Reviews the contributions of feminist critics to the study of women's lives. (DD)

Describes how a women's studies class explored the stories of students' mothers, grandmothers, and other women through readings and oral history. (DD)

Argues for the canonicity of "Sonnet: The Token," a John Donne poem whose authorship has been in doubt for some decades. Employs deconstruction as its critical approach, though that approach is nearly passe in Renaissance studies, and it calls the issue of authorship into question. (TB)

Argues that the combined lessons of critical theory, classroom practice, and contemporary history dictate not only a revision of the curriculum and pedagogy of "American" literature courses, but a forceful uprooting of the conceptual model defining the field itself. Suggests the construction of a multicultural and dialogical paradigm for…

Examines four factors contributing to the polarization in the current debates concerning the literary canon. Investigates how two groups of teachers approach the study of literature not as an impasse but as a dialectical interchange. Argues that the four factors informing canon debates need not be resolved. (HB)

Examines the meaning of the word "history" as used in the common phrase "literary history" by critics and scholars. Asserts the differences between historical scholarship and literary history. Argues that the grounding activity of literary history is insulated from the relativism insisted upon by poststructuralist theorizing.…

Argues for the study of popular female authors of the Victorian era on two grounds: (1) issues concerning Victorian female writers are relevant to problems in Victorian literary scholarship and to discussions about the relationship between literary theory and feminism; and (2) their works were printed on acid paper. (TB)

Considers the possibility that engaging a text need not proceed through a preexisting program and, further, that another style of engagement may indicate intriguing possibilities for resistance. Demonstrates a type of criticism called "productive reading." Concludes that it is not sufficient to assume that reading must proceed through a…

Indicates how current stylistic criticism might engage ideological issues by more fully developing M. Bakhtin's ideas through an approach called cultural stylistics. Notes that Bakhtin's own work was very much concerned with the divorce between ideological and formalist analysis, and his "sociological stylistics" was intended to…

Questions the rhetoric of reproof and asserts the authors' belief that the practice of scholarly critique is generally salutary. Hopes to stand as a testimony to the firm belief in the importance of critique in the ongoing scholarly conversation. Considers ethical problems with (and use of) the rhetoric of reproof, and ethical awareness and the…

The idea that "the personal is political" is both a commonplace in composition studies and something many have not yet fully theorized. The literature on personal writing tends to explore the relationship of the personal to academic discourse and the ethics and problems of intruding into students' lives. Because of this emphasis on the individual,…

The Watergate tapes reveal that Nixon and his aides were the prime victims of their own rhetoric in that they began to believe what they tried to sell the public. (JH)

Presents Hannah Arendt's views on the relationship between art and society, concluding that "worldlessness" or world alienation is reflected in modern literature and literary criticism. (DD)

Describes how one teacher incorporates stereo recordings of Shakespeare's plays into his course. (DD)