Focus directly on New Historical theory and how to apply it to help us understand texts in different ways.
Remember the questions we have been considering all semester?
• What language/characters/events present in the work reflect the current events of the author’s day?
• Are there words in the text that have changed their meaning from the time of the writing?
• How are such events interpreted and presented?
• How are events’ interpretation and presentation a product of the culture of the author?
• Does the work’s presentation support or condemn the event?
• Can it be seen to do both?
• How does this portrayal criticize the leading political figures or movements of the day?
• How does the literary text function as part of a continuum with other historical/cultural texts from the same period?
• How can we use a literary work to “map” the interplay of both traditional and subversive discourses circulating in the culture in which that work emerged and/or the cultures in which the work has been interpreted?
• How does the work consider traditionally marginalized populations?
