Answer all four (4) questions: two questions on Deconstruction and two questions on Psychoanalysis Each answer must be 250 words in length (total is 1000 words). You are required to comply with word limits. They encourage you to be succinct, precise and clear, and they also provide a good indicator of the depth to which you are expected to go. 10% word limit margin applies for each answer (10% margin: min. 225 – 275 max). Each answer is typically one paragraph, but it may extend to two paragraphs as long as the word limit is respected. You should use scholarly sources you find through your independent research – avoid lengthy quotations from secondary sources.
NOTE: Since these are reflective exercises, don’t rely too heavily on secondary sources — work on developing your own thinking in relation to the readings instead. Show evidence of engaging with what are objectively difficult ideas and sincerely trying to think them through. Be wary of repeating the same point several times over in slightly different phrasing! Present a concise, cogent and clear answer to the set questions. Each answer must use at least one
(1) relevant theoretical reading. Your answers should follow the requirements of academic writing including the formal tone and referencing conventions (MLA). Place the relevant list of Works Cited after each answer. Deconstruction 1. Identifying binary oppositions is practical way into deconstructive reading. So, identify the sets binaries used in “Cinderella”. Once you have identified relevant sets of oppositions, reflect on how the binaries are contributing to the production of meaning within the story.
2. Consider Deconstruction as a textual strategy alongside New Criticism. These two modalities have essentially different aims, methods and outcomes yet both engage intimately with the language of the text. For instance, think of the New Critical reading of “Cinderella” you did and compare it to a Deconstructive reading of the same text. Which reading do you find most illuminating? Which do you feel ‘reveals’ the text most effectively? Do you think that these strategies are mutually exclusive, or could they be used together? NOTE: my analysis of new criticism was that “it helps treat a text as complete, but being mindful of surrounding factors often proves a more enriching approach” Psychoanalysis Questions
3. In his “Insistence of the Letter in the Unconscious” Lacan recounts the story of a boy and girl arriving by train at a station. Lacan uses this story to illustrate that language (and the relationship between signifier and signified) is innately figurative and non-referential. How does the story work to illustrate this? If you’re having trouble here as some clues:
1) Think carefully about the language of the story. Lacan argues that human subjectivity is constituted by the moment of entry into language.
2) You may wish to ask yourself the following: if this story be read as a fable of this process? Also, consider, given psychoanalysis is gendered, the significance of the fact that while the little boy perceives ‘Ladies’ at the moment of entry into language, the little girl perceives ‘Gentlemen’.
NOTE: Lacan’s writings can be difficult and complex but your familiarity with Saussure’s linguistic analysis of the sign and the basic tenets of Freudian psychoanalysis should hold you in good stead. Laplanche and Pontalis’s The Language of Psychoanalysis (1983) is a useful reference guide to terminology, and you can find extended glosses of terms on some of the psychoanalytic sites.
4. Think about the development of ideas that we have traced from New Criticism to Structuralism to Deconstruction and – finally – Psychoanalysis. Pay particular attention to the way in which Saussure’s theorisation of semiotics, particularly of the arbitrary nature of signs, has influenced Structuralism, Deconstruction and now Psychoanalysis. What other basic theoretical premises are common to all of these modalities?
