当代西方文论的历史构型及其“内外”

The Historical Configuration of Contemporary Literary Theory and Its“Inside and Outside”

当代西方文论研究文学的历史基本建立在对语言的自觉关注之上。尤其是以俄国形式主义、英美新批评为肇始的语言批评所提出的“语言问题”,从内核上规定着它作为一个有机整体的构型过程。尽管在语言与文学的关系上,以“文学理论”“理论”“文化研究”“反理论”“后理论”等形貌呈现的理论话语都有其独特理解,但承认语言研究是文学阐释的前提或基础却是一种共识。不过,由于对“语言”的认知存在着差异,各种批评理论阐释文学的方式其实是不一致的。当代西方文论对文学的语言研究,也因此经历了一个从关注语言本身到聚焦语言活动的转换过程,并具体外化为“语言形式研究→语言结构研究→语言活动研究”的发展脉络。回到“历史现场”,澄清当代西方文论的历史构型和语言批评演化之间的这种“内外”关联,不仅有助于加深对语言批评的意义、功能和深度的认识,亦可为审视外来理论知识的“中国化”过程及其产物提供一定的参照。

The history of literary studies in contemporary western literary theory is based on the conscious attention to language.In particular,the“language problem”raised by the linguistic criticism starting from the Russian formalism and the Anglo-American New criticism fundamentally determines its configuration process as an organic whole.Although the theoretical discourses presented in the form of“literary theory”,“theory”,“cultural research”,“anti-theory”and“post-theory”have their own opinions on the relationship between language and literature,there is a consensus that language research is the premise or basis of literary interpretation.However,due to the differences in the cognition of“language”,various critical theories interpret literature in different ways.Therefore,the study of language in contemporary Western literary theory has undergone a transformation process from focusing on language itself to focusing on language activities,and has been concretely externalized into the development of“language form research→language structure research→language activity research”.Returning to the“historical scene”and clarifying this“internal and external”connection between the historical configuration of contemporary Western literary theory and the evolution of linguistic criticism will not only help deepen the understanding of the meaning,function and depth of linguistic criticism,but also provide a certain reference for examining the“Sinicization”process of foreign theoretical knowledge and its products.