What is critical theory?

Critical theory covers a broad spectrum of political and cultural movements – from Marxism and Feminism, to Eco-Criticism – that are primarily concerned with getting people to re-evaluate their assumptions and think critically about the world around them. At its core, critical theory challenges and undermines aspects of society that are commonly perceived as ‘natural’, often showing these features to be historically contingent and politically motivated. For instance, Marxist criticism looks at the economic relations between humans and challenges ideas such as the notion that people are naturally competitive. Feminist criticism meanwhile looks at the relationships between genders and often seeks to undermine notions of what is natural to women. When you’re analysing your texts, critical theory offers a number of different lenses through which to frame your analysis and can either open up avenues of appreciation or, conversely, be used to criticise a text. For instance, when read through a feminist lens, Jane Eyre can be seen presenting an early example of a female character self-determining her life separate from the men in her life. Meanwhile, a Marxist critique of The Wolf of Wall Street might find that the film fetishizes capitalism in its glamorisation of investment banking and competitive, winner-takes-all behaviour. In many cases, literary texts will not neatly fit into a theory and may contain elements that both support and go against a theory. For example, you could also argue that Jane Eyre is an anti-feminist text and that the Wolf of Wall Street is a Marxist text. However, it is this potential of interpretation that make literary texts so interesting; rather than simply being political manifestos they are often not black and white and instead create and encourage debate around a topic. Ultimately, when writing essays using critical theory you should try and capture a bit of this debate while also making an argument for what you think a text is saying.