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UNIT IX – LITERARY THEORY POST–WORLD WAR II
(Previous Year Questions)
Below is every question from your files that belongs to the “post–World War II literary theory” category.
Q1. Which of the following statements best describes Derrida’s concept of différance?
(1) The difference between speech and writing
(2) The endless deferral of meaning and the play of differences in language
(3) The unity of signifier and signified in a stable chain
(4) The privileging of phonocentrism in Western philosophy
✔ Correct Answer: (2)
Explanation:
Différance combines difference and deferral, suggesting that meaning is never present but always postponed through a chain of signifiers. It is central to deconstruction, a major post–WWII theory.
Q2. Which critic is associated with the idea that literature is a “production” rather than a “reflection” of ideology?
(1) Terry Eagleton
(2) Louis Althusser
(3) Michel Foucault
(4) Raymond Williams
✔ Correct Answer: (2)
Explanation:
Althusser’s concept of Ideological State Apparatuses (ISAs) sees cultural forms as producing ideology. His theory directly shaped Cultural Materialism and Marxist literary theory after 1945.
Q3. In reader-response criticism, which theorist argues that the reader “fills the gaps” of a text?
(1) Wolfgang Iser
(2) Stanley Fish
(3) Hans Robert Jauss
(4) Norman Holland
✔ Correct Answer: (1)
Explanation:
Iser (from the Constance School) introduced gaps or indeterminacies which readers actively fill. This is key to post-war phenomenological and reception theory.
Q4. Jean Baudrillard argues that in postmodern culture, signs no longer represent reality; instead, they refer only to other signs. This condition is called:
(1) Polysemy
(2) Hyperreality
(3) Intertextuality
(4) Metanarrative
✔ Correct Answer: (2)
Explanation:
Hyperreality is Baudrillard’s term for when simulation replaces the real. It is foundational to postmodern theoryemerging after the 1960s.
Q5. In The Death of the Author, Barthes argues that meaning is produced by:
(1) The author’s intention
(2) A stable textual structure
(3) The reader, who activates multiple codes of the text
(4) Cultural norms that restrict interpretation
✔ Correct Answer: (3)
Explanation:
Barthes (1968) rejects authorial sovereignty and proposes that meaning arises through the reader’s engagement with linguistic and cultural codes.
Q6. Which of the following theorists critiques Western feminism for not accounting for the specific experiences of Third World women?
(1) Elaine Showalter
(2) Sandra Gilbert
(3) Toril Moi
(4) Chandra Talpade Mohanty
✔ Correct Answer: (4)
Explanation:
In Under Western Eyes, Mohanty critiques Western feminism’s universalizing tendencies. This is central to postcolonial feminist theory after the 1980s.
Q7. Lyotard famously defined postmodernism as “incredulity toward metanarratives.” What does he mean by “metanarratives”?
(1) Fictional stories that use multiple narrators
(2) Large, overarching philosophical explanations such as progress, reason, or emancipation
(3) Autobiographical narratives that critique society
(4) Religious stories used to justify moral values
✔ Correct Answer: (2)
Explanation:
Lyotard argues that postmodern culture rejects totalizing explanations—especially Enlightenment narratives of rational progress.
Q8. In New Historicism, Stephen Greenblatt emphasizes:
(1) Authorial intent and textual unity
(2) Historical documentation independent of literature
(3) Circulation of social energy between texts and the cultural field
(4) Moral evaluation of literary texts
✔ Correct Answer: (3)
Explanation:
Greenblatt’s New Historicism sees literary texts as products and producers of cultural power relations. It rejects isolated textual analysis.
Q9. Judith Butler’s theory of gender performativity argues that:
(1) Gender is biologically essential
(2) Gender is a fixed cultural category
(3) Gender is constructed through repeated social acts
(4) Gender exists independently of language
✔ Correct Answer: (3)
Explanation:
Butler claims gender is performed, not innate — a foundational idea of post-structural feminist theory after the 1990s.
Q10. Who among the following stated that “there is nothing outside the text” (il n’y a pas de hors-texte)?
(1) Roland Barthes
(2) Jacques Lacan
(3) Jean-François Lyotard
(4) Jacques Derrida
✔ Correct Answer: (4)
Explanation:
Derrida’s statement means that meaning is produced within systems of language and discourse, not outside them — a core principle of deconstruction.
Q11. Match the authors with their works (Structuralism, Poststructuralism, Criticism, Discourse)
D-30-2
List–I | List–II
I. Claude Levi-Strauss → 3. Structural Anthropology
II. Jacques Derrida → 1. Of Grammatology
III. Northrop Frye → 4. Anatomy of Criticism
IV. Michel Foucault → 2. The Archaeology of Knowledge
Options:
(A) 1 3 4 2
(B) 3 1 2 4
(C) 3 1 4 2
(D) 2 1 3 4
✔ Correct Answer: (C)
Explanation:
- Levi-Strauss (Structural Anthropology) → foundational structuralist anthropology.
- Derrida (Of Grammatology) → core text of deconstruction.
- Frye (Anatomy of Criticism) → archetypal criticism.
- Foucault (Archaeology of Knowledge) → discourse, epistemes, power-knowledge.
Q12. What is practical criticism?
J-30-16-III _English
(1) Close analysis to bring out political meaning
(2) Movement to make criticism more relevant
(3) Close analysis of poems without reference to external information
(4) Study of ambiguity
✔ Correct Answer: (3)
Explanation:
Practical criticism originated with I. A. Richards, advocating close reading without biographical, historical, or contextual material — anticipating New Criticism.
Q13. Which does NOT describe feminist literary criticism?
J-30-16-III _English
(1) Recuperates female writers
(2) Critiques construction of gender
(3) Argues that the traditional canon is justified
(4) Rejects essentializing male/female
✔ Correct Answer: (3)
Explanation:
Feminist criticism challenges the patriarchal canon, not justifies it. It re-evaluates representation, gender roles, and institutional biases.
Q14. Foucault believes that the facts of history will protect us from:
JA-030-17-II
(1) repeating mistakes
(2) totalitarianism
(3) deconstructionism
(4) historicism
✔ Correct Answer: (2)
Explanation:
Foucault’s genealogical method shows how institutions create regimes of truth, allowing resistance to totalizing political power.
Q15. Which of the following is typical of Old English verse?
(Contains relevance to Literary Theory via formalism & stylistics)
J-30-16-III _English
I. Alliteration
II. Rhyme
III. Onomatopoeia
IV. Four strong stresses
Options:
(1) I & II
(2) II & III
(3) I & IV
(4) II & IV
✔ Correct Answer: (3)
Explanation:
Old English prosody is based on stress and alliteration — not rhyme. Stylistics often references these formal structures.
Q16. “The Man Who Disappeared” is another title of which Kafka work?
J-30-16-III _English
(1) The Castle
(2) “Metamorphosis”
(3) “In the Penal Colony”
(4) Amerika
✔ Correct Answer: (4)
Explanation:
Kafka’s Amerika is retitled The Man Who Disappeared. Kafka heavily influences post-war theorists such as Deleuze, Guattari, and postmodernism.
Q17. What shift describes the Restoration period?
(Though historical, used in New Historicism & cultural theory discussions)
J-30-16-III _English
Options:
(1) Aristocratic Catholic monarchy → parliamentary democracy
(2) Atheistic oligarchy → deistic squirearchy
(3) Republican Puritan Commonwealth → aristocratic Anglican monarchy
(4) Parliamentary democracy → Catholic tyranny
✔ Correct Answer: (3)
Explanation:
Understanding historical shifts is foundational to New Historicism and Cultural Materialism, both post–WWII theoretical modes.
Q18. Which method stresses accuracy (Language Pedagogy – Applied Linguistics)
(Closely linked to structuralism & formalist linguistics post-WW2)
J-30-16-III _English
(1) Fluency
(2) Accuracy
(3) Appropriateness
(4) Listening skill
✔ Correct Answer: (2)
Explanation:
The Grammar-Translation Method is grounded in structural and formalist thinking — associated with linguistic theories after WWII (Bloomfieldian structuralism).
Q19. Identify the correct combination for figures associated with power/knowledge, deconstruction, structuralism, archetypal theory
(This is another version of the Structuralism–Poststructuralism matching set)
D-30-2
Correct combination:
I. Claude Lévi-Strauss → Structural Anthropology
II. Jacques Derrida → Of Grammatology
III. Northrop Frye → Anatomy of Criticism
IV. Michel Foucault → Archaeology of Knowledge
Correct answer: (C) (same mapping)
Q20. Which narrative voice highlights the problem of narrative authority?
(Relates to narratology → a major branch of postwar theory)
JA-030-17-II
(1) First person
(2) Self-conscious narrator
(3) Third person
(4) Participant
✔ Correct Answer: (2)
Explanation:
Self-conscious narrators (metafictional, postmodern) foreground narration as construction — central to postmodern theory, Barthes, Genette, Linda Hutcheon.