How to (Re)discipline Literature through a Cultural Studies Lens

2026-01-14T10:34:29+02:00

Starting from Valentine Cunningham’s dichotomy between “good reading” (107), i.e. the ideology-free reading of the literary text, and “bad reading” (88), that is, reading theory against the textual grain, this article aims to discuss the lures and ruses of cultural studies, once applied to the study of literature. I shall focus on the literature-cultural studies dyad, which in the past four decades has led to a revision of academic curricula and the literary canon and, most importantly, to the socio-political understanding of literature as text in context. Special attention will be paid to the lack of consensus on cultural studies as a well-established discipline: while some scholars and critics take the discipline as a means whereby literary study can mirror different ideologies, power relations, hegemony, social practices and humanity in general, others vilify cultural studies because it makes literary studies impure. As I argue, literature can be read through a cultural studies lens as long as their knowledge and methods of analysis are duly appropriated and employed by their practitioners.

The English Bard and French Theory

2026-01-14T10:28:09+02:00

This essay revisits the question of Shakespeare’s contemporaneity in light of the interpretive frameworks that have dominated the last half-century of literary criticism. Beginning with Jan Kott’s assertion that Shakespeare is “our contemporary,” I examine how the Frankfurt School and “French Theory” reshaped Shakespearean studies through Marxist, feminist, queer, postcolonial, and ecocritical lenses. While acknowledging some of the insights these approaches have brought, I also express scepticism toward their ideological excesses, which often obscure Shakespeare’s artistry and meaning. Drawing on examples from the sonnets, Romeo and Juliet, Othello, The Tempest, and other plays, I argue for a return to historical-philological methods and for the cultivation of aesthetic wonder in the study of literature. In an age dominated by radical theory, daring to affirm the banality that Shakespeare was a great artist, not a social fighter or a fierce representative of “patriarchy” may itself be a radical act.

Linguaculture

How to (Re)discipline Literature through a Cultural Studies Lens

The English Bard and French Theory