START Studying LITERARY THEORY with THIS LECTURE | UGC NET JRF ENGLISH DECEMBER 2026

[00:00:03]Peter conceptual students complated theories.

[00:00:30]easily explain The journey students Don't worry.

[00:01:25]actually I hope you watch this whole video and I'll see you guys at the end of the lecture. Welcome back everyone. In this lecture, we'll talk about the movement from humanism to structuralism to post structurism as it pertains to interpretation of cultural phenomena.

[00:01:46]This lecture does not include names of theorists, their concepts, your top 10 ideas to study to get 10 marks. That's not the kind of lecture it is. So if you're expecting that, please uh do not watch this. What what we are going to learn here are the essential methodologies, essential assumptions and the essential look of these interpretive models. Right? The first one is humanism. Let me describe you uh describe to you a little bit what humanism is. Humanism puts humans at the center of the intellectual exploration.

[00:02:21]That's going to be a very simple definition. That's what the classical antiquity was. That's what Renaissance humanism was. Except in the Renaissance humanism there is slight difference that man is at the man by man I mean human is at the center of the world at the and at the center of man is God. That is a special kind of humanism. What we call individualism which which comes from Protestantism is going to be a humanism which we have right now. Structurism looked at cultural phenomena uh not individually but to identify the larger structures through which they mean. Right? So a structuralist would not look at the novel to learn the morals about humankind but they a structuralist will look at a novel to try to understand how does that novel attain its meaning. This is something that Bath works on. This is something a lot of work on. Post structuralism looks at the method of structuralism and it says that the essential truth that structuralism has figured out is not uh so essential that it is also arbitrary.

[00:03:28]It says there is no structure when we identify a structure in a novel that is how the novel means. This is the structure which allows meaning. If you don't understand this the example will make sense that's why you have two pictures in front of you. Pro structurism will say even that structure is kind of a random thing right it's also not something very uh important anyway there is this and then there is this right these are two pictures that are generated using chat GPD right so first picture has a photograph of friends hanging out they're just chilling having fun and it is part covered by a photograph of a phone uh with WhatsApp on it. Right? You understand this picture? Second picture is that of a board game which is partly covered by a video game remote on top of it. That a console remote on top of it. So what do these pictures mean individually? Let's look what does this picture mean? What is this picture trying to teach you or tell you? What is the moral of this picture?

[00:04:40]>> [snorts] >> when one moral well first of all pause if you cannot think of anything and you want some time and now I'm going to tell you what I think it could mean right of course there are no definite meanings everyone can have different interpretation that's the whole point right one meaning is that this phone with WhatsApp on it is put on this photograph and that implies that in the modern world genuine human connection is replaced by cold devices and cold uh social media right so there are no humans uh people are not hanging out as much because they can just talk to each other on WhatsApp so they hang out lesser so if you did not talk to your friends every day on WhatsApp telling them all the latest tea that you have to share if you could not meet uh if you could not text them maybe you'd meet them more often Right? That's what this image could mean that this genuine human connection is replaced by messaging apps.

[00:05:47]Now, this one is easier to interpret. I think one interpretation could be that a general a community- based game where you sit down with your friends and family you know to play uh a game where you are all in the same space you are sitting together maybe you're having some drinks and some snacks and just having a amazing time with your buddies is replaced by video games for which you don't need anyone to play with. Right?

[00:06:10]Back then there weren't many games you could play by yourself. Right? If you want to let's let's say you want to play Gurya Gurya, you need one more person to play Gurya Gurya with you. All maybe you need one more doll, right? If you wanted to play let's say Gildy Dunda or [clears throat] if you wanted to play cricket, if you wanted to play, I don't know Ludo as you can see here, you needed somebody to play it with. But now you could play Ludo without anyone. You could play Ludo very uh in a very lonely way, right? You can play video games in a very lonely way. Even if there is voice chat, it's not the same. Even if it's a multiplayer game, it's not the same.

[00:06:46]So the humanist interpretation is going to be social media. This example I have removed. Wait one second. The humanist interpretation is going to be that social media is replacing genuine human connection and video games are replacing the social games.

[00:07:03]Um it's not social games but games which are social. You get it right. So what is the essential moral?

[00:07:12]Moral is that we should go for human connection not for cold devices.

[00:07:20]That is what these two pictures mean.

[00:07:24]Now if you notice this, we looked at these pictures to get a moral message which is kind of common sensical, right?

[00:07:33]It's a common sense meaning. That's not to say humanism is common sense, but that is to say humanism is very often ordinary when done by ordinary people like me. There are some very beautiful humanist analysis, some very beautiful humanist works, but usually humanist is kind of benal, right? And structuralism is kind of dull. I'll show you what structuralism is. Now, a structuralist analysis, first of all, try it yourself.

[00:07:59]Look, can you identify a structure?

[00:08:01]Right? Pause and then I'll tell you the structure that I intended.

[00:08:07]Right. So the structure here now the structuralist methodology does not look at individual images. It will only look at what do these in how sorry do these individual images attain meaning. Right?

[00:08:22]I'm not going to look at the images. I'm going to look at how do these mean images attain meaning. So how did I know or I how did I interpret this food this picture in a way to say that human connection is being replaced by cold technology. How did I come to this conclusion? Well, I came to this conclusion because I can see that the photograph is at the bottom and it's partly covered by a phone with WhatsApp on it. Right? Similarly, I see a board game at the bottom which is partly covered by a video game mode on it.

[00:08:56]So structurist doesn't care about what the message of this picture is or what the message of this picture is. It just wants to understand how does that message get conveyed and it will say you know what so the general structure here is if A which is here the phone and here the video game remote if A is on top of B is the photograph and uh here the B is uh uh B is the board game. Right? If A is on top of B and here A is on top of B. If A is on top of B, it implies that B is being replaced by A. Right? So a general structural statement would be if A is on top of B, this implies that B which is more human is being uh replaced.

[00:09:54]That's our type. That's our role guys is being replaced by a which is cold tech.

[00:10:06]Right? So, so what the structuralist did was they did not figure out any meaning in this. They did not figure out okay you need to be inuh available for your friends. You need to be there. You should stop using social media. You should stop playing games. Suchism does not give a does not care about any of that. Right? It only cares about how is that meaning conveyed. It is conveyed by putting one thing on top of the other.

[00:10:29]Now if there was a picture where there was a photograph and on a side on the side of the photograph beside the photograph there was the phone on the WhatsApp with WhatsApp in it. So they're not on top of one another but they're side by side. Will we have the same interpretation?

[00:10:47]Right? If video game remote and the board game were side by side, instead of the video video game remote being on top of the board game, will we have the same interpretation? And I believe we would not because this structure is missing.

[00:11:00]This structure is what gives it meaning.

[00:11:04]Right? So that is the structuralist analysis. Meaning comes from structure.

[00:11:08]A upon b means A is replacing B. Now note one more thing. A upon B which is A on top of B also is another way to say this is the way these two things relate to each other. A relates to B in the way that A is on top of B. The relationship between two elements determines the meaning not the elements themselves. So if the relationship changes meaning changes. If they're side by side meaning changes. If photo is on top of the phone meaning changes.

[00:11:43]Right? This this photograph is top of the phone meaning changes. So it's the relation which allows the meaning. It is not the inherent meaning of WhatsApp and photograph. Right? That is structuralism. Structuralism will say meaning arises from a system or a structure. It's a six system of differences that we have a video on on whole structurism video that nobody watched. I think nobody will watch this video either but regardless. So structurism will try to identify these structure and that's what the structurist methodology is and that's why I said it is dull. It is interesting right? Okay this is interesting and now I know that this is how this works but did I have fun doing this? I did not. Did you have fun? Maybe you learned something but did you have fun?

[00:12:28]Humanism can be bal structurism can be dull and postructurism can be complicated. So you are between a kai and a rock and a hard place. Now what would be the post structuralist interpretation that based on what you know so far I'm going to pause the video sorry no you are going to pause the video and think and then I'll tell you what I'm I intended yeah so what I intended again I say I intended because if I say this is what it means then I'm going against the ideas of post structure that it doesn't mean anything anything for sure it doesn't mean anything for sure right or rather it doesn't mean one thing meaning is too much there's too much Well, post structuralism said this. Now, this is something Dereda does in his structures and play. He says that if you look at the humanist interpretation, now I'm going to red simplify this too much.

[00:13:19]So, please try to understand this is very simplified, but you will understand the ideas.

[00:13:24]If you look at this picture, it is saying the one that is at the bottom is better than one at the top. here to the one that is at the bottom the social game that are social is better than one that is at the top. But what is the difference between these two? Well, the diff the things that are at the bottom at the top. Well, the difference is that one at the bottom requires everyone to be present. Your friends have to be there for that photo. Your friends have to be there to play Ludo on a board.

[00:13:58]And WhatsApp and video games represent absence. You have to be your friends if if your friends are not there you have to use a cold device right so what's essentially happening here is uh these people are saying humanists are saying presence I'm sorry for the notification sound presence is better better than absence right This taken to an extreme. It's a very complicated thing. We'll talk about it in our dera lectures. This he calls the metaphysics of presence.

[00:14:44]Metaphysics of presence which is another way of saying that the western philosophy or humanist ways of looking at the world.

[00:14:55]Uh humanist ways of looking at the world prefer presence over absence. Presence of human over absence of humans.

[00:15:03]Presence of humans over absence of humans. In philosophy this looks like presence of person when they are speaking slash absence of person when they're not there. Right? So that is writing.

[00:15:14]regardless.

[00:15:16]Now it will say key now this binary is common. Excuse me. Just give me one second.

[00:15:24]Sorry for the disturbance. Yeah, he'll say this binary is arbitrary, right? We don't now this arbitrariness of the binary can be a bit complicated to understand. Let me give you again a simple example which is basically okay.

[00:15:39]So what if your friends are not here?

[00:15:41]What if your friends let's say uh live a city away right some of my friends live in Bangalore and I'm in Delhi some of my friends one of my closest friend lives in Mumbai and I'm in Delhi how will I talk to him right that's the problem now photograph is there right but it's the through which I can talk to him at the same time if you think about it photograph when I click the photograph it reminds me of their absence oh he's not here I have my friend's picture my buddy's But the cold technology WhatsApp helps me talk to him. So which one is presence and which one is absence? Is the photo presence or is the WhatsApp presence that this demystifies the boundary? It creates an in between thing.

[00:16:32]There's an in between presence and absence which is both photograph and WhatsApp. We can't decide. It's the undecidable dera calls it right. So this undecidable in between breaks the binary.

[00:16:49]Now you tell me what does this picture mean? It could mean that WhatsApp is cold technologies replacing human connection. But certainly it could also mean that the human presence which is not there can be placated can be solved by good technology which can make my friend be present to me again because I can just text him. So it means both the things it means that technology is replacing real connection and second it is somehow supplementing real connection. It's making it more.

[00:17:22]So what is true right and that is the whole point of post structuralism you do not know what is true interpretation is endless a/ b it will respond to structurism by simply saying that structures structure is said that this presence/absence binary that humanism has this is very unscientific that we are more scientific this is this is what truth is now to that this postructurist response is where you are not scientific you have replaced this presence/ absence binary with a/b binary you have just changed the center you have not destroyed the center this would be the center right so both of these photos can be interpreted by this simple center now post structuralists structuralists did not have this center they said we have something more scientific right this applies to everything even if there is no humans no photos involved but here let's replace the center by this what if I say that this can mean the other way around as Well, that a real human connection, real humans are replaced by technology. So technology is being replaced by real humans or whatever, right? All of this binary could be inverted essentially that what we inverted here, right? We said key photograph could be absence, WhatsApp could be presence. This is what postructuralism shows. It shows that humanist values and structuralist interpretations are arbitrary. They are conventional. They are not objective.

[00:18:51]they are not inherent to the world right I'm sorry for the call again but this is going to be right the binary is arbitrary this is for the next lecture uh I hope you understood how these ways of looking at the world relate to each other it is going to be very very if you do not understand this you will not understand any of literary theory if you watch this lecture to the end you're ahead of almost all other candidates and to be honest most English teachers now if you want more lectures like these If you want to actually understand what deconstruction is, if you want to actually understand the thought of Jac Laka, all of these complicated uh thinkers and philosophers, structuralist, post structuralist, if you actually want to understand who they are, what their thought is, how is it related to literature, then you can get a JF scholar course where Dhan and I will stand next to your shoulders and guide you. You can also get a recorded lectures program if you want just the access to our recorded lectures. Thank you for watching and now you understand what post structuralism, structuralism and humanism really are.