Voice-Based Literature: The Literary Study In The View Of Media Ecology

For a long time, the text-centric view in literary studies led the worship of text by literary theorists. A series of academic term like "text", "literature" and "literary theory" which was invented with the core of "words" has been support the authority of the words-based literature (the words literature for short). The overemphasis on the literary words, would inevitably lead to the forgotten of the literary voice. When the literary voice was depreciated as one part of the words, literary theorists naturally ignored the research of oral literature which treated the voice as the dominant communication media. Therefore, the major shortcoming in the current literary theory study is the lack of awareness of the bipolar contrast between oral literature and written literature and the lack of analysis about the different characteristics between these two types of literature thinking activities.In 20th century, as the appearance of The Parry-Lord Theory of Oral Composition, western academic circles raised a cultural debate on The Great Divide between Orality and Literacy. Enlightened by Media Ecology's studies on oral literature and written literature, I tried to construct the new concept "voice-based literature" by carefully examined the limitations of "text" in the use of oral literature research in order to enrich and improve the academic terms system of literary theory. This paper was attempted to bring the latest theoretical advances made by the anthropology and folklore in the study of the oral literature into the current literary theory system, forcing an interlocution occurring between oral and written literature research, and it will provide a more comfortable discussion environment for them.This paper is divided into five parts. The first chapter centering on the "text" pointed out an emphasis on text tradition was existed both in China and the Western literary theory. The second chapter introduced the basic theoretical propositions of Media Ecology and its relationship with literary study. The third chapter tried to put forward the new concept "voice-based literature" and accurately express the substantial compositions of the new concept. Chapter four proposed the model of "Performance-Voice-Based Literature-Listening" in the view of voice-based literature by repressing The Parry-Lord Theory of Oral Composition, Performance Theory and Ethnological poetics. Chapter five emphasized the construction of literary theory should pay attention to both the words and voice of literature, as well as the awareness of the bipolar contrast between oral literature and written literature and the different characteristics between these two types of literature thinking activities.