Term Paper

LITS3304 CONTEMPORARY CRITICAL THEORY:
(POST-)STRUCTURALISMS AND POST-COLONIALISMS

TERM PAPER, SEMESTER II, 2007-2008

The term paper is based on Module One; answer ONE (1) of the following questions, referring closely to the text(s) of the theorist in question:

1. Compare the views of at least two of the following theorists on the topic of communication:

Ferdinand de Saussure Course in General Linguistics
V. N. Volosinov Marxism and the Philosophy of Language: Part II
Jacques Derrida "Différance"
Stuart Hall "Encoding / Decoding"
Henry Louis Gates, Jr. The Signifying Monkey: "The Signifying Monkey and the Language of Signifyin(g)"

2. Compare the views of at least two of the following theorists on the nature of the social formation:

Claude Lévi-Strauss "Structural Analysis in Linguistics and in Anthropology"
Louis Althusser "Contradiction and Overdetermination: Notes for an Investigation"
Michel Foucault "Two Lectures" / "Governmentality"
Stuart Hall "Race, Articulation, and Societies Structured in Dominance"
David Scott "Colonial Governmentality"

3. Compare the views of at least two of the following theorists on the nature of the human being (the mind, the body, and / or the self):

Émile Benveniste "Subjectivity in Language"
V. N. Volosinov Marxism and the Philosophy of Language: Part I
Louis Althusser "Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses"
Michel Foucault "The Subject and Power"
Stuart Hall "Cultural Identity and Diaspora"

DEADLINE: 6 pm, Thursday, March 27, 2008

LENGTH: 7 pages maximum (typewritten, double-spaced)

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