American Literary Criticism Since the 1930s fully updates Vincent B. Leitch's classic book, American Literary Criticism from the 30s to the 80s following the development of the American academy right up to the present day.

Updated throughout and with a brand new chapter, this second edition:

• provides a critical history of American literary theory and practice, discussing the impact of major schools and movements
• examines the social and cultural background to literary research, considering the role of key theories and practices
• provides profiles of major figures and influential texts, outlining the connections among theorists
• presents a new chapter on developments since the 1980s, including discussions of feminist, queer, postcolonial and ethnic criticism.

Comprehensive and engaging, this book offers a crucial overview of the development of literary studies in American universities, and a springboard to further research for all those interested in the development and study of Literature.

The gold standard anthology for anyone who wants to understand the development and current state of literary theory. Offering 191 pieces by 157 authors, The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, Third Edition, is more comprehensive and more varied in its selection than any other anthology. Forty-eight NEW selections-concentrated mostly on the twentieth and twenty-first centuries-make the book not only the best overview of the history of theory, but also a remarkably up-to-date portrait of the state of theory today.

American Literary Criticism Since the 1930s fully updates Vincent B. Leitch s classic book, American Literary Criticism from the 30s to the 80s following the development of the American academy right up to the present day.

Updated throughout and with a brand new chapter, this second edition:

• provides a critical history of American literary theory and practice, discussing the impact of major schools and movements
• examines the social and cultural background to literary research, considering the role of key theories and practices
• provides profiles of major figures and influential texts, outlining the connections among theorists
• presents a new chapter on developments since the 1980s, including discussions of feminist, queer, postcolonial and ethnic criticism.

Comprehensive and engaging, this book offers a crucial overview of the development of literary studies in American universities, and a springboard to further research for all those interested in the development and study of Literature.

This book provides accounts of thirteen American critical schools and movements of the period from the early 1930s to the mid- 1980s. Each chapter presents a history of a specific school or movement, covering pertinent social and cultural backgrounds, main figures and texts, key philosophical and critical theories and practices and significant relations with allied and antagonistic contemporaneous movements both here and abroad.

Leitch argues for the use of poststructural theory in cultural criticism. He maintains that deconstruction remains crucial for a truly critical approach to cultural studies. Literary critics now frequently use sociological, historical, political, and institutional methods of inquiry. This turn toward "dis-course" and away from "literature" has led to a resurgence of cultural criticism, a mode of analysis revitalized and reformed by the arrival of "theory". Leitch illustrates the weak points of influential predecessors, showing how poststructuralism offers useful advances over reigning modes of critical inquiry. Leitch develops positions on key topics: social formations and cultural critique; authorship and intention; "poetic" discourse and the social text; literary genre and cultural convention; minority literatures and "general poetics"; textual interpretation and assessment; institutional theory and analysis; and Birmingham's Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies and poststructuralism. He draws on the work of Barthes, Deleuze, de Man, Derrida, Foucault, Jameson, Kristeva, Lentricchia, Lyotard, Said, and Scholes - whose work he does not hesitate to criticize.

For more than a decade literary criticism has been thought to be in a post-theory age. Despite this, the work of thinkers such as Derrida, Deleuze and Foucault and new writers such as Agamben and Ranciere continue to be central to literary studies. Literary Criticism in the 21st Century explores the explosion of new theoretical approaches that has seen a renaissance in theory and its importance in the institutional settings of the humanities today. Literary Criticism in the 21st Century covers such issues as: . The institutional history of theory in the academy . The case against theory, from the 1970s to today . Critical reading, theory and the wider world . Keystone works in contemporary theory . New directions and theory's many futures Written with an engagingly personal and accessible approach that brings theory vividly to life, this is a passionate defence of theory and its continuing relevance in the 21st century.

The ideal prelude to the study of deconstructive theory for the as-yet-uninitiated reader. Leitch uses in-depth analyses, surveys of historical background, and helpful overviews to address the questions posed by the major figures -- Saussure, Lacan, Levi-Strauss, Heidegger, Derrida, Barthes Foucault -- then penetrates and displays the subtle intricacies of their answers.