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This final lesson brings everything together. You have studied eight critical approaches — feminist, Marxist, psychoanalytic, post-colonial, New Historicist, structuralist/post-structuralist, narratological, and eco-critical/emerging. Now you need to use them effectively in exam conditions. This lesson provides practical strategies for integrating critical theory into your essays without name-dropping, losing your own voice, or sacrificing close reading.
The examiner does not want a summary of feminist theory or a biography of Jacques Derrida. They want to see you use critical concepts to produce readings of literary texts.
| Wrong | Right |
|---|---|
| "Feminist criticism is a type of literary criticism that examines gender in literature. Kate Millett wrote Sexual Politics in 1970." | "Millett's argument that literary representations of sexuality are always political illuminates Atwood's presentation of the Ceremony — a ritualised act of sexual violence legitimised by state and scripture." |
The difference: the first summarises theory; the second uses theory to read a text.
It is more useful to name a concept than to name a person:
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