Systems Theories and the Study of Literature and Culture

Abstract

“Systems Theories and the Study of Literature and Culture” introduces the ACLA Forum on systemic and empirical approaches for the study of literature and culture. While both micro- and macro-systemic approaches have been prominent in the study of literature and culture in European scholarship since at least the 1980s, these approaches remain under-utilized in humanities scholarship in the U.S. This essay provides definitions or tenets of systemic and empirical frameworks for the study of literature and culture and aims to show how these approaches highlight the social relevance of the study of literature.

Approaching literature and culture and/as ‘intelligent systems’

“…System theory has been a popular approach in literary and cultural studies (Zepetnek 2015), beginning with formalism and structuralism. As argued by David B. Kronenfeld ‘culture […] is best understood as a heterogeneously distributed collective system of pragmatic knowledge’ (Kronenfeld 2018, 2).…”

“…Systems, therefore, are not closed or static but open and dynamic and can adapt to new environments and changing (sociocultural or technological) conditions. System theory has been a popular approach in literary and cultural studies (Zepetnek 2015), beginning with formalism and structuralism. As argued by David B.…”