List of basic critical theory topics

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For a more comprehensive list, see the List of critical theory topics.

In the humanities and social sciences, critical theory has two quite different meanings with different origins and histories, one originating in social theory and the other in literary criticism. The former is theory oriented toward critiquing and changing society as a whole, in contrast to traditional theory oriented only to understanding or explaining it. The latter is theory used in the critical analysis and understanding of literature and is discussed in greater detail under literary theory. Basic topics in critical theory include:

Contents 1 Nature of critical theory 2 Branches of critical theory 3 History of critical theory 4 Major works 5 Basic critical theory concepts 6 Major theorists 7 Critical theory lists 8 See also

[edit] Nature of critical theory

Main article: Critical theory

[edit] Branches of critical theory

• Social theory
• Literary theory

[edit] History of critical theory

Main article: History of critical theory

[edit] Major works

• One-Dimensional Man
• Escape from Freedom
• Theory of Communicative Action
• Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere,
• Negative Dialectic
• Dialectic of Enlightenment
• Writing and Difference
• Of Grammatology
• Mythologies
• Practice of Hope
• Reinventing Social Work

[edit] Basic critical theory concepts

• Biopower
• Civic society
• Communicative action
• Critical Race Theory
• Cultural industry
• Cultural Studies
• Deconstruction
• Dehumanization
• Disciplinary institutions
• Discourse
• Enlightenment
• Episteme
• Feminism
• Genealogy
• Governmentality
• Hermeneutics
• Heterotopia
• Ideology
• Late capitalism
• Logical Positivism
• New Musicology
• Objectification
• Orientalism
• Panopticon
• Parrhesia
• Phenomenology
• Power
• Power-knowledge
• Post-colonialism
• Post-Modernism
• Post-structuralism
• Public sphere
• Queer Theory
• Reason
• Semiotics
• Social constructionalism
• State racism
• Structuralism
• World Systems Theory

[edit] Major theorists

Main article: List of critical theorists

• Theodor Adorno
• Louis Althusser
• Roland Barthes
• Jean Baudrillard
• Jacques Lacan
• Gilles Deleuze
• Jacques Derrida
• Michel Foucault
• Jürgen Habermas
• Herbert Marcuse
• Edward Said

[edit] Critical theory lists

Main article: List of critical theory topics

[edit] See also

• the Frankfurt School

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