevailing aesthetic movements, notably in Europe, while practical criticism
and new criticism took shape in Britain and the United States.

Textual Focus
 Formalists and new critics emphasized the importance of examining the text itself, disregarding external factors.
 T.S. Eliot stressed poetry's role as a form of artistry, minimizing the significance of personal emotions or authorial
identity.

Practical Criticism
 I. A. Richards advocated for analyzing poems without any prior knowledge of the author or historical context.
 His methodology, outlined in "Practical Criticism," encouraged students to interpret poems solely based on the
words present in the text.

New Criticism
 New critics like Ransom, Brooks, and Warren focused on analyzing the unique literary language of poetry.
 They emphasized avoiding paraphrasing to preserve the original literary qualities of the text.

Literary Fallacies
 The intentional fallacy, proposed by Wimsatt and Beardsley, rejects the idea of interpreting texts based on
authorial intentions.
 The affective fallacy cautions against relying on personal emotional responses to derive meaning from a text.

Continental Formalism
 Formalism originated in Russia, with scholars like Jakobson, Shklovsky, and Eikhenbaum exploring the unique
qualities of literary language.
 They introduced the concept of defamiliarization, suggesting that literature makes language 'strange' through
various literary devices.

Differences and Debates

 Formalism emphasizes form and rules, while new criticism delves into meanings and interpretations.
 Contemporary debates revolve around balancing close reading and contextual analysis.

Legacy and Impact

 Despite evolving theories, formalism and new criticism's focus on close reading remains important.
 Influences discussions on literature's relationship with socio-historical context.

NEW CRITICISM
 discussion begins with the influence of Matthew Arnold, especially his emphasis on culture and its role in
combating the societal challenges posed by urban, industrialized civilizations.

T.S. Eliot
 highlighted as a key figure who mediated Arnold's ideas into the new critical movements of the 20th century,
particularly emphasizing the reverence for literary works themselves.
 focus on the importance of tradition
 modernist authors believe in the depersonalization of the author

7
  focusing on concepts such as the historical sense, depersonalization of the artist, and the impersonality of
poetry.
 His notion of poetry as an escape from emotion and personality, and the idea of the poet as a medium, is
also highlighted.
New Criticism's Anti-Romanticism and Modernist Influence
 The emergence of New Criticism is characterized by an anti-romantic thrust, with an emphasis on science,
objectivity, and impersonality.
 New Criticism had a symbiotic relationship with literary modernism, finding its premises borne out in
modernist works.

Key Proponents
 I.A. Richards,
 William Empson
 F.R. Leavis are identified as the main proponents of the new English at Cambridge
 each contributing significantly to the development of New Criticism

F.R. Leavis
 focus on morality – canon = source of important values  moral formalism – aesthetic of the text is
connected to didactic function
 minority culture vs. mass civilization – perceived mass civilization as a threat to traditional values

I.A. Richards and William Empson

 based at Cambridge
 ‘professional’ criticism - focus on literary text and the meanings text produces
 developed within academy
 focus on literary text and the meanings text produces
 emotive vs. referential  literary language is referential, language is emotive causes us emotion, it’s more
ambiguous
 Practical Criticism (1929) - establishes influential close reading technique
- Pay close attention to reading a text
- 7 levels of ambiguity  Linguistic, Semantic, Structural, Cultural

American New Criticism

Background and Influences
 emerged in the 1920s, gaining dominance in the 1940s and 1950s
 shares affinities with the traditional Southern Agrarians or "Fugitives," exhibiting a conservative stance
against modern industrialism and materialism
 Matthew Arnold, T.S. Eliot, and F.R. Leavis.
 during the Second World War and the Cold War era, offering a haven for alienated intellectuals.
 With the expansion of the student population, New Criticism's focus on close reading and ahistorical analysis
provided a seemingly democratic approach to literary study.

Principles and Practices

 New Criticism emphasizes the intrinsic qualities of the text itself, disregarding historical, biographical, or
authorial intentions.
 It prioritizes close textual analysis to understand how a work achieves its order, harmony, and aesthetic
effects.

Key Figures
 Cleanth Brooks, a prominent New Critic and editor of the Southern Review, exemplifies the movement's
principles in his works such as "Understanding Poetry" and "Understanding Fiction." His book "The Well-
Wrought Urn: Studies in the Structure of Poetry" is regarded as a significant text in New Criticism.

Beardsley, Wayne C. Booth

8
  concerned with the text in itself= its language and organization
 central concepts: order, harmony, irony, paradox, tension, ambivalence, ambiguity

John Crowe Ransom

1. The New Criticism (1941)- criticism should try to define what makes poetry – poetical

Cleanth Brooks, Robert Penn Warren – Understanding poetry (1938), Understanding Fiction (1943)
W.K. Wimsatt and Monroe C. Beardsley - The Intentional Fallacy (1946) and The Affective Fallacy (1949)

According to them we can only ask what the text is trying to say, not author.  intentional fallacy
context
the addresser (writer)- message(text)-addressee (reader) nexus
Code
New critics only try to assess timeless qualities

New critics only try to assess timeless qualities

New critics rules:
1. focus on the dramatic speaker instead of author
2. rejection of impressionism and relativism

poems – our cultural heritage, permanent and valuable artefacts

Wayne C. Booth (the Chicago school of Neo-Aristotelians) – The Rhetoric of Fiction (1961)
Major contribution:
1. the implied author - ‘an ideal, literary, created version of the real man; he is the sum of his own choices’,
implied only on the basis of the text, not from the real life of the author because their beliefs could differ
from what they wrote
2. reliable/unreliable narrator – important when making a distinction between the real author and the voice in
the story, have to be careful when identifying – reliable = omniscient, unreliable = 1st person

NARRATIVE COMMUNICATION DIAGRAM

the addresser (writer) – message (text) - addressee (reader)
Real author – Implied author - narrator – narratee - implied reader - real reader
Texts: close reading technique (tension, pattern, relations, structure, poem as an organic unit) + implied author

CLOSE READING
 Close reading involves paying exceptionally close attention to the text on the page, beyond just
understanding the literal meanings of words.
 requires sensitivity to the nuances and connotations of language used by skilled writers, including
vocabulary, sentence construction, imagery, themes, narrative techniques, and worldview presented.

Levels of Attention
1. Linguistic: Focus on surface linguistic elements like vocabulary, grammar, syntax, and style.
2. Semantic: Delve deeper into word meanings, including denotations, connotations, and implicit messages.
3. Structural: Analyze relationships between words and elements within the text.
4. Cultural: Consider how elements of the text relate to external factors such as other works by the same
author, historical context, social or cultural issues, and academic disciplines.

Complexity and Development

 Close reading progresses through increasingly complex phases:
- linguistic (beginner),
- semantic (intermediate),
9
 - structural (advanced),
- cultural (advanced and beyond).
 Each phase involves different levels of scrutiny and understanding, from descriptive to interpretive.

Acquisition and Practice

 Developing close reading skills takes time and practice across linguistic and literary disciplines, requiring
extensive reading.
 While many people possess these skills unconsciously, deliberate practice and awareness can enhance them
significantly.

Reading and Re-reading

 Close reading often involves multiple readings of a text to fully appreciate its nuances and connections
between its parts.
 Re-reading allows readers to assemble and compare the subtleties of meaning and significance within the
text.

Enhancing Enjoyment
 Contrary to common belief, close reading enhances enjoyment by enabling readers to appreciate the
intricacies and details of a work more fully.
 Noticing and analyzing these details deepens understanding and engagement with the text, enriching the
reading experience.

RUSSIAN FORMALISM (1920s)

Interested more in formal aspects of literary text
- Roman Jacobson
- Petr Bogatyrev
- Viktor Shklovsky
- Yury Tynyanov
- Boris Eikhenbaum

Aim: to establish a scientific basis for the theory of literature sharp division of form and content studied
aesthetic effects produced by literary devices

literature: a special use of language

- 1st phase: model of the machine – text consists of literary devices, approach to language was very
mechanical (looked at phrases)
- 2nd phase = organic: text = fully functioning organism of interrelated parts
- 3rd phase = text = product of the entire literary system and even of the metasystem of interacting
literary and non-literary systems

Ordinary language –encourages the automatization of our perceptions: don’t think about the language we
use, used to exchange information or ideas, easily understandable
Literary language: draws attention to perceptions by making them unfamiliar
Shklovsky’s central term – defamiliarization – interested mainly in the devices that produce the effect

Example 1.
Craige Raine Martian
A Martian Sends a Postcard Home – informs us that the perspective is different because speaker is not human but a martian

Caxtons are mechanical birds with many wings

Referring to books, wings are pages, markings is text
and some are treasured for their markings –

they cause the eyes to melt Books cause us emotions

10
Perch = hold a book in the hand
or the body to shriek without pain.

I have never seen one fly, but

sometimes they perch on the hand.

Mist is when the sky is tired of flight

and rests its soft machine on ground:

then the world is dim and bookish

like engravings under tissue paper.
– laying bare one’s technique – Russian formalists tried to apply the technique on non-literary text, tried
to notice the form of the text NOT content, praised the ability to destroy artistic effect

Example 2: Laurence Stern - Tristram Shandy

In the beginning of the last chapter, I informed you exactly when I was born; but I did not inform you how. No, that particular
was reserved entirely for a chapter by itself; --besides, Sir, as you and I are in a manner perfect strangers to each other, it would
not have been proper to have let you into too many circumstances relating to myself all at once.

--You must have a little patience. I have undertaken, you see, to write not only my life, but my opinions also; hoping and
expecting that your knowledge of my character, and of what kind of a mortal I am, by the one, would give you a better relish for
the other: As you proceed farther with me, the slight acquaintance, which is now beginning betwixt us, will grow into familiarity;
and that unless one of us is in fault, will terminate in friendship.--O diem praeclarum!--then nothing which has touched me will
be thought trifling in its nature, or tedious in its telling. Therefore, my dear friend and companion, if you should think me
somewhat sparing of my narrative on my first setting out--bear with me,--and let me go on, and tell my story my own way:--Or, if
I should seem now and then to trifle upon the road,--or should sometimes put on a fool's cap with a bell to it, for a moment or
two as we pass along, -don't fly off,--but rather courteously give me credit for a little more wisdom than appears upon my
outside;--and as we jog on, either laugh with me, or at me, or in short do anything,-- only keep your temper.

Story (fabula)/plot (sjuzet) distinction:

Aristotle: plot = artful arrangement of incidents that make up a story
Shklovsky: plot = not merely arrangement of story incidents but also the devices used to interrupt and
delay narration – (digression, typographical games, displacement of parts of the book and extended
descriptions) praised by Russian formalists

Example 3:
The palm of his right hand, as he fell upon the bed, receiving his forehead, and covering the greatest part of both his eyes, gently
sunk down with his head (his elbow giving way backwards) till his nose touched the quilt; - his left arm hung insensible over the
side of the bed, his knuckles reclining upon the handle of the chamber pot

Roman Jakobson – The Dominant

Focus: different aesthetic functions of devices in different works or may become totally automatised
Literary work: a dynamic system
the dominant = the focusing component of a work of art: it rules, determines and transforms the
remaining components
History of literature = poetic forms change and develop as a result of a shifting dominant:

11