B.A. (Hons.

) English III Year Mid-Term Examination

Paper IX (d): Literary Theory

Time: 3 hours Max. Marks: 75

Attempt all FOUR questions. The first question has three parts and the second two. Each
of the parts in the first question and in the second must be answered.

Q. 1. Attempt all three parts:

(a) Briefly outline Gramsci’s use of the term ‘intellectual’.
OR
Describe Althusser’s example of the ‘hail’. How does it illustrate his theory of
ideology?
(11)

(b) Comment on Showalter’s understanding of ‘the female imagination’.

OR
Briefly describe and analyze the idea that patriarchy is founded on homosexuality.
(11)

(c) Write a short note on the “scandal of the incest prohibition”.

OR
Critically comment upon the following extract:
“Successively, and in a regulated fashion, the centre receives different forms or names.
The history of metaphysics, like the history of the West, is the history of these metaphors
and metonymies.”
(11)

Q. 2. Attempt both parts:

(a) Briefly describe Eagleton’s understanding of Formalism, in his ‘Introduction’.
OR
What, according to Eagleton, constitutes the literary?
(6)

(b) Write a short note on the terms ‘base’ and ‘superstructure’ in Marxist theories.
OR
Critically and conceptually distinguish ‘Gender’ from ‘Sex’
(6)

Q. 3. How does Raymond Williams elaborate the statement that "certain forms of social
relationship are deeply embodied in certain forms of art" in his essay ‘Forms’?
OR
Explain the theory of Cultural Materialism with a detailed analysis of the terms
"culture" and "materialism".
(15)
Q. 4. In his book Said demonstrates that Orientalism was allied to the political
expediency of colonialism. Elucidate this through a few examples from the text.
OR
Discuss, following Gauri Viswanathan, the factors that led to the rise of English
literary studies in India.
(15)