Theory on Theory

This chapter reviews recent contributions to the meta-discourses of theory and criticism. Theory on theory is bound always to be a protean and polymorphous category, and the discussion here is structured by a division into five themes, even though the works reviewed frequently range across more than one of them. Section 1 notes the emergence of a distinctive move to reinsert teaching into discussions of literary studies. Section 2 surveys a range of publications that continue the long work of historicizing theory, particularly in the French vein that is almost synonymous with understandings of (high) theory as a period. Building on that glance backward, Section 3 considers a number of works that propose new approaches or methods for our field. These proposals, at least in part, emerge from a virtually universal sense of crisis in the humanities, which is examined in Section 4. Finally, Section 5 considers the positing of a transdisciplinary world turn that is said to go well beyond the humanities. In this year’s melange of continuing practices, revivals, and innovations, theory on theory is revealed to be a lively and stimulating voice in the cultural conversations of the past year.