PRESENTATION

Russian Formalism
Presented by Group F
Russian Formalism
Definition
School of thought that mainly focused on form or
structure of the literary work instead of its content.

Historical background
Originated during World War 1 in 1920s
In the former Soviet Union
Development
The Moscow Linguistic Circle (founded in 1915)
Prague Linguistic Circle
 Key Features
 They focused on form rather than content
 They viewed literary language different from everyday speech
 They believe in “Literariness” refreshes the common language.

(The sum of special linguistic and formal properties that

distinguish literary texts from non-literary texts, according to
the theories of Russian Formalism.)

 They were interested in “Literary devices”

(specific technique that allows writer to convey deeper meaning)
 They emphasize making this Unfamiliar or de- familiar.
 De familiarization is the opposite of Automatization.
concept of “Defamiliarization”, proposed by Viktor Shklovsky
in his Art as Technique, 
• It is the artistic technique of presenting to audiences
common things in an unfamiliar or strange way so they
could gain new perspectives and see the world differently.

 Russian Formalism made a distinction between plot and

story
Russian Formalism and New Criticism
Russian Formalism New Criticism

School of thought that mainly focused New Criticism was a formalist

on form or structure of the literary work movement in literary theory that
instead of its content. dominated American literary criticism
in the middle decades of the 20th
century
Focused on form Focused on form and content

Originated in Russia Originated in north America

Russian formalist believed that there is New Critics, on the other hand,
a distinction between form and content, believed that the form and content of
and their focus was on the form or the text are closely connected and
structure of a text cannot be analyzed separately.
 SCHOOLS OF RUSSIAN FORMALISM

There are three schools of Russian Formalism:

 OPOJAZ
Boris Eikenbaum, Jury Tynianov
 MLC
Roman Jakobson , Boris Tomashevsky
 PLC
Tzvetan Todorov, Roman Jakobson, Jam Mukarvasky, Rano
Wellek
OPOJAZ
• Group of linguists and literary critics In St. Petersburg
• Responsible for the development of Russian Formalism and
also literary semiotics.
MLC
Moscow linguistic circle
Was a group of theorists in moscow .
Interested in semiotics , literary theory and linguistics\
PLC
 Prague linguistic circle
Was influential group of Linguists and literary critics.
Developed methods of structuralist literary analysis.