Stepping Between Text And Culture

As a means or a mode, linguistic criticism started in Russia as Russian formalism in the early 1900's. Having developed and evolved into New Criticism and French Structuralism, it became a particular critical means in western literary theory. But with the appearance of de-structuralism, it faded into dreariness in 1970's. In 1980's, it was introduced into China , bringing on a gust of powerful linguistic upsurge and deep influence and enlightenment on Chinese literature criticism.Linguistic criticism aims to study literature by using the conception,terminology,category,theory and method of linguistics, which is actually a full fusion of linguistics and literature criticism . In the west, it regards literature as an independent existence, the reality of literature is the language and form in texts. So the literature criticism focuses on the textual language and form and makes elaborate analysis, completely regardless of the world outside the text.The mode, which widely differs from traditional sociological criticism and impressionist criticism arouses strong interest in Chinese scholars. It has gone through the period from translation,spreading,expounding,evaluation to suspicion,alteration,reconstruction and putting into practice , and has gained extensive and profound study in China. While the linguistic criticism in the western world completely cuts off the relationship of text and the outside , making closed textual analysis and resulting in unilateralism and extremeness, Chinese scholars actively attempt to explore a new mode of criticism . This dissertation argues that this new critical mode is the full fusion of the textual form analysis and aesthetic culture analysis, which not only pays attention to the subtle linguistic analysis, but also values the excavation of the abundant aesthetic implication and culture connotation in the text. In addition, this new critical mode is not only a break through of the pure western form of criticism, but also a transcendence of Chinese traditional analysis, and thus becoming the unique Chinese linguistic criticism.This paper suggests that in the transformation from"western linguistic criticism in China"to"Chinese linguistic criticism", Chinese scholars have taken three different angles : aesthetic , rhetorical...