The Validity in Interpretations of Stories

Structuralism is still going on. It is a profound influence on literary criticism. It is current thinking in post structuralism, it follows drum-structuralism. Richter leaves out the symbol of the sign (the oval with the line through it). The nature of the sign and the role of difference in the sign. With structuralism we enter the era of high theory, as it is known in contemporary literature. It is deeply philosophical and doesn’t even begin in a literary standpoint. New historicism doesn’t begin in literature either. Structuralism pointed us to another linguistic place. Ontology: Study of being. The one we may hold is linked to realism. A realist believes there is an external reality outside of ourselves, independent and objective of our looking at it. Anti-structuralist. Structuralism is anti realistic. Epistemology: the study of knowledge. Empirical, empiricism—we gather knowledge through experience. Structuralists believe knowledge comes through language, not through experience. :
1) Psychology: independent selves, we use language for this, this can be called instrumentalism—it is likely our attitude towards language is something that we use as an instrument, we use language for certain purposes of communication, and thought. This is anti-structuralist: structuralists argue that language uses us, because language provides resources that just flow through us.
2) Linguistics: referentialist /referentialism, an attitude towards what language does for us. Language works because it refers to things, or classes of things in the real world. Structuralism: anti-referentialist –it’s not a thing or class of thing, but a mental entity. It has nothing to do with the real world. There are trees if our language system has a construct and system for it, but if our language system doesn’t, then we have no trees. Language does not get its meaning from referring to the real world. But it gets its meanings from language
3) Philosophy: the identity of things, and of identities. Indentitarinism. In structuralism, there are not things only differences. Like positive identities. The role of difference is very important in understanding this.



Lyotard, Jean-François. "The Postmodern Condition." Literary Theory: An Anthology. 2nd ed. Ed. Julie Rivkin and Michael Ryan. Malden, Ma: Blackwell Publishing, 2004. 355-62.