Literature as Communication: The foundations of mediating criticism: 78 (Pragmatics & Beyond New Series) - Hardcover

Sell, Roger D.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 9027250960 ISBN 13: 9789027250964

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2000

Synopsis

This book offers foundations for a literary criticism which seeks to mediate between writers and readers belonging to different historical periods or social groupings. This makes it, among other things, a timely intervention in the postmodern “culture wars”, though the theory put forward will be of interest not only to students of literature and culture, but also to linguists.
Sell describes communication in general as strongly interactive, as very much affected by the disparate situationalities of “sending” and “receiving”, yet as by no means completely determined by them. Seen this way, men and women are both social beings and individuals, capable of empathizing with sociohistorical formations which are alien to them, sometimes even to the extent of changing their own life-world. By treating literary activity as communicational in this same dynamic sense, Sell radically modifies the main paradigms of twentieth-century literary theory, casting much new light on questions of genre, interpretation, affect and ethics.

About this title

Synopsis

This title offers foundations for a literary criticism which seeks to mediate between writers and readers belonging to different historical periods or social groups. It looks at postmodern "culture wars" and the author describes communication in general.

Edition details

• Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 9027250960
• ISBN 13: 9789027250964
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 366