After Theory: The Reflection Of Theory And Its Outlet

"After theory"was emerged in the west, It can be named"post-theory"as well. On this topic, lots of articles and dozens of books were published in the west. Among these books, the most influenced one is After Theory (published in 2003) which was written by the British Marxist theorist Terry Eagleton. In the Domestic theoretical circles, there is only one monograph called the research on literature and culture study in after theory era which was wrote by Wangning, other achievements were in the journal articles. Since 2000,"post-theory"gradually became one of the most prevalent topics. Regard to"post-theory", some scholars believe that it's about"the end of theory", others think it as"the resistance to theory"and it's just the continuation of"the resistance to theory". But"post-theory"has no association with either of them, and this point has been proved by some scholars. This article based on the conclusion of"post-theory", take Eagleton's After theory as the research object, according to the background of"post-theory", attempt to improve that:"post-theory"is not a systematic theory, and it is not the old theoretical problems, the true meaning of this phrase is"the reflection of theory". On this conclusion, this article will try to explore the state of Theory and the outlet of Theory in After Theory.Except the preface, this thesis was made up by three chapters, the preface describes the research situation including both of post-theory and after theory, and it consists of monographs and journal articles. We will point out that post-theory is not"the end of theory"; the true meaning of it needs to be discussed.The first chapter mainly introduced the background of post-theory; post-theory was born after the two Golden Ages of theory themselves. The first Golden Age is from 1915 to 1930, and the other from 1965 to 1980. Terry Eagleton focuses on the latter in After Theory. In this age, culture theory was very prosperous, culture theory made a deep step on its research objects and methods. The Political criticizing function gradually comes up. After the Golden Age, the generative capacity of theory diminishing day by day, it becomes more and more obscure, the gap between theory and the daily life becomes more and more serious, in some urgent issues , culture theory turns out to be powerless. Terry Eagleton were keen to point out all these problems of culture theory, other theorists have already started thinking of the plight of culture theory. Especially the editorial board members of Critical Inquiry. They hold that the innovation ability of theory was much less than before. The interpretation ability appeared to be inadequate, in this context "after theory" appeared.The second chapter focuses on the meaning of "post-theory". "After theory"is not"the end of the theory", Terry Eagleton worn that theory is necessary to life In the beginning of After theory for fear that the name would mislead us, and the last chapter of this book declare that we can never be"after theory", post-theory is not"resistance to theory"which created by Paul de Man, they have no common with each other. The phrase"after theory"and"post-theory", according to Eagleton,"after Theory"could be explained as"following theory"or"according to theory", it's under the attitude of exploring some issues of Truth and Value after theory's Golden Age. The core idea of After Theory is re-think, in this phrase, Eagleton says,"theory"has a capital letter. The phrase"post-theory"have two forms, it's"post'theory'', in this form , it's meaning is critical assessment towards theory, the other form is"'post'theory", the meaning of it is"criticism upgrade", it was connected with the innovations of theory. The two phrases both have the meaning of"rethinking", thus we came to the conclusion that "after theory" was theory of reflection.The third chapter focuses on the reflection of theory in After Theory. In the first place, Terry Eagleton's reflection concentrates on the Marxist criticism, when it comes to the modern situation of Marxist criticism, he as a guarder. Eagleton has been thinking about the causes of Marxism is no longer popular. In After Theory, he thought that the reason of Marxism is now redundant is not that the capitalist system has undergone fundamental changes, but that it is more thoroughly than ever. Most of these cultural theories were born in the exceedingly creative dialogue with Marxism. In the second place, Eagleton reflects on postmodernism which he had already perfectly analyzed in the book of Literary Theory: An Introduction and The Illusion of Postmodernism. Now the modernism which resistance Reason cannot deal with issues as Death, religion, suffering. Eagleton wants to find a balance between theory and the constantly changing reality. So he start thinking the outlet of theory, this way is the re-engagement of ethical a political. The reason why Eagleton find such idea is that terry Eagleton's Marxist standpoint prompted him to constantly thinking people's living situation, and another reason is his Catholic background.The conclusion explores the reason why there is no talk about Literature in After Theory; among all reasons the most important one is that Eagleton believe that Literature is indeed not so important.