Theory Matters: The Place of Theory in Literary and Cultural Studies Today

by Martin Middeke (Editor), Christoph Reinfandt (Editor)

Overview

This book demonstrates that theory in literary and cultural studies has moved beyond overarching master theories towards a greater awareness of particularity and contingency – including its own. What is the place of literary and cultural theory after the Age of Theory has ended? 
Grouping its chapters into rubrics of metatheory, cultural theory, critical theory and textual theory, the collection demonstrates that the practice of “doing theory” has neither lost its vitality nor can it be in any way dispensable. Current directions covered include the renewed interest in phenomenology, the increased acknowledgement of the importance of media history for all cultural practices and formations, complexity studies, new narratology, literary ethics, cultural ecology, and an intensified interest in textual as well as cultural matter.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781137474285
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan
Publication date:	07/09/2016
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	362
File size:	511 KB

About the Author

Martin Middeke holds the Chair of English Literature at the University of Augsburg, Germany, and is Visiting Professor of English at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa. He has published widely in the fields of 19th to 21st century drama and fiction and aspects of deconstruction, literary anthropology and ethics. Major book publications include: Biofiction (ed. 1999), Zeit und Roman (ed. 2002), Die Kunst der gelebten Zeit (2004), Literature and Circularity (ed. 2009), The Literature of Melancholia (ed. 2011), Literature and/as Ethics (ed. 2011), and Representations of the Precarious in Contemporary British Drama (ed. 2016). 
Christoph Reinfandt is Chair of English Literature at the University of Tübingen, Germany. He has published widely on the history of the novel, Romanticism, and contemporary literature and culture. His theoretical work tends to be anchored in sociological systems theory. Major book publications include: Der Sinn der fiktionalen Wirklichkeiten (1997), Systems Theory and Literature (ed. 2001), Romantische Kommunikation (2003), The Cultural Validity of Music in Contemporary Fiction (ed. 2006), Englische Romantik (2008), Multi-Ethnic Britain 2000+ (ed. 2008), Romanticism Today (ed. 2009), and Voice and Perception in Transcultural Realities: Focus on India (ed. 2013).

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements.- List of Contributors.- Introduction: The Place of Theory Today; Martin Middeke and Christoph Reinfandt.- PART I: METATHEORY.- 1. Comes the Revolution; J. Hillis Miller.- 2. Literary Theory in Reverse: The Literariness of Theory; Gerold Sedlmayr.- 3. Misreading Shelley, Misreading Theory: Deconstruction, Media, and Materiality; Christian Huck.- 4. ‘I am, yet what I am’: Theory, Being and Dis-appearance; Julian Wolfreys.- 5. Matter Against Materialism: Bruno Latour and the Turn to Objects; Benjamin Noys.- 6. Avoiding Post-Structuralism at Its Root: Toward a New Theory; Dino Galetti.- Interlude I: The Cultures of Reflexivity; Martin Middeke and Christoph Reinfandt.- PART II: CULTURAL THEORY.- 7. The University: A Matter of Theoretical Importance; Thomas Docherty.- 8. When Theory Is Not Enough: A Material Turn in Gender Studies; Ingrid Hotz-Davies.- 9. Luhmann in da Contact Zone: Towards a Postcolonial Critique of Sociological Systems Theory; Lars Eckstein and Christoph Reinfandt.- 10. Passive Voice: Democratic Indifference and the Vibrant Matter of Literature; Dirk Wiemann.- 11. Managing Complexity: The “Literary Turn” in Organization Studies; Nicola Glaubitz.- Interlude II: Ideologies of Habitus; Martin Middeke and Christoph Reinfandt.- PART III: CRITICAL THEORY.- 12. Ecological Transformations of Critical Theory; Hubert Zapf.- 13. The Literary Work as Ethical Event; Derek Attridge.- 14. Ethics and Agency: The Limits and Necessity of Ethical Criticism; Sebastian Domsch.- 15. The Art of Compearance: Ethics, (Reading) Literature, and the Coming Community; Martin Middeke.- 16. Narrative Theory at the Limit; Richard Walsh.- Interlude III: On Interpretation; Martin Middeke and Christoph Reinfandt.- PART IV: TEXTUAL THEORY.- 17. The Fate of Texts under Changing Theory; Herbert Grabes.- 18. Latour & Literature; David J. Alworth.- 19. Reading Textures; Christoph Reinfandt.- 20. Plato or Aristotle? Form and Textuality; Sukanta Chaudhuri.- Coda: Theory Matters; Martin Middeke and Christoph Reinfandt.- Index.-