Contributions To Critical Theory
Culler believes that the linguistic-structuralist model can help “formulate the rules of particular systems of convention rather than simply affirm their existence." He posits language and human culture as similar.
In Structuralist Poetics Culler warns against applying the technique of linguistics directly to literature. Rather, the "'grammar' of literature" is converted into literary structures and meaning. Structuralism is defined as a theory resting on the realization that if human actions or productions have meaning there must be an underlying system that makes this meaning possible, since an utterance has meaning only in the context of a preexistent system of rules and conventions.
Culler proposes that we use literary theory not to try to understand a text but rather to investigate the activity of interpretation. In several of his works, he speaks of a reader who is particularly "competent." In order to understand how we make sense of a text, Culler identifies common elements that different readers treat differently in different texts. He suggests there are two classes of readers, “the readers as field of experience for the critic (himself a reader)” and the future readers who will benefit from the work the critic and previous readers have done.
Culler's critics complain of his lack of distinction between literature and the institution of writing in general.
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