E.K. Sparks
Dept of English
Clemson U
July 2001

Orientations of Feminist Criticism
 [Long after M.H. Abrams]


 
  • Mimetic Crititcism/ WORLD
  • Images of Women Criticism/Feminist Critique
    • How does art/ literature portray women? What roles are women allotted/ allowed?
    • What stereotypes about women does the work perpetuate? 
    • Are women accurately portrayed?
    • To what degree is art responsible for presenting positive role models?
    • Is the work idealistic or misogynistic?
    • What is the relation of women to nature? Emotions? The body?
    • How has the history of women's situation affect the presentation of women in literature/art?
    • How does the work critique or change traditional views of women, especially Freudian, Jungian or archetypal perspectives?
    • To what degree do cultural perceptions of gender differences affect literary works?
    Objective Criticism/ THE WORK
    Reassessment
    • Is there such a thing as a female language or style? Does it come from the body or from social and historical sources?
    • How is the language, form, structure, or style of a work influenced by the writer's gender? (Is there such a thing as a "woman's sentence"?
    • Are there typical images, themes, or literary strategies employed by women writers?
    • How is the work of art connected to other disciplines and contexts, such as psychology, history, politics etc.?

     
     
     

      Pragmatic Criticism/ AUDIENCE
    Feminist Reader-Response/ Canon-Busting
    • What gender of a reader does a work imply, require, or favor? 
    • What happens if you assume the reader is a woman?
    • Does gender a/effect reading?
    • How do men and women read differently?
    • Can a man read as a woman?
    • Why have some works "lasted" and been reread and republished while others (written by women) have vanished? What role does gender play in literary reputation and canon formation?
    • Are there such things as "feminine genres"
    • Why do women read romances? Are such books "good? for them" 
     
        Expressionist Criticism/ AUTHOR
    Recovery , Gynocriticism
    • Do women create differently from men?
    • Is any apparent difference biological or social?
    • How have historical conditions affected women's ability to write?
    • How do women writers relate to the gender of their precursors? Are they intimidated by male models?
    • How do women writers relate to previous women writers?
    • Is there such a thing as a female tradition?
    • Why have women writers specialized so much in fiction? What are the special theoretical problems for women writing poetry?