New Historicism is an approach to literary criticism and literary theory based on the premise that a literary work should be considered a product of the time, place and circumstances of its composition rather than as an isolated creation of genius. It had its roots in a reaction to the "New Criticism" of formal analysis of works of literature that were seen by a new generation of professional readers as taking place in a vacuum. New Historicism developed in the 1980s, primarily through the work of the critic Stephen Greenblatt, and gained widespread influence in the 1990s. Literary criticism is the study, discussion, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. ... Literary theory is the theory (or the philosophy) of the interpretation of literature and literary criticism. ... New Criticism was the dominant trend in English and American literary criticism of the early twentieth century, from the 1920s to the early 1960s. ... MacGyver is one of the symbols of the 1980s in America The 1980s decade refers to the years from 1980 to 1989, inclusive. ... Stephen Jay Greenblatt (born 1943) is a noted Shakespeare scholar and a literary critic/theorist often seen as the leader of the school known as New Historicism or as Greenblatt likes to put it, cultural poetics. He believes that all works of literature are a products of their times and... The 1990s decade refers to the years from 1990 to 1999, inclusive. ...

New Historicists aim simultaneously to understand the work through its historical context and to understand cultural and intellectual history through literature, which documented the new discipline of the history of ideas. Michel Foucault based his approach both on his theory of the limits of collective cultural knowledge and on his technique of examining a broad array of documents in order to understand the episteme of a particular time. New Historicism is claimed to be a more neutral approach to historical events, and is sensitive towards different cultures. The history of ideas is a field of research in history and in related fields dealing with the expression, preservation, and change of human ideas over time. ... Michel Foucault Michel Foucault (October 15, 1926 – June 25, 1984) was a French philosopher who held a chair at the Collège de France, which he gave the title The History of Systems of Thought. ... As distinguished from techne, the Greek word episteme (literally: science) is often translated as knowledge. ...

The study

New Historicist scholars begin their analysis of literary texts by attempting to look at what other texts—both literary and non-literary— to which a literate public had access at the time of writing, and what the author of the original text himself might have read. The purpose of this research, however, is not to derive the direct sources of a text, as the New Critics did, but to understand the relationship between a text and the political, social and economic circumstances in which it originated. A major focus of those New Historicist critics led by Moskowitz and Stephen Orgel has been on understanding Shakespeare less as an autonomous great author in the modern sense than as a clue to the conjunction of the world of Renaissance theater—a collaborative and largely anonymous free-for-all—and the complex social politics of the time. In this sense, Shakespeare is seen as an inseparable from the context in which he wrote. See contextualism, thick description. In language, text is a broad term for something that contains words to express something. ... Politics, sometimes defined as the art and science of government[1], is a process by which collective decisions are made within groups. ... Human relationships within an ethnically diverse society. ... Buyers bargain for good prices while sellers put forth their best front in Chichicastenango Market, Guatemala. ... Stephen Orgel is Professor of English at Stanford University. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... In the traditional view, the Renaissance is understood as an historical age that was preceded by the Middle Ages and followed by the Reformation. ... For other usages see Theatre (disambiguation) Theater (American English) or Theatre (British English and widespread usage among theatre professionals in the US) is that branch of the performing arts concerned with acting out stories in front of an audience using combinations of speech, gesture, music, dance, sound and spectacle — indeed... In philosophy, contextualism describes a collection of views in the philosophy of language which emphasize the context in which an action, utterance or expression occurs, and argues that, in some important respect, the action, utterance or expression can only be understood within that context. ... Thick description is a phrase used most famously by the anthropologist Clifford Geertz to describe his own specific mode of practice. ...

In this shift of focus, a comparison can be made with the best discussions of works of decorative arts. Unlike fine arts, which had been discussed in purely formal terms, comparable to the literary New Criticism, under the influences of Bernard Berenson and Ernst Gombrich, nuanced discussion of the arts of design since the 1970s have been set within social and intellectual contexts, taking account of fluctuations in luxury trades, the availability of design prototypes to local craftsmen, the cultural horizons of the patron, and economic considerations— "the limits of the possible" in economic historian Fernand Braudel's famous phrase. An outstanding pioneer example of such a contextualized study was Peter Thornton's monograph Seventeenth-Century Interior Decoration in England, France and Holland (1978). The decorative arts are traditionally defined as ornamental and functional works in ceramic, wood, glass, metal, or textile. ... Fine art is a term used to refer to fields traditionally considered to be artistic. ... Bernard Berenson in the garden of his estate Villa I Tatti in 1911 Bernard Berenson (born Bernhard Valvrojenski, June 26, 1865 – October 6, 1959), was an American art historian. ... Sir Ernst Hans Josef Gombrich (30 March 1909 – 3 November 2001) CBE, was an art historian, who spent most of his working life in the United Kingdom. ... Fernand Braudel Fernand Braudel (August 24, 1902–November 27, 1985) was a French historian. ...

Pre-history

Clearly, in its historicism and in its political interpretations, New Historicism owes something to Marxism. But whereas Marxism (at least in its cruder forms) tends to see literature as part of a 'superstructure' in which the economic 'base' (i.e. material relations of production) manifests itself, New Historicist thinkers tend to take a more nuanced view of power, seeing it not exclusively as class-related but extending throughout society. This view derives primarily from Foucault. In its tendency to see society as consisting of texts relating to other texts, with no 'fixed' literary value above and beyond the way specific societies read them in specific situations, New Historicism also owes something to postmodernism. However, New Historicists tend to exhibit less skepticism than postmodernists, and show more willingness to perform the 'traditional' tasks of literary criticism: i.e. explaining the text in its context, and trying to show what it 'meant' to its first readers. Historicism is a term which applies to a number of theories of culture or historical development which place the greatest weight on two factors: that there is an organic succession of developments, that local conditions and peculiarities influence the results in a decisive way It can be contrasted with reductionist... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... // Sociological concept In social sciences, superstructure is the set of socio-psychological feedback loops that maintain a coherent and meaningful structure in a given society, or part thereof. ... Buyers bargain for good prices while sellers put forth their best front in Chichicastenango Market, Guatemala. ... In philosophy, materialism is that form of physicalism which holds that the only thing that can truly be said to exist is matter; that fundamentally, all things are composed of material and all phenomena are the result of material interactions. ... Relations of production (German: Produktionsverhaltnisse) is a concept frequently used by Karl Marx in his theory of historical materialism and in Das Kapital. ... Sociologists usually define power as the ability to impose ones will on others, even if those others resist in some way. ... Social class refers to the hierarchical distinctions between individuals or groups in societies or cultures. ... Value is worth in general, and it is thought to be connected to reasons for certain practices, policies, actions, beliefs or emotions. ... It has been suggested that postmodernity be merged into this article or section. ... The neutrality of this article is disputed. ... Look up Context in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... The introduction to this article provides insufficient context for those unfamiliar with the subject matter. ...

New historicism also has something in common with the historical criticism of Hippolyte Taine, who argued that a literary work is less the product of its author's imaginations than the social circumstances of its creation, the three main aspects of which Taine called race, milieu, and moment. It is also a response to an earlier historicism, practiced by early 20th century critics such as John Livingston Lowes, which sought to de-mythologize the creative process by reexamining the lives and times of canonical writers. But New Historicism differs from both of these trends in its emphasis on ideology: the political disposition, unknown to an author himself, that governs his work. Portrait of Hippolyte Taine on French postage stamp of 1966 Hippolyte Adolphe Taine (April 21, 1828 - March 5, 1893) was a French critic and historian. ... Portrait of Hippolyte Taine Race, milieu, and moment were the three aspects of the literary critic and sociologist Hippolyte Taines attempt at a scientific account of literature. ... (19th century - 20th century - 21st century - more centuries) Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s As a means of recording the passage of time, the 20th century was that century which lasted from 1901–2000 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar (1900–1999 in the... Born in Illinois in the 1880s, John Livingston Lowes first taught mathematics, then became a Professor of British Literature at Harvard in the 1920s. ... The Western canon is a canon of books and art (and specifically one with very loose boundaries) that has allegedly been highly influential in shaping Western culture. ... An ideology is an organized collection of ideas. ...

Foucauldian basis

Following Foucault, New Historicism frequently addresses the idea that the lowest common denominator for all human actions is power, so the New Historicist seeks to find examples of power and its dispersement in text. Power is a means through which the marginalized are controlled, and the thing that the marginalized (or, other) seek to gain. This relates back to the idea that because literature is written by those who have the most power, there must be details in it that show the views of the common people. New Historicists seek to find "sites of struggle" to identify just who is the group or entity with the most power. In mathematics, the lowest common denominator or least common denominator (abbreviated LCD) is the least common multiple of the denominators of a set of vulgar fractions. ... Marginalisation or marginalization (US) refers in general to the overt or subvert acts and trends within societies whereby those perceived as lacking function or desirable traits are killed or otherwise excluded from existing systems of protectionism, thereby limiting their means for survival. ... Literature is literally acquaintance with letters as in the first sense given in the Oxford English Dictionary (from the Latin littera meaning an individual written character (letter)). The term has generally come to identify a collection of texts, which in Western culture are mainly prose, both fiction and non-fiction... ==GROUP== CONTENTS : 1. ... An entity is something that has a distinct, separate existence, though it need not be a material existence. ...

Foucault's discussions of the panopticon, a theoretical prison system developed by English philosopher Jeremy Bentham, are particularly useful for New Historicism. Bentham stated that the perfect prison/surveillance system would be a cylindrical shaped room that held prison cells on the outside walls. In the middle of this spherical room would be a large guard tower with a light that would shine in all the cells. The prisoners thus would never know for certain whether they were being watched, so they would effectively police themselves, and be as actors on a stage, giving the appearance of submission, although they are probably not being watched. Panopticon blueprint by Jeremy Bentham, 1791 The Panopticon is a type of prison building designed by the philosopher Jeremy Bentham. ... Jeremy Bentham (IPA: ) (February 15, 1748 – June 6, 1832) was an English gentleman, jurist, philosopher, and legal and social reformer. ... A right circular cylinder In mathematics, a cylinder is a quadric, i. ... This article does not cite its references or sources. ... Submission can refer to: An object to hand in A proposal for a presentation at an academic conference Domination and submission, where it is opposite in meaning to dominance. ...

Foucault included the panopticon in his discussion of power to illustrate the idea of lateral surveillance, or self-policing, that occurs in the text when those who are not in power are made to believe that they are being watched by those who are. His purpose was to show that power would often change the behavior of the subordinate class, and they would often fall into line whether there was a true need to do so or not. Surveillance is the monitoring of behavior. ... Behavior or behaviour (see spelling differences) refers to the actions or reactions of an object or organism, usually in relation to the environment. ... A hierarchy (in Greek hieros = sacred, arkho = rule) is a system of ranking and organizing things. ... Social class refers to the hierarchical distinctions between individuals or groups in societies or cultures. ...

Although the influence of such philosophers as French structuralist Marxist Louis Althusser and Marxists Raymond Williams and Terry Eagleton was essential in shaping the theory of new historicism, a lot of praise must be given to the work done by Foucault. Although some critics believe that these former philosophers have made more of an impact on new historicism as a whole, there is a popularly held recognition that Foucault’s ideas have passed through the new historicist formation in history as a succession of épistémes or structures of thought that shape everyone and everything within a culture (Myers 1989). It is indeed evident that the categories of history used by new historicists are standardised academically. Although the movement is publicly disapproving of the periodisation of academic history, the uses to which new historicists put the Foucauldian notion of the épistéme amount to very little more than the same practice under a new and improved label (Myers 1989).

Insofar as Greenblatt has been explicit in expressing a theoretical orientation, he has identified the ethnography and theoretical anthropology of Clifford Geertz as highly influential. Ethnography (from the Greek ethnos = nation and graphein = writing) refers to the qualitative description of human social phenomena, based on fieldwork. ... Anthropology (from the Greek word άνθρωπος, human or person) consists of the study of humanity (see genus Homo). ... Clifford James Geertz (born August 23, 1926 in San Francisco) is an American anthropologist serving as professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey. ...

Criticism

New historicism has, like most studies, suffered from criticism, most particular from the clashing views of postmodernists. Our society today is seen as being post-modern and that view has been rejected by new historicism and has somewhat ignited the 'culture wars' (Seaton, 2000). The main points of this argument are that new historicism, unlike post-modernism, acknowledges the fact that almost all historic views, accounts, and facts they use contain bias. As Carl Rapp states: 'they often appear to be saying, "We are the only ones who are willing to admit that all knowledge is contaminated, including even our own"'(Myers 1989).

References

 Myers, D G 1989, The New Historicism in literary study, viewed 27 April 2006, <http://www-english.tamu.edu/pers/fac/myers/historicism.html> 

Further reading

• Foucault, Michel. Discipline and Punish. Translation of Surveiller et Punir. Vintage, 1979.
• Greenblatt, Stephen. Renaissance Self-Fashioning. U Chicago P, 1980.
• Orgel, Stephen. The Authentic Shakespeare. Routledge, 2002.

 Dixon, C 2005, Important people in New Historicism, viewed 26 April 2006, <http://www.gsw.edu/~english/NewHistoricismSite/New%20Historicism%20People.htm>. Felluga, D 2003, General introduction to New Historicism, viewed 28 April 2006, <http://www.purdue.edu/guidetotheory/newhistoricism/modules/introduction.html>. Hedges, W 2000, New Historicism explained, viewed 20 March 2006 <http://www.sou.edu/English/Hedges/Sodashop/Rcenter/Theory/Explaind/nhistexp.htm> Murfin, R. & Ray, S 1998, The Bedford glossary of critical and literary terms, Bedford Books, St Martins. Myers, D G 1989, The New Historicism in literary study, viewed 27 April 2006, <http://www-english.tamu.edu/pers/fac/myers/historicism.html> Rice, P & Waugh, P 1989, Modern literary theory: a reader, 2nd edn, Edward Arnold, Melbourne. Seaton, J 1999, The metaphysics of postmodernism, viewed 29 April 2006, <http://www.nhinet.org/seatonr.htm> The Australian concise Oxford dictionary 2004, 4th edn, Oxford University Press,South Melbourne. 

External links

• New Historicism from the Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism
• Warren Hedges, "New Historicism explained"
• To the Latest Generation, a 2005 Louisiana State University doctoral dissertation by Jeff Smithpeters which examines several recent US Civil War novels, asking the kinds of questions New Historicists typically ask of literary texts and performing the sort of archival research New Historicists advocate