Literary Criticism: An Autopsy

175 Pages·1997·8.579 MB·English

by  Mark Bauerlein

Literary Criticism: An Autopsy
CRITICAL AUTHORS & ISSUES
Josue Harari, Series Editor
A complete list of books in the series
is available from the publisher.
Literary Criticism:
An Autopsy
Mark Bauerlein
PENN
University of Pennsylvania Press
Philadelphia
Copyright© 1997 University of Pennsylvania Press
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2
Published by
University of Pennsylvania Press
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-6097
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Bauerlein, Mark.
Literary criticism, an autopsy I Mark Bauerlein.
p. em.
ISBN: 978-0-8122-1625-7
1. Criticism. I. Title.
PN81.B387 1997
801'.95-dc21 97-14199
CIP
to
Eve-Alice Roustang
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Contents
Preface IX
Introduction 1
A Critical Glossary 17
construction 17
cultural poetics 23
cultural studies 30
decisive assertions 35
deconstruction 42
discipline 48
discourse 51
essentialize 57
gender 62
ideology 69
-ing 74
interdisciplinary 78
literary criticism 81
the logic of 92
political criticism 103
problematize 109
the question of 113
radical ll8
rethink 122
sociology ofliterature 125
theory 131
voice 132
what so-and-so calls 136
viii Contents
Epilogue 141
Bibliography 149
Index 155
Preface
In 1994, at an English department meeting at Emory University, I
found myself in the middle of a debate over future staffing needs.
Naturally, the faculty members all had varying, though mutually re
spectful opinions. Some thought we should fill historical gaps in
our curriculum with entry-level period specialists. Others pushed
for a distinguished scholar in any field to strengthen the research
credentials of the graduate program. Another opted for a compo
sition specialist to waylay the adjunct hiring we have to undergo
every semester. Yet another suggested a computer expert to bring
us all technologically up to date.
Though we disagreed abuut the relative merits of each proposal,
we admitted each one as having some measure of justification.
Everyone recognized a rationale behind each idea being thrown
around the table and understood that the department's final choice
was a matter of deciding on the priority of one proposal over an
other, not accepting one and rejecting the others. We merely had
to rank them in terms of urgency. But, as the colloquy proceeded,
one colleague offered a general comment that introduced a new
concern. He said, "I think we should all realize that the world has
changed drastically in the last twenty years and that we should think
about how we as a department and as individual scholars and teach
ers are going to represent those changes." A lull followed this state
ment, as if the other faculty members were thinking about how to
assimilate Professor X's wake-up call to the issue at hand. Maybe X
intended his point as a reproof to some of the conservative opinions
expressed ("We need a straightforward Miltonist"). Perhaps it was
meant as support for arguments for a less traditionally defined
scholar, a postcolonialist or a cultural critic, for example. Or per-