WHAT ARE THE STANDARDS OF

LITERATURE?
 1. UNIVERSALITY
It appeals to everyone regardless of culture, race, gender, and
time which are all considered significant; timeless, timely
and forever relevant; different perceptions, orientations towards
fundamental truths and conditions; the domain that recurs across
genetically and areally unrelated traditions with greater
frequency than would be predicted by chance
 2. ARTISTRY
All art is the expression of life in forms of
truth and beauty; it is the reflection of some
truth and beauty which are in the world, but
which remain unnoticed until brought to
our attention by some sensitive human soul.
2. ARTISTRY
 3. Intellectual Value
Literature stimulates critical thinking that enriches mental
processes of abstract and reasoning, making man realize the
fundamental truths of life and its nature; stimulate thought,
enrich intellectual life with the truth of human nature;
 4. Suggestiveness
It appeals to emotion and imagination
rather than to intellect; it is not so much
with what it says as what it awakens in us
that constitute its charm; he doesn’t state
any fact or expect an answer.
 5. Spiritual value
Literature elevates the spirit and the soul and this has the
power to motivate, and inspire drawn from the suggested
morals or lessons of the different literary genres; bringing
moral values to the realm of the physical world; the
necessity to reflect and inspire to become a better person
 6. Permanence

The world does not live without seeing its

hurry and bustle and apparent absorption in
material things. It does not willingly let any
beautiful thing perish; it can be read again
and again while giving fresh delights and
insights.
6. Permanence
 7.Style
This is personal standard, as such that it is only in a mechanical
sense that style is the adequate expression of thought, or the peculiar
manner of expressing thought, or any other of the definitions that are
found in the rhetoric. In a deeper sense, style is the man that is the
unconscious expression of the writer’s own personality.
 LITERARY
CONSTRUCT
 A. Construct
Ideology/ Philosophy/ History/ Aesthetics: Colonialism
The idea illustrates how an individual can be alienated by the
product of his labor. For example, if you are a worker in a
garment industry, while you produce clothing for a company,
you are paid for your labor but not receive the equal amount of
invested time and talent in the merchandise. You will not be
able to sell, consume or profit from the object. Your work,
equivalent to time and skill, becomes the commodity sold and
not your inherent talent. The company who hired you will get
the royalty, profit and power to own the product of your talent.
 A. Construct
Psychology: Identity
Identity is conceived through a systematic theory of the
mind and human psychic development from the concept
of Psychoanalysis by Sigmund Freud. In classic literature,
identity is the mask that the character literature wears as
he represents the person who wrote it.  Representation
may be personal or impersonal, or a part of the reality of
the writer; but his writing is not the writer.
A. Construct
Psychology: Identity
 A. Construct
Race and Ethnicity (Black, White and Asian) and
Gender (Male, Female, Other Voices)
To be specific with culture, it means
identification of race, ethnicity, and gender.
Lived experiences are cultivated in the culture.
An individual cannot live apart from his society,
and the “knowledge, belief, art, morals, law,
custom and any other capabilities and habits
acquired by man as a member of society”
 A. Construct
Race and Ethnicity (Black, White and Asian) and
Gender (Male, Female, Other Voices)
the problem of race is not just about the color of skin, but what is associated
with the color in terms of economy, geography, politics, and power. If you are
black, your social position would be categorized as material wealth, nation of
origin, affiliation, and influence. If you are a millionaire black male American who
has a position in government, the person who has slight authority over you is a
millionaire white female American who has a position in government or
influence in society. The person above the millionaire white female American
who has a position or influence in the society is a male while American with the
same stature.  Hence, this hegemonic (ruling context) “colonial” consciousness
manifests in all spheres of the society, dominating all other relations and cultural
productions.
3. Continuum: New Historicism
New historicism is historicist in orientation, however,
influenced by theories in language and textuality that
question the dominant modes of reading while engaging
the text to a new interpretation of lived realities.
3. Continuum: New Historicism
Post Colonialism
Basically, post-colonialism is expressed colloquially
as after colonialism, then what? What does the agent do
with his colonial nature, or how does he live his life after
being colonized? What remains of his ideological
construct? Will he remain as subservient to foreign rule,
or will he recreate his reality with the new freedom he
gained? 
 3. Continuum: New Historicism
Deconstruction
Deconstruction is a philosophical term or activity initiated by
Jacques Derrida. It is mainly a critique of concepts and
hierarchies which are essential to traditional criteria of
certainty, identity, and truth. These truths are determined only
by repressing and forgetting other elements which become a
thought that was not spoken or written, or not thinkable. 
 3. Continuum: New Historicism
Deconstruction in Gender and Race

Representation in gender and race: The question highlighted for

example in race or gender is who or what is the basis of one’s
representation? This type includes the question of origin (where
one comes from) and closure (to legitimize belonging with
another). Before an agent is able to deconstruct any thought,
there is a need to refer to the same from its origin.
3. Continuum: New Historicism
Translation

Translation from English to other languages and vice versa: Translation is a branch of literary
criticism that brings close analysis of language through convergence in the language (Childs
& Fowler, 2006, p.243). One cannot separate form and content. The language used in the
original text has embedded in it the life, intelligence, and culture of a group of people. In the
same way, other languages essentially bear the same characteristics in a unique way. The
coming together of the unique experiences both in form and content, in the cross-cultural
activity provides the creative energy for convergence and exchange. 
 3. Continuum: New Historicism
Critiquing: Excerpts and Examples in the Discourse

Example #1: 
Poetry – Displacement Theory
In an example of “Hay(Na)Ku” poems introduced by Eileen Tabios, the
haiku windows/branch light/reflecting shadow selves (p.15) illustrate a
repressed self that finds its expression in nature, specifically, the light and
the branch of trees. The mention of "shadow selves" reflect an image of the
ideal self which is broken as the light reached the window.
Thank You for Listening!
Don't Hesitate To Ask Any Questions