PARTS OF SPEECH - 2

 

PARTS OF SPEECH – 2 – NOUN (KINDS, GENDER, NUMBER AND CASE)

 

Kinds of Noun

 

Nouns are divided into two classes – Concrete nouns and Abstract nouns.  Names of persons or things that we can touch and see are concrete nouns.

(e.g.) Rahul, Table, Water, Crowd, Silver

 

The names of things that have no physical existence are abstract nouns.

(e.g.) Kindness, Wisdom, Darkness (quality), Theft, Laughter (action), Death, Poverty, Sleep (state)

 

Apart from these, nouns are also divided into two other divisions. They are countable nouns and uncountable nouns.

Countable nouns are the names of the nouns that can be counted

(e.g.) book, tree, river, house

The uncountable nouns are the names of nouns that can't be counted.

(e.g.) music,news,milk,courage,meat,progress.

 

The uncountable nouns won't have ‘a’ or ‘an’ (articles) and 'one' in front of them. Similarly, they won't have plural forms too.

 

Concrete nouns are subdivided into four groups

 

1.  Proper Noun is the name of a person, place or a thing.

(e.g.) John, Chennai, Everest

 

2.  Common Noun is the name of a class of persons, places or things

(e.g.) King, City, Mountain

 

He is the Shakespeare of our time (a proper noun is used as a common noun)

3.              Collective noun is the name of groups of persons or subjects of the same kind, considered as a single whole.

(e.g.) a team of players, a herd of cattle, an army of the Russians

 

4.              Material noun is the name of a material or substance out of which things are made.

        (e.g.) Gold, Silver, Stone, Clay, Iron, Wool

 

GENDER

 

Majority of the living beings are of either male or female sex.  The nouns that denote male animals or persons are considered to be in Masculine gender.

(e.g.) boy, king, hero, father, lion, bull

 

The nouns that denote female animals or persons are considered to be in feminine gender.

(e.g.) girl, queen, heroine, mother, lioness, cow

The noun that denotes both male and female animals or persons are considered to be in Common Gender.

(e.g.) child, student, friend, neighbor, servant

 

The nouns that denote the inanimate things i.e. those that don’t have life likeanimals and human beings are considered to be in Neuter Gender. (Abstract nouns and Collective nouns)

(e.g) book, tree, stone, crowd, beauty, truth

 

Feminine Gender words are also formed by adding –ess to the masculine gender words

     Lioness, hostess, countess, poetess, actress, princess

 

Feminine gender words formed placing a word before or after

He-goat, She-goat; Man-servant, Maid-servant; Jack-ass, Jenny-ass; Bull-calf, Cow-calf; (before)

Grandfather, Grandmother; Peacock, Peahen (after)

NUMBER

 

There are two numbers in English.  A noun that denotes one person or thing is said to be in singular number.

(e.g.) boy, girl, dog, bird, tree, book, car

 

A noun that denotes more than one person or thing is said to be in plural number.

(e.g.) boys, girls, dogs, birds, trees, books, cars

 

·                  Plural nouns are generally formed by adding –s to the singular

(e.g.) book-books; pen-pens; photo-photos; roof-roofs;

 

·                  Nouns ending in –s, -sh, -ch or –x Add –es to the singular to become plural

(e.g.) class-classes; branch-branches; box-boxes; dish-dishes

·                   Nouns ending in –y change –y into –i and add –es to it to become plural.

(e.g.) baby-babies; army-armies; lady-ladies; city-cities;

 

·                   Some nouns ending in –o add –es to the singular to become plural.

(e.g.) hero-heroes; echo-echoes; volcano-volcanoes; potato-potatoes;

 

·                   Several nouns ending in –f or –fe, change –f or –fe into ‘v’ and add –es to the singular to become plural.

(e.g.) wife-wives; knife-knives; shelf-shelves; thief-thieves;

 

·                   Some nouns form their plural by changing the inside vowel of the singular

(e.g.) man-men; tooth-teeth; mouse-mice; foot-feet;

 

·                   A few nouns have the old English plural ending –en

(e.g.)  ox-oxen; child-children;

 

·                   Compound nouns generally form plurals by using the plural of the principal word.

(e.g.) son-in-law, sons-in-law; passer-by, passers-by; foot-man,foot-men; Major-general, Major-generals; Governor-General, Governors-General

·                  A few compound words have double plural

(e.g.) man-servant, men-servants; woman-student,women students;

 

FOREIGN WORDS IN ENGLISH HAVE FOREIGN PLURALS

 

·                  Words ending in –a have a plural in –ae

(e.g.) formula-formulae; larva-larvae;

 

·                  Words ending in –us have a plural in –i

(e.g.) stimulus-stimuli; radius-radii; fungus-fungi;

 

·                  Words ending in –um, have plural in –a

(e.g.) medium-media; bacterium-bacteria; datum-data; curriculum-curricula; memorandum-memoranda;

 

·                  Words ending in –ex, -ix, -is, have a plural in –es

(e.g.) index-indexes; axis-axes; analysis-analyses; crisis-crises; hypothesis-hypotheses; synopsis-synopses; oasis-oases; thesis-theses;

·                  Words ending in –on, have a plural ending in –a

(e.g.) criterion-criteria; phenomenon-phenomena

 

·                  There are a few nouns ending in –ry.  They are singular nouns

(e.g.) imagery, scenery, poetry, machinery, stationary

 

·                  There are some nouns that have the same form in the singular and plural

(e.g.) sheep, deer, trout, salmon, means, innings, gallows

 

·                  There are some nouns those go in pairs. They should be used only as plural

Scissors, spectacles, trousers, pants

 

·                  There are some words denoting subjects of study that are in plural form but have singular meaning

Mathematics, Physics, Politics, Economics, Civics

CASE

 

A noun which is the subject of a verb is said to be in Nominative Case (Subjective case)

John (subject) met Mohan (object) in the office.

 

A noun which is the object of a verb (whom did John meet? – Mohan) is said to be in Accusative case (Objective case)

 

This is John’s bicycle. (Whose bicycle?-John’s)

A noun that shows the possession is said to be in possessive case.

 

Ø   Come here, John (vocative-nominative of address)

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears (nominative of address)

 

A noun (a person or a thing) that is addressed is said to be in the vocative case (nominative of address)

Ways of forming possessive case

 

·                ‘s- is added to the singular nouns.

King’s death, Cow’s milk, Dog’s tail

 

·                ‘s- is added to the plural nouns that don’t end in ‘s’

Women’s college, Men’s hostel, Children’s park

 

·                Apostrophe ‘ added to plural nouns ending in ‘-s’and singular nouns those have two or more ‘hissing’ sound.

Students’ union, Moses’ laws, in Jesus’ name, Merchants’ association

Malayalam

https://youtu.be/GXeiacjqgtM

தமிழ்

https://youtu.be/l3p1tjZd0d8

-----Thulasidharan V

PARTS OF SPEECH

 

Malayalam  https://youtu.be/0ybdlbLNY_k தமிழில் https://youtu.be/ZGXN3xNY7hE ------Thulasidharan

PASSIVE CONSTRUCTION - PART 3

The difficult sentences in passive construction are explained with examples.

I (subject) teach (verb) you (indirect object - answering to whom you teach?) Passive construction (direct object - teach what?)

Who (subject) did (verb) this? (object)

Close (verb) the door (object)

Malayalam

https://youtu.be/VwyrwRJelHU
The difficult sentences in passive construction - Active and Passive voice with examples are given at the end of the video as a chart.

தமிழில்

https://youtu.be/GCFG5XR5TWw

----Thulasidharan V

JOSEPH ANDREWS – HENRY FIELDING (1707-1754)

 

          Henry Fielding, who is unequalled by any of his contemporaries as a novelist of contemporary manners, was born in 1707.  Though he had written many plays and won reputation, he realized that they hadn’t given him proper scope for his own literary gifts.  ‘Joseph Andrews’ the very first novel of Henry Fielding is a Parody of Samuel Richardson’s Pamela, a great sensational success of that time. Fielding created Andrews as an imaginary brother of Pamela.  If Richardson’s characters were virtuous, Fielding simply painted their manners.  As Fielding was a realist, his novels gave the most powerful and artistic expression of the social conscience of his age.  That is why he is considered as the Father of the Realistic novel in English.  The novel is picaresque in nature as it deals with the adventures of Joseph Andrews.  However, Fielding calls his novel as ‘Cosmic epic in prose’.

 

              At the age of ten Joseph Andrews the son of Gaffer Andrews and the brother of Pamela who was famous for her female virtue, entered the house of Sir Thomas Booby and began to work as an apprentice.  As he became an accomplished horseman later, Lady Booby made him her foot man.  Parson Adams, a curate met Joseph and was greatly impressed by his knowledge of the scripture.  Lady Booby was very much attracted by the handsome figure of Joseph.  She took him even along with her other servants for the seasonal visit to London.  After the sudden death of her husband, Lady Booby attempted to seduce him, but failed.  Forty five year old Mrs. Slip Slop, Lady Booby’s servant maid too tried to seduce him.  As Joseph loved Fanny, he was not easily trapped by any of them.  He wrote about the misfortune that his beauty brought him to his sister Pamela.  However, he was determined to preserve his virtue and chastity.  Enraged at the unapproachable chastity of Joseph, Lady Booby dismissed him.

 

              Then Joseph set out on a journey to Lady Booby’s country estate, instead of his parents, with the hope of meeting his beloved Fanny.  On the way Joseph was attacked by thieves, beaten robbed and stripped and was left dying in a ditch.  However, a Postillion gave his coat to cover his naked body and with the help of the passengers of the coach took him to Dragon, an inn that was run by Mr. and Mrs. Tow-wouse.  Though his wife objected, Mr. Tow-wouse decided to give him refuge there.  However, Parson Adams, who was on his way to London to sell his sermons, identified Joseph.  As he had forgotten to bring sermons with him, he decided to return with Joseph.  On their way as Parson failed to pay the hostler for his horse’s board, they were separated.  But with the help of Mrs. Slipslop, they united.  When Mrs. Slipslop and Joseph went by coach, Parson Adams walked on foot.  On hearing the scream of a woman, he rushed to the spot and rescued a woman from her attacker.  But, when a group of young bird-hunters came that way, the attacker accused the Parson and the girl of robbing him.  When they were presented in front of the Justice of peace, Parson Adams discovered that the girl was Fanny, who was looking for Joseph.  As Parson Adams was recognized by a local squire, he was set free.  However, Adams found Joseph from the song he heard nearby.  Thus, all the three who wanted to meet, met. When Joseph persuaded Fanny to consent to marriage, Parson advised them to wait until the publication of the banns.

 

              The three travelers, on their way met the Squire of False promises and finally reached the house of Mr. Wilson.  He helped them a lot, by providing them lodging, food and even offered a gold coin.  He also said in between about his lost son, who was stolen by gypsies when he was three years old.  Then they met a squire, who later sent his men to attack them.  Having tied Joseph and Adams on the bed post, they abducted Fanny.  However they were encountered on the way by Lady Booby’s steward Peter Pounce and Fanny was saved.  They were actually coming a few hours ahead of Lady Booby on her homeward journey.  At last, they all reached the country seat of Lady Booby.  At church the banns of marriage for Joseph and Fanny was announced.  Lady Booby threatened Adams to stop the marriage.  But Adams didn’t obey.  Any how she succeeded in getting Joseph and Fanny persecuted on made-up charges.  Unexpectedly the timely arrival of Squire Booby and Pamela saved them.

 

              Though Squire Booby tried to dissuade his brother-in-law Joseph from his marrying the poor Fanny, Joseph didn’t agree.  Lady Booby, who tried her maximum in every possible way to stop the marriage, engaged Beau Didapper to rape Fanny but that also failed.  Then a peddler appeared and informed them that Fanny, who was stolen by gypsies, when she was a child, was actually the sister of Joseph and Pamela.  When Pamela’s parents were brought to reveal the truth, Mrs. Andrews said that her little girl was stolen, but a boy, who was Joseph, was replaced in her stead.  As all these happened when her husband was in army, she didn’t tell her husband and raised Joseph as their son.  Then Mr. Wilson arrived and by means of the strawberry mark discovered that Joseph was his son.  Joseph and Fanny were married by the new curate Parson Adams and lived happily.  Squire Booby decided to give one hundred and thirty pounds a year to Parson Adams.  Lady Booby returned to London and found a young captain and began to forget Joseph.  Thus, Fielding brings a happy conclusion to his novel.

 

              One of the themes of Joseph Andrews is the contrast between town and country.  When the town represents the sophisticated modern life, the country represents simplicity and innocence.  The other themes are said to be Christianity and clothing and nakedness.  Actually the centre of interest of the novel doesn’t lie in the love affair of Joseph and Fanny but in the adventures of Parson Adams and Joseph.  The story of the novel modeled on Cervantes’ ‘Don Quixote’.  Though it is a picaresque novel, in it both the adventures and characters are quite important.  The characterization in this novel is excellent.  There is a large variety of characters and they are all clearly distinguished from one another.  Though he was not a Psychologist and a novelist of the stream of consciousness, he portrays both the inside and outside of his characters amazingly.  They are actually the true representatives of the eighteenth century society.  However we feel that Fielding knows everything there is to know about his characters even though he doesn’t tell us all.  Similarly behind every simple statement of Fielding, we feel the force of a deep and varied experience of life.  That is how Henry fielding becomes an unequalled novelist of contemporary manners, among his contemporaries.

----Thulasidharan V

 

 

               

 

 

 

PASSIVE CONSTRUCTION - 2

Passive construction in 8 tenses including positive and negative questions with interrogative words (wh - words) and without interrogative words (yes or no questions) These are also given at the end of the video

In malaiaylam

https://youtu.be/QTxA3TohxUM

தமிழ்

https://youtu.be/ZZlRpDXZoCU

-------Thulasidharan V

PASSIVE CONSTRUCTION

 Passive construction

If the subject is active i.e. if the subject does something in a sentence, the sentence is said to be in active voice.  But if the subject is passive i.e. if something is done to the subject in a sentence, it is said to be in passive voice. 

When a sentence in active voice changed in to passive voice, the meaning won’t change.

 Eg: - He (subject) cleans (verb) the room (object) (Active voice)

The room (subject) is cleaned (verb) by him (object) (Passive voice)

Changes to be made in Passive construction

(1) - Changes in verbs (only transitive verbs)

Present tense – am/is/are + past participle

Past tense – was/were + past participle

Future Tense – will be + past participle

Present continuous – am/is/are + being + past participle

Past continuous – was/were + being + past participle

Future continuous – Passive not in use.

Present perfect – have/has + been + past participle

Past perfect – had + been + past participle

Future perfect – will have + been + past participle

Present Perfect continuous – Passive not in use

Past perfect continuous – Passive not in use.

Future perfect continuous – Passive not in use.

 

(2) - Changes of subject and object

The subject of the sentence in active voice will become object in passive construction.  So, if it is a pronoun, its objective case should be written in the sentence of the passive voice.  Similarly the object of the sentence in active voice will become the subject of the sentence in passive voice.  So, if it is a pronoun its subjective case should be written then.

(3) – Placing, 'by', in front of the object of the sentence in passive construction.

Explanation in Malayalam given in this you tube video. You can watch it in the link given below

https://youtu.be/PRCNgfWd-Qk

PROFICIENCY IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE (MALAYALAM) - PART 6 - PASSIVE CONSTRUCTION - PART 1

PROFICIENCY IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE (தமிழ்) - PART 6 - PASSIVE CONSTRUCTION - PART 1

-----Thulasidharan V

Examination Point of View Approach-Zeitgeist - Part - 2

 

II MODULE - SUSTAINABLE ENVIRONMENT CONTINUATION - 'ZLATEH THE GOAT'

‘Zlateh the Goat’ is an amazing and at the same time a touching story of Issac Balshevis Singer.  Through this story the author reveals the mutual relationship of warmth and togetherness between man and animal. Reuven, the furrier has no other way except selling Zlateh the goat to a butcher for the expense of Hanukkah.  Aaron takes the goat to the butcher.  A blizzard made them get trapped in a haystack for three days.  There Aaron sucked the milk of Zlateh and Zlateh ate the hay.  The interdependence of the two results in Zlate’s continuing its life as a member of the family then. 

III MODULE - GENDER

Gender is the 3^rd Module.  In that module, we have Adrienne Rich’s ‘Claiming an Education’.  She is a renowned poet, essayist and political activist.  She has defined herself as ‘woman, Fabian and feminist’.  It is actually the convocation speech delivered in Sep 1977 to the women students of Douglass College, New Jersey, USA.  Here, she explains that being educated is a right and therefore women should claim that right.  She also needs woman’s experience and thought should be included in the curriculum.  Women should take responsibility towards themselves.  Women should never allow others do their thinking, talking and naming for them.  Women should love only those who should be able to respect them apart from loving them.  The teachers of women should believe that women’s mind and experience are intrinsically valuable.  Thus this speech has become one of the best critiques of the present system of education from the woman’s perspective.

‘The story of an hour’ is a story with a startling anti-climax of Kate Chopin.  She reveals what it means to be free and happy from a feminist perspective.  Great care was taken in breaking the news of the death of her husband to Mrs. Mallard.  As she hadn’t often loved him, she whispered ‘Free, body and soul free’.  Though she pretended well, her grief to others, on seeing her dead husband alive, the rude shock killed her at the end.

Lee Mokobe’s ‘What it’s like to be transgender’ is a heart rending poem that reveals the hard realities in the life of transgender people.  Though the poet was the mystery of an anatomy, the poet decided to be a boy.  So, he played hide and seek and did all that boys did.  But the transphobia nature of the people continued with its issues of gender identity.  That was why many transgender people like Mya Hall and Leelah Alcorn either killed by others or committed suicide.  But Lee Mokobe is optimistic and so he concludes his poem ‘May be God finally listened to my prayers’.

 

 IV – Human Rights

  W. H. Auden’s ‘Refugee Blue’ is one of the most important poems that responded against the imprisonment and brutal killings of the Jews of Europe, by Hitler.  It is a poem of twelve stanzas consisting of three lines in each stanza.  The speaker of the poem addresses his lover about the pathetic condition of the refugees.  The repetition used at the last line of each stanza is touching and powerful.  As the birds in the forest and fishes in the water are free, the narrator is jealous of them.  When the consul found him without passport, says, ‘If you’ve no passport, you are officially dead.  He is shattered on his hearing from others, ‘If we let them in, they will steal our daily bread’.  Thus the poem talks about Migration, which is still continuing as one of the burning human rights issues of the world.

‘Amnesty’ is a moving story of Nadine Gordimer, who won Nobel Prize for literature in 1991.  The narrator of the story is the fiancée of the nameless protagonist of South Africa.  Amnesty means the forgiveness given to those who committed political crimes.  The unionist came back after 6 years imprisonment.  Though his wife and parents had tried to meet him earlier in the prison they couldn’t because of their ignorance and illiteracy.  Even after his arrival, the unionist continues with his movement for bringing good future to the people of South Africa.  That is why when the narrator says about their second ‘child coming’, he answers ‘He will born and live in the new world’.  Thus, they all wait for their freedom and rights.

‘The outcaste’ is a pathetic story of Sharan Kumar Limbale, that shows a true and realistic picture of the darker side of Indian Society about half a century ago.  It is about a few students belonged to untouchable family.  The high-caste village boys and low-caste village boys had two different games at two places on their going for a picnic from the school.  When they settled down to eat the teachers asked the Mahar boys and girls to sit under a tree separately.  They were given the left-over food of the high-caste boys and girls.  That leftover food was nectar not only to the Mahar boys but to the mother of the narrator, who couldn’t taste it.  Next day the narrator and other boys were asked to write about the picnic, by the teacher.  The narrator recollected all that happened then. He didn’t know what to write and how to begin

‘Chemical Happiness and the meaning of life’ is a discourse of Yuval Noah Harari on the meaning of life.  Harari is the author of the international best seller ‘Sapiens: A brief history of Humankind’.  He says that happiness is the result of chemical process taking place in the human brain.  According to him, Serotonin, a chemical produced in the nerve cells; Dopamine, an organic chemical that controls the brain’s pleasure centers; Oxytocin, the love hormone are having their key roles to make a person happy.  Money, social status, beautiful houses won’t bring happiness.  Lasting happiness comes only from Serotonin, dopamine and Oxytocin.  To this, a meaningful life we need.  This can be achieved through personal delusions and collective delusions.  If we want to consider both or synchronize both, we should be obliged to self-delusion.  Thus he concludes self-delusion brings happiness through the chemical changes in the body.

Suppose you are not able to vide the video here you can click the you tube link given below and listen

https://youtu.be/UDx5kK-kB1Q

-------Thulasidharan V

 

Examination Point of View Approach-Zeitgeist - Part - 1

 

ZEITGEIST

 

Zeitgeist means the general spirit of a period in history, shown in the beliefs and ideas. It is a common course teaching material for first year graduate students of Calicut University. It has 4 modules namely Indian constitution and secularism, Sustainable environment, Gender, Human rights. Every module has 3 to 4 chapters in it. I am here to help you to remember the main ideas discussed there.

1.   1.   Indian Constitution and Secularism – the 1^st module. In this module we have four chapters.  The very first one is

'Should the assassin of Gandhi be killed?' By Pearl .S. Buck

          Pearl. S. Buck, who won Nobel Prize for Literature in 1938, says that the people believed in Gandhi because he did what he taught.  Considering Godse, the man who was in prison having killed Gandhi, she says that he should not die by violence.  Because, Gandhiji was a man who refused to use violence.  So, if India decides not to kill the man who killed Gandhi, it can be worthy of India’s Gandhi.

The preamble to the constitution of India is considered as the identity card of the constitution.  It had 395 articles in 22 parts and 8 schedules when it came into force on 26 January 1950.  Now it has a preamble, 25 parts with 448 articles, 12 schedules, 5 appendices and 101 amendments.  As India is a Sovereign, Socialist Secular Democratic Republic, its objective is to secure to all its citizens social, economic and political justice, liberty of thought, expression, belief faith and worship, equality of status and opportunity, fraternity for the unity and integrity of the nation.         Toba Tek Singh is a satirical short story of Saadat Hasan Manto.  It talks about a social and psychological territory in which ‘madness’ is the reigning norm.  Through Bishan Singh’s refusal to move either to India or to Pakistan at the end, the author satirises on the absurdity of partition.  Through Fazal Din’s visiting Bishan Singh with a bag of sweets the author shows the presence of secularism and its need.         Rabindranath Tagore’s ‘Freedom’ is a fine poem where he says that Real freedom constitutes the freedom from religious, political, moral and intellectual oppressions.  So, freedom from fear, freedom from the burden of all ages, freedom from the anarchy of destiny and freedom from the insult of dwelling in a puppet’s world are necessary. MODULE II – SUSTAINABLE ENVIRONMENT           ‘The End of living and the beginning of Survival’ is the speech of chief Seattle that delivered on March 11, 1854.  It is a powerful, bitter sweet request to respect the rights of native Americans and the environmental values.  He reminds that the earth does not belong to the man; the man belongs to the earth.  So, he needs kindness to our brother rivers.  Similarly he asks all white men should treat beasts as their brothers.  He also says as the earth is precious to God, if the earth is harmed it will invite God’s contempt.  The damage that has been done to the earth so far is not small.  That is why it seems that the living has come to an end and the survival has begun, he says.           Gieve Patel’s ‘Killing a tree’ is a poem with irony and detachment that describes man’s cruelty to trees.  The poem focuses on the resilience nature of tree against human violence.  The poet sarcastically conveys his anger against environmental destruction.  A simple jab won’t kill a tree.  The root is to be pulled out entirely from the earth-cave.  It should be exposed to air and sun.  Then only scorching, twisting and withering will cause its death.  Through the step by step process of killing a tree the poet has effectively used irony as a poetic device in the poem. https://youtu.be/UAjH8V5grX8

          

Suppose you are not able to watch it here you can click the link given above and watch it.

------Thulasidharan V

LGBTIQ - Queer Theory

                 Lesbian and Gay literary theory emerged as a distinct field only by the 1990s with the publication of ‘The Lesbian and Gay studies Reader’ in 1993 by Henry Abelove and others.  Actually Feminism, at the course of time marginalized or ignored lesbianism.  So the conflict between heterosexual feminists and lesbians opened up.  Thus lesbian feminism existed.  Adrienne Rich with her, “Compulsory heterosexuality and lesbian existence”, introduced ‘Lesbian Continuum’.  Thus sexuality which was seen as something merely ‘natural’ and unchanging began to change as a construction or a subject to be changed.  In this way, the comprehensive term Queer theory entered.

            Teresa De Lauretis organized the first queer theory conference in 1990 at the University of California.  Queer theory is broadly associated with the study and theorization of gender and sexual practices that exist outside heterosexuality and which challenge the notion that heterosexual desire is normal.  The works of Michel Foucault and Judith Butler are often considered the founding texts of queer theory.

            Innovations in queer theory have made it evident that Performativity is a function of the choices that gay and lesbian individuals make every day and in all walks of life.  In this way, we can understand that Oscar Wild’s life experience is as valuable for queer theory as his literary works.

            The queer theory not only examines the communities surrounding the queer people, but also the communities they form.  Same sex living communities have significant priority in the formation of queer theories.  Deconstructing the binary opposition of Post-Structuralism too influenced queer theory.  The hierarchy in the pair of heterosexual and homosexual was also questioned, when the film star Rock Hudson a gay died of AIDS.  He was one among the early celebrities to have been diagnosed with AIDS in 1985.

            According to Eve Sedgwick gayness may be openly declared to family and friends but not to banks and Insurance companies, as everyone has the right for concealment and openness.  Here, both heterosexual and homosexual do not have any fixed essences.  So, the post modernist concept of identity should be availed to them.

            As far as the gay and lesbian texts are concerned, they may be written by a gay or lesbian or they may be written about gays or lesbians and sometimes they may express the ‘vision’ of gays and lesbians.  Similarly the lesbian and gay critics usually identify lesbian or gay episodes in mainstream work and discuss them as in the case of the relationship between Jane and Helen in ‘Jane Eyre’, is discussed.  Some other critics expose ‘homophobia’ of mainstream literature and criticism, where homosexual aspects are ignored purposefully as it happened to the love lyrics of W.H. Auden.  Some even setup or extended metaphorical sense of ‘lesbian and gay’ in their critical analysis so that it connotes a moment of crossing a boundary.  Actually such moments mirror the self identification as lesbian or gay that establishes certain norms and boundaries.

            However, strong homo-erotic tenderness is seen widely in the First World war poetry.  Mark Lilly points out that a frequent motif in the poems is to see ‘same-sex love as superior to men’s love for women’.  In ‘Passing the love of women’, written by Studdert Kennedy it is said,

                        ‘But I knows a Stronger love than theirs

                        And that is the love of men’

            Similarly, Lilly detects an element of ‘necrophilia’ in Herbert Read’s ‘My Company’

                        ‘A man of mine

                        Lies on the wire

                        And he will rot

                        And first his lips

                        The worm will eat

                        It is not thus I would hev him kissed

                        But with the warm passionate lips                   

                        Of his comrade here.’

            Similar poems of wound, hospitals are also there, by the 19^th century American poet Walt Whitman about the American Civil war.  The wound is erotically charged in First World War poetry because it allows tender physical contact between males.  Thus, the war became a ‘safe’ area in which feelings usually suppressed can be openly expressed.  Here Lilly also talks about the similar examples of foot ball field, where men kiss and embrace each other passionately in public.

            It is said the army itself exploited these feelings at the start of war with the settling up of ‘Pals’ regiments, in which large numbers of men from the same district enlisted and served in units together.  Thus, this kind of poetry has official sanction and gets access to publication in news papers and poetry journals.  The Continuum of feelings expressed in this poetry tends ultimately to ‘deconstruct’ the notion of gayness as a distinct one with a separate identity.

-------Thulasidharan V

ECO CRITICISM

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoVrCP84LAU&t=46s

ECO CRITICISM

 

            Eco Criticism is the study of the relationship between literature and the physical environment.  Actually it takes its literary bearings from three major 19^th C American writers, Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882), Margaret Fuller (1810-1850) and Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862).  They were the essayists and philosophers known collectively as the transcendentalists.  Emerson’s ‘Nature’ talks about the impact of nature upon him.  Fullers ‘Summer on the lakes, during 1843’, deals with her encounter with the American landscape at large.  Thoreau’s ‘Walden’ is an account of his two-year stay from 1845, in a hut he had built on the shore of Walden Pond.  These three books can be considered as the foundational works of American ‘eco centered’ writing.

            However, the terms ‘eco criticism’ and ‘Green Studies’ were used to denote a critical approach in the USA in the late 1980’s and in the UK in the early 1990’s.  In the USA the acknowledged founder is Cheryl Glotfelty with her essay ‘The Eco criticism reader: Landmarks in literary Ecology’.  It was she who revived the term ‘eco criticism’ to refer the critical field that had previously been known as ‘The Study of Nature Writing’.  Similarly the UK version of eco criticism takes its bearings from the British Romanticism of 1790’s.  The founding figure on the British side is the critic Jonathan Bate who wrote ‘Romantic Ecology: Wordsworth and the Environmental Tradition’ in 1991.  However, both these American and British variants warn us of environmental threats emanating from governmental, industrial, commercial and neo-colonial forces.

            Eco criticism deals with how environmental issues, cultural issues concerning the environment and attitudes are presented and analyzed.  This has gained a lot of attention during recent years due to higher social emphasis on environmental destruction and increased technology.  Thus it has become a broad one that includes green studies, eco feminism; eco poetics, deep ecology and bio-politics.  As there was earlier a utilitarian attitude towards nature, nature was for human needs.  However, after the 18^th C, there emerged a demand to revaluate the relationship between man and the environment.

            Arne Naess (1912-2009) a Norwegian philosopher developed the notion of ‘Deep ecology’ that emphasizes the basic interconnectedness of all life forms and natural features and presented a symbiotic and holistic worldview rather than an anthropocentric (human-centered) one.  Similarly, Eco poetics extended the art of poetry with the intention of foregrounding an investigation into ecology.  It is actually a new form of phenomenology as it tries to locate the human in the world.  Its approach is totally different from the Romantic and aestheticizing approaches of nature. 

            Apart from these ‘Ecofeminism’ was coined by Françoise d' Eaubonne (1920-2005).  The Ecofeminists argue that a relationship always exists between the oppression of women and the degradation of nature.  Moreover, in post-colonial studies of native and indigenous communities, ecocriticism took up a lead role.  The critics of imperialist expansion involve an ecocritical understanding of land rights and issues of ownership.  Thus Biopolitics, the intersectionality between racism and land occupation, that takes the administration of life and a locality’s population too has become a thing to be considered in ecocriticism.

            While ecocritics began to study literature written throughout history and analyze its relationship to the environment, the British and American literature of the 19^th and 20^th centuries had a lot in it to be focused.  It happened because, American and British Romantic writers took great interest in nature as a subject.  The Victorian realists wrote about industrialization that was changing the natural landscape.  Moreover, 19^th century American naturalists and explorers are actually credited here by ecocritics for their initiation of the conservation movement through their scientific descriptions and speculations about nature.

            William Wordsworth celebrates the beauty and mystery of nature in his ‘Michael’, ‘The Excursion’ and ‘The Prelude’.  The poetry of S.T. Coleridge John Keats, Byron and Shelley too has their contributions to it.  The Victorian essayists John Ruskin and Thomas Carlyle too were there to lament the destruction of the environment due to industrialization.  The two great American naturalists, according to the ecocritics are John Burrough and John Muir.  John Burrough’s ‘Wake-Robin’ and ‘Birds and poets’ actually influenced Whitman a lot.  Muir, apart from writing, worked to prevent the destruction of the environment.  It was he, who is responsible for preserving the Yosemite Valley in California, the very second national park in the United States.

            An ecocritical reading of a literary text is, actually an approach with a new alertness to a dimension that has perhaps always hovered about the text, but without ever receiving our full attention earlier.  Let’s take Edgar Allan Poe’s (1809-1849) well known tale ‘The Fall of the House of usher.  In the tale, Rod-crick Usher and his sister Madeline, undergo a kind of voluntary imprisonment in the ancient, crumbling isolated house of Usher that stands next to an evil-looking lake.  When the sister suffers from a strange wasting disease, Usher is afflicted by ‘A Morbid Acuteness of the senses’, which makes him unable to bear any contact with the natural world.  It is said, ‘The odours of all flowers were oppressive; his eyes were tortured by even faint light’.  His only contacts with the world beyond himself were books and musical instruments.  The tale is usually read and analyzed with the focus on the morbid psychology of Usher.

            The ecocentered reading of this tale focuses outside, on the house and its environs, rather than inside, on the owner and his psychology.  It uses ideas of energy, negative energy that causes breakdown and symbiosis the ‘living together’ that denotes mutual sustaining and co-existing systems.  The house has no symbiotic connections with the broader biosphere.  The house breathes in the atmosphere of its own decay.  The stagnant lake reflects the house’s own unmoving image.  These all led them to a gradual yet certain condensation of an atmosphere of their own about the waters and the walls.  So, Usher is ‘Photophobic’ (hyper sensitive to light) and prefers the represented light in paintings.  As he cannot bear natural sounds he hears only the ‘processed sound’ of music.  So, what is imagined here is on eco-system damaged beyond repair and cut off from any possible sources of renewal.  On this reading, the centre of the story is not a dark night of the soul, but the permanent night of willfully-courted ecological disorder or solar exhaustion.  The aloofness turns the house into a kind of black hole into which its energies are sucked and destroyed as it is said the black lake into which the house collapses and disappears at the end.  Thus, the ecocentered reading makes this tale a more frightening one.

            When other literary theories examine the relationships between the writer texts and the world with the social sphere, Ecocriticism expands the notion of the world to include the entire ecosphere.  Thus this ecologically oriented criticism is an inevitable response to the urgent issues of the day.  As critics have pointed out, one of the reasons that ecocriticism continues to grow as an important one is the continued global environmental crisis.  Its aim is also to show how the work of the writers considering environment can play important roles in solving ecological problems and environmental issues.

----Thulasidharan V