Approaches in Writing a Critique/Review

There are various ways or standpoints by

which you can analyze and critique a certain
material. You can critique a material based on its
technical aspects, its approach to gender, your
reaction as the audience, or through its portrayal of
class struggle and social structure.
Formalism
 claims that literary works contain intrinsic
properties and treats each work as a distinct
work of art. In short, it posits that the key to
understanding a text is through.
 Following are the common aspects looked
into when using formalism are as follows:
 Author’s techniques in resolving contradictions within the work
 Central passage that sums up the entirety of the work
 Contribution of parts and the work as a whole to its aesthetic quality
 Relationship of the form and the content
 Use of imagery to develop the symbols in the work
 Interconnectedness of various parts of the work
 Paradox, ambiguity, and irony in the work
 Unity in the work
Feminist Criticism (Feminism)
 focuses on how literature presents women as
subjects of socio-political, psychological, and
economic oppression. It also reveals how
aspects of our culture are patriarchal, i.e., how
our culture views men as superior and women as
inferior.
 Following are the common aspects looked
into Feminism:
 how culture determines gender
 how gender equality (or lack of it) is presented in the text
 how gender issues are presented in literary works and other aspects
of human production and daily life
 how women are socially, politically, psychologically, and economically
oppressed by patriarchy
 how patriarchal ideology is an overpowering presence
Reader-Response Criticism
 is concerned with the reviewer’s reaction as an
audience of a work. This approach claims that
the reader’s role cannot be separated from the
understanding of the work; a text does not have
meaning until the reader reads it and interprets it.
Readers are therefore not passive and distant,
but are active consumers of the material
presented to them.
 Following are the common aspects looked
into when using Reader-Response Criticism:

 Interaction between the reader and the text in creating meaning.

 The impact of the reader’s delivery of sounds and visuals on
enhancing and changing meaning.
Marxist Criticism
 is concerned with differences between economic
classes and implications of a capitalist system,
such as the continuing conflicts between the
working class and the elite. Hence, it attempts to
reveal that the ultimate source of people’s
experience is the socioeconomic system.
 Following are the common aspects looked
into when using Marxist Criticism:

 Social class as represented in the work

 Social class of the writer or creator
 Social class of the characters
 Conflicts and interactions between economic classes