Critical literary theory embodies ideas and methods that are used during practical reading in literature. These theories entail the underlying principle where one uses a critical analysis of the text to understand its meaning. About all interpretation of literature draws based on theory but can be used to justify various kinds of critical analysis. It is a critical theory that shows the relationship between the text and the author. The critical theory offers different approaches to help understand the role of historical context while interpreting a literature text regarding the relevance of language and unconscious elements found in the text.
On the other hand, reader-response assumes that the literature work takes place through a mutual relationship between the text and the reader. The meaning of the text is formulated through a transaction between the text and the reader around a particular context (Brooks & Browne, 2012). When readers develop responses for a particular text, they facilitate an active and meaningful reading. This activeness allows the readers to develop emotional and intellectual engagement with the text, ensuring that the learners have a better awareness of the text and comprehend it deeply.
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New criticism, a formalist movement in literature theories, emphasized the closing reading of a text, especially poetry, to ensure that the reader discovers how literature works as a self-contained text. The new criticism believes that the meaning and the structure of a text are strongly connected. They need to be analyzed together when one wants to understand the meaning of the text rather than analyze them separately (Selden et al., 2018). Therefore, the new critic examines what the text says and how the saying is done. The reader needs to examine the whole text and its relationship to its structural composition. For example, when analyzing a text, a new critic suggests that one look at how a piece of work by examining its complexities such as ironies, paradox, and ambiguities. All these theories can be applied in the current curriculum to enable the readers to understand the literature. To understand a given text, learners need to critically analyze the historical and unconscious elements of the text to understand what the author intends to say. Some of the author's historical contexts greatly influence the literature writing of many authors. Also, building a good reader response can improve literacy studies. The classroom can incorporate discussions where learners can express their emotions towards the text and trigger a thoughtful response and have a different perspective about a text, which helps them understand the text.
Basal and anthologies teach learners how to read by using material produced for commercial purposes. The materials are designed to give reading instruction to the readers where the reader is taught to focus on basic linguistic concepts and vocabularies. These allow the learner to understand different languages that enable them to get the meaning of the text they read. The Literature-based approached teaches learners how to read by exposing them to various literature materials. The learners are required to analyze different texts, which helps the learners develop literacy skills by having a real experience in analyzing literature writings (Siaulys, 2013). They shape their responses when they encounter different literary writings since they will have experiences analyzing various, which helps them think critically. Individualized reading and writing approach on teaching content and setting instructions based on abilities and interest of various learners. Individualized reading and writing workshops are organized to train readers and writers on various literature skills depending on their interests. The workshops allow learners to develop great critical analysis skills. In an integrated instructional approach, the learner can use the prior knowledge to support the skills being taught by the literature instructor. By allowing this cross-sharing, the learners use their experiences and the new skills more complexly. This shapes their emotional reactions, which shapes their different perspectives on the literature, which, when deeply analyzed, increases the learners' understanding of a text.
Almost every text requires readers to do literary analysis, which incorporates critical analysis and developing reader responses to help understand the meaning of a given literature writing. However, they are several strategies that literature programs can incorporate to ensure that learners understand and recognize the use of reader-response theory, critical literary theory, and new criticism theory and ensure they can create culturally responsive learning in the classroom. One strategy is literary teaching through collaborative inquiry. Such can be done by grouping students, assigning a text for them to analyze through a certain lens, and presenting their findings to the classroom. This allows learners to have a deeper understanding of the text through different lenses. Another approach is to allow the students to leverage their cultural capital and present their views and feelings based on their cultural experiences (Burnham, 2020 ). Given that learners are from different cultural backgrounds, each learner presents a different perspective towards the text, which can help other students critically analyze the text depending on the idea presented hence a deeper understanding.
Understanding a context can be done by using writing skills where readers get actively engaged in reading and analyzing a text. One of the ways of engaging readers through is writing is by encouraging inferring writing. This type of writing allows readers to bring together the spoken and what is not spoken in the text and the reader's knowledge. When the reader writes down what do these ideas throughout the text, they can construct the meaning of a text. The written down ideas from their emotional reactions based on cultural experiences and critical analysis of the spoken and silent element of the text enable them to comprehend the text deeply. It is also essential for writing down questions that other learners will answer as a strategy to use writing while reading. The answers will be answers by peers according to their viewpoint. This increases the understanding of the text.
References
Brooks, W., & Browne, S. (2012). Towards a Culturally Situated Reader Response Theory. Children's Literature in Education , 75-85.
Burnham, K. (2020 ). 5 Culturally Responsive Teaching Strategies. Northeastern Unversity Graduate Program.
Selden, R., Widdowson, P., & Brooker, P. (2018). A Reader's Guide to Contemporary Literary Theory. Taylor & Francis.
Siaulys, K. (2013). A Balanced Literacy Approach to the Classroom. A Senior Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for graduation in the Honors Program Liberty University .
