CRITIQUE PAPER

• Critique paper


  One of the specialized forms of writing in which a reviewer or reader evaluates
• Critiques usually range in length from 250 to 750 words
• Critiques


  Process ideas and theories, revisit and extend ideas in a specific field of study and present an analytical response to a book or article.
• Critique


  A careful analysis of an argument to determine what is said, how well the points are made, what assumption underlie the argument, what issues are overlooked, and what implications are drawn from such observations
• Purpose of literary criticism

  • To broaden a reader's understanding of an author's work by summarizing, interpreting, and exploring its value
  • After giving the text a close reading a critic formulates a comprehensive literary analysis that can inform or challenge another reader's understanding of the text
  • The practice of literary criticism creates space for readers to better understand the beauty and complexity of the worls through literature
• Formalist criticism


  Deals primarily with the text and not with any of the outside considerations such as author, the real world, audience, or other literature. Meaning is inherent in the text.
• Formalist criticism


  • Examines the form of the work as a whole, the form of each individual part of the text (the individual scenes and chapters), the characters, the settings, the tone, the point of view, the diction, and all other elements of the text which join to make it a single text. After analyzing each part, the critic then describe how they work together to give meaning (theme) to the text.
  • Focuses on author's techniques in involving contradictions within the work
  • Identifies central passage that sums up the entirety of the work
  • Analyzes contribution of parts and the work as a whole to its aesthetic quality
  • Examines relationship of the form and the content
  • Analyzes use of imagery to develop the symbols used in the work
  • Examines interconnectedness of various parts of the work
  • Identifies paradox, ambiguity, and irony in the work
  • Examines unity in the work
• Feminist criticism


  Concerns with the woman's role in society as portrayed through texts. It typically analyze the plight of woman as depicted in the story. Generally, it criticizes the notion of women as a construct through literature.
• Feminist criticism


  • Focuses on how literature presents women as subjects of sociopolitical, psychological, and economic oppression
  • Reveals how aspects of our culture are patriarchal, i.e., how our culture views men as superior and women as inferior
  • Examines how culture determines gender
  • Examines how gender equality (or lack of it) is presented in the text
  • Examines how gender issues are presented in literary works and other aspects of human production and daily life
  • Examines how women are socially, politically, psychologically, and economically oppressed by patriarchy
  • Examines how patriarchal ideology is an overpowering presence
• Reader-response criticism


  Concerned with how the work is viewed by the audience. In this approach, the reader creates meaning, not the author of the work. Once the work is published, the author is no longer relevant.
• Reader-response criticism


  • Focuses on the interaction between the reader and the text in creating meaning
  • Examines the impact of reader's delivery of sounds and visuals on enhancing and changing meaning
• Marxist criticism


  Concerns with the analysis of the clash of opposing social classes in society, namely; the ruling class (bourgeoisie) and the working class (proletariat) as it shaped the events that transpired in the story.
• Marxist criticism


  • Examines social class as represented in the work
  • Examines social class of the writer/creator
  • Examines social class of the characters
  • Examines conflicts and interactions between economic classes