Critical Theory?

Rubberbandits

Im reading about critical theory and I am unaware what the word "text" means. E.g Deconstruction is a means of analysing "texts"? What does "text" mean in this context? Im guessing a "text" in not literally a body of text like the one you are reading now. Can anyone help?

Offalycool

It is simply text, as in the individual perception of language given our unique backgrounds, culture etc. Text on its own is a type of code; we interpret this code in our own unique way, through our understanding of our experiences. Text is simply text.

hivizman

Offalycool wrote:

Text is simply text.

It's hard to argue with a tautology.

Views of 'text' depend on how radical your critical theory is. Structuralists like Roland Barthes and Umberto Eco view texts as artefacts designed to be interpreted. The text is not the sole property of its author or creator, but its meaning(s) emerge through reading. A book exists in its own right, while a text requires a reader. Structuralists, though, consider that texts have an internal integrity that constrains the range of interpretations that are feasible. Deconstructionists like Jacques Derrida go further. To quote from the book Is There a Meaning in This Text? by Kevin Vanhoozer, 'The text is merely the adventure playground of interpretation, the site of verbal slides, swings and sandboxes that afford the reader the means to exercise his or her imagination. The text is a possibility that can be taken up in different ways. . . . The text can never be received in its integrity but only be used.'

So 'text' goes beyond the author focus of the original writing or other artefact and stresses the interpretations of the readers.

carl_

hivizman wrote:

It's hard to argue with a tautology.

Views of 'text' depend on how radical your critical theory is. Structuralists like Roland Barthes and Umberto Eco view texts as artefacts designed to be interpreted. The text is not the sole property of its author or creator, but its meaning(s) emerge through reading. A book exists in its own right, while a text requires a reader. Structuralists, though, consider that texts have an internal integrity that constrains the range of interpretations that are feasible. Deconstructionists like Jacques Derrida go further. To quote from the book Is There a Meaning in This Text? by Kevin Vanhoozer, 'The text is merely the adventure playground of interpretation, the site of verbal slides, swings and sandboxes that afford the reader the means to exercise his or her imagination. The text is a possibility that can be taken up in different ways. . . . The text can never be received in its integrity but only be used.'

So 'text' goes beyond the author focus of the original writing or other artefact and stresses the interpretations of the readers.

Seriously, I see nothing here apart from the obvious statement that people interpret literature. Is there any substance to this 'critical theory'?

nesf

carl_ wrote:

Seriously, I see nothing here apart from the obvious statement that people interpret literature.

I'm not a fan of critical theory or anything but the above is a debate about whether a text inherently constrains interpretation or not, not simply a statement that people interpret literature.

hivizman

carl_ wrote:

Seriously, I see nothing here apart from the obvious statement that people interpret literature. Is there any substance to this 'critical theory'?

I ask that myself. I think that some critical theorists have created a "straw man" by implying that conventional views of texts claim that there is only a single meaning in any text, which the author of the text has intended. On that basis, all interpretations except for the one that the author intended are simply wrong. This sort of view would give the author intellectual property rights not just in the words themselves but also in how his or her readers interpreted the words.

But if multiple interpretations of literature are possible, how, if at all, do we evaluate different interpretations? Can we say that some interpretations don't make any sense, or make poor sense, or are perverse? I think that some deconstructionists would assert that we have no valid criteria for endorsing or excluding interpretations, so "anything goes". Indeed, there is no privilege for the author's own interpretation of the text - there is nothing outside the text that allows for a definitive meaning to be pinned down.

I'm sure that this is a gross oversimplification of deconstruction, though, and I await the deconstruction of my own text.:)

DadaKopf

carl_ wrote:

Seriously, I see nothing here apart from the obvious statement that people interpret literature. Is there any substance to this 'critical theory'?

It depends which 'critical theory' you're referring to. French post-structuralism was never originally called 'critical theory', as it grew out of stranges of phenomenology and structuralism. It was after the likes of Barthes, Lacan, Derrida, de Certeau that 'critical theory' was applied to them.

Then there's German critical theory where 'critical' was most closely associated with the term as it would appear in Marxist, or Marxian, philosophy. Before the works of Lacan or Derrida, you had Gramsci, Lucacks and Benjamin who decoded literature, language and the arts as they related to the political-economic and social structures of their day. Here, a critical theory meant the critical theory of revolution which developed theories to explain how social relations (the economic base) linked up with the 'superstructure' (culture, literature, art, media, political rhetoric).

Towards the 1950s, these two strands became intermeshed to the point where they merged significantly. There's an excellent book comparing the works of Derrida and Theodor Adorno, showing how they came to similar conclusions in different ways.

To my mind, these theorists weren't specifically interested in interpretation per se (though this was a key component), but how interpretation creates structures, and how structures influence interpretation. In a political sense, how relationships of power and exploitation (by master or slave) influence action and judgements. More than that, how we are all intersubjectively creating 'social reality' through these, how we are not lone individuals but subjects.

As Derrida said, "there is no outside text". Meaning: text is not simply the written word, but the entire social context in which the stuff of human life, and meaning, is inscribed and reinscribed ad infinitum. The story of how humans create meaning and their world.

Rubberbandits

Thanks lads, especially hivizman.

So, in the language of an absolute beginner is it fair to say that a "text" is anything created by a human which can be critically analysed? Whether it be a book, a film, a painting, an advert or a piece of music? Not just written words?

DadaKopf

I would say, in CT, you cannot generalise. In a particular sense, it's the written word (and world conjured by the text); in a general sense it could be any of these things.

In any case, I prefer to use the term 'discourse'.

carl_

nesf wrote:

I'm not a fan of critical theory or anything but the above is a debate about whether a text inherently constrains interpretation or not, not simply a statement that people interpret literature.

Thanks nesf, I missed that aspect of hivizman's post. So is this the main idea behind critical theory?

The idea that the structure of a piece of text can constrain interpretation is interesting, but it's a bit pie-in-the-sky without hard facts and definitions. For example, what is interpretation exactly? If you take a broad enough notion of interpretation, you could say that any text could be interpreted in an infinite number of ways.. so there obviously has to be a limit on what we mean by 'interpretation'.

peckerhead

Discourse, to me, implies utterance (énonciation), and therefore an agent. I prefer to define text (including e.g. visual text; it's not solely a case of written or spoken language) as anything which is construed as meaningful, whether by the receiver or emitter. In that sense, a gesture may obviously be considered as text — it participates in (conventional, arbitrary) codes of signification.

Mind you, so does a 'pattern' in the clouds...

SkepticOne

peckerhead wrote:

anything which is construed as meaningful, whether by the receiver or emitter. In that sense, a gesture may obviously be considered as text — it participates in (conventional, arbitrary) codes of signification.

Mind you, so does a 'pattern' in the clouds...

'Sign' might be a better word here - more in keeping with the ordinary use of words.

nesf

carl_ wrote:

Thanks nesf, I missed that aspect of hivizman's post. So is this the main idea behind critical theory?

The idea that the structure of a piece of text can constrain interpretation is interesting, but it's a bit pie-in-the-sky without hard facts and definitions. For example, what is interpretation exactly? If you take a broad enough notion of interpretation, you could say that any text could be interpreted in an infinite number of ways.. so there obviously has to be a limit on what we mean by 'interpretation'.

Honestly, I'm not familiar enough with critical theory to actually attempt to explain it to anyone. It's not an area that I've ever had reason to look at in depth.