Thinking Activity : Marxism, Feminism, Queer theory and Ecocritisim

 Hello readers !!! 

I'm Latta Baraiya and I'm a student of the English department, MKBU. Today in this blog I'm going to discuss about the theories; Marxism, Ecocriticism, Feminism and Queer criticism. This thinking Activity is assigned by our professor Dilip Barad sir. So let's see how this criticism works in different fields. 

• Marxist criticism

Before beginning the example of reading criticism in a text, first we have to understand what is Marxism ? and what is Marxist criticism ? What do they do ?

So first I would like to give one definition of Marxism. This is the political and economic theories of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, later developed by their followers to form the basis of communism. According to Merriam Webster,  

This is a theory and practice of socialism including the labor theory of value, dialectical materialism, the class struggle, and dictatorship of the proletariat until the establishment of a classless society. 

So we can say that Marxism is a method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand class relations and social conflict as well as a dialectical perspective to view social transformation. Now let's try looking at the society created in a classic piece of literature, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. This book takes place in the American South in the 19th century and follows a white boy, Huck, as he helps a black slave, Jim, escape his situation. Here we've got quite a bit more detail. Instead of just two large classes, society is really divided into several smaller ones.

As a result, a Marxist critique would focus not only on those classes, but also what happens when they break down. After all, Huck and Jim form a bond that society would have forbidden. Because of this, it would be argued that Twain wanted society to get rid of race-based castes altogether, since they only kept humanity in bondage.

• Feminist criticism 

Are a feminist ? This question might be coming to your mind and also asked by somebody many times. So what is Feminism and how does it work ? That we will see here. First, let’s understand what feminism is meant to be.

If you look up the definition of “Feminism” in the dictionary, you’ll see these statements:

Feminism is:

1. The advocacy of women’s rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes.

2. The theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes.

3. The belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities.

4. The doctrine advocating social, political, and all other rights of women equal to those of men. 

Now let's read feminism in The Great Gatsby. In the 21st century, it may be difficult to imagine a time when women were not even allowed to vote. However, prior to 1920, when the U.S. Congress ratified the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, female American citizens did not enjoy this right. The Great Gatsby takes place just two years after the ratification of this amendment during the Jazz Age. The Jazz Age, also known as the Roaring Twenties, was a time of dramatic cultural, economic, and social change in America, where not only men, but also women, drank and engaged in extramarital sex.  

Myrtle Wilson, Tom Buchanan's mistress, is another example of females as property in The Great Gatsby. Tom even refers to Myrtle as 'his girl' when he talks about her to others. However, Myrtle is also her husband's, George Wilson's, girl, an auto mechanic who does not provide her with the lifestyle she desires. As a means of escape from her economically and emotionally unhappy marriage, Myrtle looks to another man to satisfy her needs. 

• Queer theory

Countries like India have not started to give importance to the third gender yet. So it is very pivotal to study them also. They are also human beings, they have equal rights, they have their dreams though all should see them as human beings. So the first thing I would like to discuss here is what is queer theory ? 

If we look Queer Theory (QT) is both theory and political action. Definition is impossible, but QT can be summarised as exploring the oppressive power of dominant norms, particularly those relating to sexuality, and the immiseration they cause to those who cannot, or do not wish to, live according to those norms. 

According to Dr. Mary Klages, UC Boulder ; 

The word "queer" in queer theory has some of these connotations, particularly its alignment with ideas about homosexuality. Queer theory is a brand-new branch of study or theoretical speculation; it has only been named as an area since about 1991. It grew out of gay/lesbian studies, a discipline which itself is very new, existing in any kind of organized form only since about the mid-1980s. Gay/lesbian studies, in turn, grew out of feminist studies and feminist theory. 

Have a look at this video :- 

 

Shakespeare’s male dominated sonnets are most closely viewed in contemporary literature through Oscar Wilde’s The Portrait of Mr. W.H. This is one of the first pieces of literature that openly explores gay themes, a coming-out story of a sorts. This story follows a protagonist coming to terms with his sexuality with the help of Shakespeare’s sonnets, giving a very contemporary reading to these classic texts. The idea that the queer language within these texts can be used to help this character to understand such a large aspect of his life has given further appreciation to the writing and the subject matter.

The related theme within these sonnets relates directly to the “young man”, the narrator expresses his desire of admiring the man’s beauty, and that he wishes the man to sire a male heir, perhaps so he may pass on his beauty to future generations. This is clearly stated in Sonnet 3:

Look in thy glass and tell the face thou viewest

Now is the time that face should forme an other;

Whose fresh repair if now thou not renewest,

Thou dost beguile the world, unbless some mother.

(Sonnet 3) 

The way in which the narrator wishes to capture the “young man’s” beauty by having a child contrasts with the narrator's idea that the “young man’s” beauty is being wasted as time goes on. The internal conflict can be seen within these sonnets in the way that the narrator explores conventional beauty and compares that which he sees in the “young man” and the “dark lady”. The poet personifies the notions of time and love in his sonnets, with negative and positive connotations. The concept of time is connected to the “young man”, through a parallel to beauty, there is an anxiety in the “young man’s” fading beauty that time will soon decay. Natural imagery is often used to mirror the “young man’s” beauty as nature too is only beautiful for a short period before time takes its toll, “Now is the time that face should form another”. 

The other example is Orlando : A Biography by Virginia Woolf. In which we see protagonist Orlando change his sex from man to woman. This is important and interesting example of queer theory to study.

• Ecocriticism

You all were aware about what ecocriticism is.

Ecocriticism is the study of literature and environment from an interdisciplinary point of view where all sciences come together to analyze the environment and brainstorm possible solutions for the correction of the contemporary environmental situation. Ecocriticism was officially heralded by the publication of two seminal works, both published in the mid-1990s: The Ecocriticism Reader, edited by Cheryll Glotfelty and Harold Fromm, and The Environmental Imagination, by Lawrence Buell. 

Ecocritics believe that we also have to investigate the concept of nature itself. Societies frequently view their own hierarchies and codes of conduct as natural, rather than as artificial and man-made. Literary texts can help us realize how human beings use nature for their own ends. 

A great example of an ecocritical reading of Wordsworth’s “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud”. 

Wordsworth treats the daffodils like a photo on a postcard. Wordsworth doesn’t involve himself in nature. Instead, he looks at nature from afar (like a cloud), and leaves as soon as he had his fill. In other words, Wordsworth acts like the tourist who comes by once and snaps a quick picture before moving on. In the end, Wordsworth seems more concerned about his own feelings than about nature, Wordsworth composes the landscape into aesthetic form from a single point, located outside that landscape, exactly in the manner of a picturesque viewer, and in the process constructs a purely visual and seemingly disembodied subjectivity. Even as he claims to connect to nature, he views that nature through a kind of invisible frame and turns it into a resource for the construction of his own seemingly autonomous self. 

Wordsworth is being too selective in his representation of the environment. In fact, Wordsworth’s attitude to the way Americans treasure their National Parks as perfect and pristine natural places, while caring less about the degradation of nature everywhere else.