Today, you need...● unit packets● writing utensil● highlighter (optional)

** PLEASE, Have your homework out on your desk

and ready for me to check! **

Quick DebriefTell someone close to you:

How did you use what we learned about Formalist Theory to analyze The Giving

Tree?

I’ll be coming around to stamp homework.

Let’s review quick...1. Why did we use the tinted sunglasses analogy to

help explain critical literary theory?2. How is Reader’s Response Theory different from

Formalist Theory?If you finish early...3. Why do you think we talked about Reader’s

Response and Formalist Theory first?4. Are either of these theories more important or

valid than the other? Be able to explain your answer.

So, I overheard something yesterday...Student A: Why do we have to do this?Student B: Do what?Student A: Look at this movie and that book in all these different ways.Student B: She said it in the PowerPoint, I think.Student A: Yeah, I know, but I still don’t get why.

That is an important, and incredibly valid question.Let’s talk about it.

“For knowledge isn’t just something we acquire; it’s something we are or hope to become. Knowledge is what constitutes our relationship to ourselves and to our world, for it is the lens through which we view ourselves and the world. Change the lens and you change both the view and the viewer. This principle is what makes knowledge at once so frightening and so liberating, so painful and so utterly, utterly joyful.” — Lois Tyson, 1999

This is why.

New Historicist Theory

An Introduction

New Historicist Theory● considers historical

context present at time of publication and in the text’s settingo ∴ meaning changes based on

society, politics, economics, and culture of both time periods

● requires outside research

Source: Historic Houses Association

How can you apply this theory?

Try asking questions like…1.What global, national, and local events

were important…a. at the time of publication?b. at the time in which the story is set?

2.How might those events have influenced the text?

Application to Maleficent1.Make some inferences.

a. What’s the setting of this text? 2.What do we know about that time

period in history? (Is extra research needed?)

3.Why is this setting significant to the story being told?

4.What do we know about our modern society?

5.Why is it important that this (markedly different) retelling was produced today?

An Introduction

Marxist Theory

Marxist Theory● social class matters

o affects economic, political, and social advantages

o impacts beliefs, values, perceptions, and ways of thinking

● power struggles are significant o highlight conflicts

between “haves” and “have nots”

● ∴ meaning is made by exploring who has power and why

economic power

+ social-class membership

societal organization

How can you apply this theory?

Try asking questions like…1.Who/What struggles for power? Why?*2.How does the social class of the

characters play a role?*__3. What widespread (or dominant)

beliefs are present in the text? 4. Are there other beliefs that clash with

them?

Application to Maleficent1.Social groups2.Plot characters using a social ladder3.Primary power struggles?

a. * any conflicts that could be “class” conflicts

On your own...Think about your own social position, either at IHS or in our American society. How has that impacted your reading?

Your turn!1. (Re)read Shel Silverstein’s The Giving

Tree.2.Analyze the text using what you’ve

learned about the New Historicist and Marxist Theories and our class models that analyze Maleficent.

Whatever you don’t finish in class is homework. So, make good use of your

time!