COMPREHENSIVE REPORT

ENGLISH LITERATURE: TEXT AND CONTEXT

KELVIN CHRISTOPHER
REG. NO. 2016060804

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
FACULTY OF LETTERS
UNIVERSITAS PAMULANG
2023
ACKNOWLEDGE

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 PREFACE

This report was conducted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for

Sarjana Sastra (S.S) in the English Department, Faculty of Letters, Universitas

Pamulang. The title of this report is “Comprehensive Report English Literature:

Text and Context.” This report described literature, literary criticism, and also an

analysis of a short story.

The writer realizes that the report has yet to be perfect. Therefore, the

writer would like to accept constructive criticism, suggestions, and comments

about this report. Hopefully, this report could help enrich the knowledge of

readers interested in literature, literary criticism, and the short story Manar of

Hama.

Tangerang Selatan, March 2023

The Writer,

Kelvin Christhoper

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 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Praise and gratitude to the Lord, Allah SWT, for the unconditional

strengthening and blessing during the process of finishing this report. Blessing

and salam to the Prophet Muhammad SAW and all his followers. May Allah

continuously pour down us his blessing. This report would not be completed

without guidance, support, advice, and help from several individuals who always

give their valuable time and prayers in conducting this report. It is such an honor

to provide them with gratitude to the following people to accomplish this report:

1. Dr. Pranoto, S.E., M.M., as the Head of Sasmita Jaya Foundation.

2. Dr. E. Nurzaman A.M, Msi., M.M. as the Rector of Universitas Pamulang.

3. Dr. Mohammad Ramdon Dasuki, Lc., M.A. as the Dean of Letters Faculty

of Universitas Pamulang.

4. Tryana, S.S., M.A. as the Head of English Department of Universitas

Pamulang.

5. Setiana Sri Wahyuni Sitepu, S.pd., M.pd. as Secretary of English

Department of Universitas Pamulang.

6. Sari Fitria S.S., M.A, as the advisor of the writer who has patiently guided

and helped the writer in finishing the report. Thank you for the suggestions

and advice you have given to the writer.

7. All English Department lecturers who taught and shared their valuable

knowledge, motivation, and lesson from the first grade in the Universitas

Pamulang.

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 8. Silvia Robertha Lumy and Budi Hartin as the writer’s parents. The writer

believes that their prayers and support are the reason why the writer could

finish this report.

9. My brother and little brother who always support the writer even in

silence.

10. Indah kurnia as the writer’s support system who always has my ups and

downs.

Finally, all the gratitude is given to all friends and family that cannot be

mentioned one by one. Thank you for all of the kindness, support, and love for the

writer, so this study could be finally finished.

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

FORM OF RATIFICATION…………………………………………………… i

STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY.....................................................................ii

PREFACE.............................................................................................................iii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.................................................................................iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS.....................................................................................vi

CHAPTER I............................................................................................................1

INTRODUCTION..................................................................................................1

1.1 Introduction....................................................................................................1

CHAPTER II..........................................................................................................3

DISCUSSION.........................................................................................................3

2.1 What is Literature?.........................................................................................3

2.2 Types of Literary Criticism............................................................................4

2.2.1 The Psychological Approach...................................................................4

2.2.2 Feminism and Gender Studies.................................................................5

2.2.2.1 Feminism and Feminist Literary Criticism.......................................5

2.2.2.2 Woman: Created or Constructed?.....................................................6

2.2.2.2.1 Feminism and Psychoanalysis....................................................6

2.2.2.2.2 Multicultural Feminisms............................................................7

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 2.2.2.2.3 Marxist Feminism.......................................................................8

2.2.2.2.4 Feminist Film Studies.................................................................9

2.3 Analyzing Mohja Kahf’s Manar Of Hama..................................................10

CHAPTER III......................................................................................................12

CONCLUSION.....................................................................................................12

REFERENCES.....................................................................................................14

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 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Introduction

In today’s fast-paced world, literature may not always be the first thing

that comes to mind when thinking about essential things in our lives.

However, literature remains an important aspect of our culture and is crucial in

our society. People need to learn literature because it helps them to develop

critical thinking skills. Reading requires us to engage with complex ideas and

concepts and analyze and interpret information thoughtfully. This can help us

become more critical consumers of information in our everyday lives and

better equipped to navigate complex societal issues.

According to Lazere (1983)  literature is the single academic discipline

that can come closest to encompassing the full range of mental traits currently

considered to comprise critical thinking. By reading books or other forms of

literature written by people from different countries and cultures, we can

better understand their values, beliefs, and experiences. This helps us become

more empathetic and open-minded, which makes us better global citizens. 

Moreover, literature is an essential part of our cultural and intellectual life.

Through literature, we can connect with people from different background and

cultures, reflect on our own lives and personal growth, develop critical

thinking skills, and gain insight into our collective history. In a world that is
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becoming fast in every aspect to gather information, literature can help us

bridge divides and foster greater empathy and understanding. Therefore,

literature is more important now than ever before.

 CHAPTER II

DISCUSSION

2.1 What is Literature?

Literature is all of the written works of fiction that try to explain nature

and life. They want to understand, express, and share experiences. Moreover,

literature also talks about the way people or people and society interact with

each other and with society as a whole. However, literary works have unique

qualities, like using language, that shows imagination and artistic value.

According to Isariyawat (2020), that literature gives us different feelings

because it is the art of communication. Feelings and emotions come through in

poetry, which has a life of its own and makes the readers feel emotionally

satisfied. Literature can deliver emotion, experience, and thought through their

literary works such as poetry, prose, and drama in aesthetic ways.

As a result, it is possible to argue that literature is fundamentally a product

of culture, concretizing the complete range of human values, emotions,

behaviors, and ideas (Eagleton , 1996). The readers may delve deeper into the

specific vision by viewing literature with a critical eye. With the help of

literary criticism, readers can create an informed opinion on the relevance of a

literary work that an author was attempting to represent. Literary criticism

isn’t always negative; it refers to an in-depth examination of an author

creations or writing style in order to grasp the meaning.

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2.2 Types of Literary Criticism

The analysis, interpretation, and evaluation of literary works is known as

literary criticism. It entails analyzing a piece of literature's language, topics, and

style in order to determine its relevance and meaning. Literary criticism comes in

a variety of forms, each of which takes a unique stance on a piece of literature.

We'll talk about some of the most popular categories of literary criticism in this

post.

2.2.1 The Psychological Approach

The psychological approach to literary criticism has been one of the most

contentious, misunderstood, and, for many readers, the one that has received the

slightest appreciation (Guerrin, 2005). Despite the challenges it presents, the

psychological approach has the potential to be both fascinating and fulfilling.

Other methods each have their own set of limitations that are unique to them.

Freud proposed that most of an individual's mental activities occur outside of

conscious awareness. In addition to this, he argued that the fundamental force

behind all human behavior is sexuality. According to Freud (1923), the essential

aspect of one's psyche is the libido, often sexual energy. His third and most

important argument is that much of what we want and remember is repressed. A

psychoanalysis theory describes the subject as well as personality changes.

Emotion, motives, and other internal factors are the most significant aspects of

this subject.
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2.2.2 Feminism and Gender Studies

Feminism and gender studies are trying to examine the social, political,

and economic roles and also experiences of an individual based on their gender.

These fields emerged in response to the historically unequal treatment of women

and the limitation that traditional gender roles imposed on individuals. Gender

studies are an interdisciplinary field featuring many subjects under study

(Soderlund & Madison, 2017).

2.2.2.1 Feminism and Feminist Literary Criticism

Feminism is an idea and movement to restore human rights for all human

beings. Moreover, feminism has generally focused more on what is lacking than

what is seen, showing concern about how males are privileged in patriarchal

cultures that silence and marginalize women. Feminist criticism is part of feminist

studies that became known in the 1960s. Feminist criticism is a broad term for

different ways of looking at culture and literature that are important to women and

are based on feminist literary theory and scholarship (Bressler, 2011). Feminism,

in general, is hostile to men and children, advocates for family separation,

resulting in human miser in a family-less life, and maintains a direct or indirect

link with the increasing numbers of rape and men-women physical relationships

without marital bonds. The most recent versions of Marxist, feminist,

psychoanalytic, and linguistic criticism all define themselves in opposition to

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earlier versions of each, so it tries to explain the earlier versions first in each case

(Barry, 2002).

2.2.2.2 Woman: Created or Constructed?

Most feminists worldwide employ four ways to explain differences:

biological, linguistic, psychoanalytic, and cultural. First, the biological model:

women writers who discuss the intimate details of the female experience of the

female body. Second, linguistic model: women tend to write “male” language,

such as using associational rather than linear logic, other “feminine” artistic

choices, such as the free play of meaning and a lack of closure, as well as genre

preference, such as letters, journals, confessional, domestic, and body-centered

discourse. Third, the psychoanalytic model identifies gender differences in the

psyche and artistic process. The last, the cultural model: places feminist concerns

in social contexts, acknowledging class, racial, national, and historical differences

and determinants among women (Guerrin, 2005).

2.2.2.2.1 Feminism and Psychoanalysis

The psychological approach to literary criticism has been one of the most

contentious, misunderstood, and, for many readers, the one that has received the

slightest appreciation (Guerrin, 2005). Despite the challenges it presents, the

psychological approach has the potential to be both fascinating and fulfilling.

Other methods each have their own set of limitations that are unique to them.

Freud proposed that most of an individual's mental activities occur outside of

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conscious awareness. In addition to this, he argued that the fundamental force

behind all human behavior.

According to Freud (1923), there is a theoretical formation of a person,

and it differs into three levels of consciousness. He illustrated it as a giant iceberg

with a different stage. It consists of conscious, preconscious, and unconscious

levels—perspective on gender inequality. Gender inequality already rooted since

early childhood. Like the way man sees their selves as masculine and woman as

feminine. A psychoanalysis theory describes the subject as well as personality

changes. Emotion, motives, and other internal factors are the most significant

aspects of this subject.

2.2.2.2.2 Multicultural Feminisms

Most feminists want to represent the power structure, be considered the

same as men, and participate in modern capitalist culture's advantages such as fair

rights, child care, and other social rights. Philosophical multiculturalism is an

attempt to criticize how the majority culture oppresses minority cultural groups,

like when minority cultural groups have to follow the rules of the majority culture

to be accepted in the public system. Women can get into long-lasting fights over

race, class, age, religion, and work opportunities. Women, race, and class focused

on how race and class inequality hurt first and second-wave feminist organizing.

As a result, black and working-class women, migrants, and other ethnic minorities

were mainly left out of feminism as participants and as a group that supported it

(Motta , 2011).
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Most of the time, feminist arguments have been against racism,

xenophobia, and homophobia. That is why multicultural feminists identified an

inequality caused by differences in culture, race, ethnicity, and gender.

2.2.2.2.3 Marxist Feminism

Constructivist feminism took inspiration from Marxism, especially in how

it analyses the relationships between reading and other social constructions.

Marxist feminists contend that literary value is a socially constructed quality

rather than a transcendent quality. Marxist feminist has criticized what they call

“Classist.” Classist itself means the gap between women and men is caused by an

economic system where women have weaker positions than men. Moreover,

according to Hossain (2016) Marxist feminists say that the only way to change a

social system where women are more likely to be exploited than men is to change

how property is structured.

They point out that women in the working class are hired and paid less

than men in the same jobs. Even though they do the work that keeps the capitalist

system going, they do not get the same benefits as men. Feminists have pointed

out that women’s unpaid domestic work, sexuality, and procreation are essential

to capitalism. They call this “unfree labor,” which shows that the devaluation of

reproduction works goes hand in hand with the devaluation of women’s social

position (Rai, 2018).

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2.2.2.2.4 Feminist Film Studies

Gender identity comes from the patriarchal culture just as much as the idea

that men are better than women. The change in how patriarchal systems are seen

has led to a new phase in the movement against patriarchy, such as the survival of

the feminist industry based on the law of social evolution (Soderlund & Madison,

2017). From these and other sources, feminist film scholars started to figure out

how patriarchal ideas are passed on to female viewers through film texts. This is

called “feminist critiques” in literary studies.

The development of alternate feminist filmmaking in the 1970s by people

like Laura Mulvey and Sally potter also affected the early stages of feminist film

theory. So, feminist film theory has always comprised two parts: criticism of

mainstream film and support for an alternate or “counter” film film (Bannet &

Royle, 2016). Laura malvey demonstrates how male ambivalence toward the

general representation of women leads viewers to choose between dismissing,

punishing, or saving a guilty female, or making her into a pedestal figure or fetish,

using examples from Alfred Hitchcock movies. Early feminism was directed by

stereotypes of women, mainly in Hollywood films. In the real world, what is

considered to be feminine can be shaped by “ideas” that are made and spread

through texts and practices (Chertian, 2022).

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2.3 Analyzing Mohja Kahf’s Manar Of Hama

Manar of Hama by Kafh 2005, is a story about an Arab-American woman

who lives in America. Manar, the protagonist in this story, must first come to

terms with her pain and loss and learn to accept her new environment. The story

strips Manar of her stereotypical covering and exposes her subjectivity while

speaking her voice. The difficulty begins with the protagonist attempting to

integrate into American culture. She contends that her children have learned

English, but she continues to find it challenging to communicate and express

herself.

Manar of Hama short story also contains cultural identity issues that show

from the community of Arab living in America. It was shown when Manar joined

the community of Arab living. They share food and spice and also the atmosphere

of the community itself.

In this country there is no squash, no eggplant. What they call

squash is long and skinny. What they call eggplant is gigantic and
seedy. They have skimpy orange carrots, not the fat purple kind
you can hollow out and stuff. Most repulsive of all is the enormous
slimy thing they call cucumber. Waxy outside, watery and seedy
and taste-less inside, it simply cannot be eaten. I can’t find fresh
mint. Mint! Let alone coriander. I looked up the English name for
it in the Mawrid, but when I asked the girl at the grocery stores she
looked at me as if I asked for something from the Land of Waq-
Waq. There is no allspice, no sumac, no cardamom. So I cannot
even make the food smell like food (Kafh, 2005:113-114).
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In the quotation above, she feels hopeless because she has to deal with a

culture that thinks she is an “ignoramus” because of how she dresses, even though

it is considered dignified for a woman to wear in Syria. Moreover, there is also a

definition itself to explain cultural identity itself. The first definition says that

cultural identity is a unitary collective self in which people of the same culture

share everyday historical experiences and cultural codes with stable, unchanging,

and continuous frames of reference and meaning underneath the changing

divisions of actual history.

I said what do you expect, putting them in American schools that

mix up girls and boys. What do Americans care about modesty,
they are the world leaders in immorality, this everyone 111 knows.
But we have no choice—there is a private Catholic school for girls
only but we can’t afford it.(Kafh, 2005:111-112).

In the quotation above, the protagonist also has concerns with the United

States morals due to the co-location of boys and girls in mixed schools and the

food she finds repulsive. Moreover, Manar condition said that Manar is proud of

her identity, which she knows by giving her full name and country of origin, as is

customary in Arabic culture. She misses the aroma of Syrian food, and since there

is only one arab family in the town with whom she can connect, she begins to feel

alone and isolated; hence, we conclude that Manar is having trouble adjusting to

her new way of life. The story implies physical deprivation and hunger and is

intertwined with spiritual and cultural deprivation. The woman's character takes

the Arabic tradition pride by stating her full name and national origins. However,
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her confidence is undermined by a sense of hopelessness as she struggles with the

culture in which she perceives herself.

 CHAPTER III

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, literature is a collection of written works. The term has

traditionally been applied to visionary works of poetry and prose characterized by

their author's goals and perceived aesthetic brilliance of execution. Literature can

be categorized using various methods, including language, national origin,

historical period, genre, and topic. Literature can also serve as a quiet witness and

commentator on human life. The literary background alone can reveal how a

region's people generally live. Human expression is expressed through

literature.Literary criticism is an important field of study that helps us to

understand and appreciate works of literature in more nuanced and informed way.

Literary criticism is an essential field of study that helps us understand and

appreciate works of literature more nuanced and informedly. Through the analysis

of literary works, literary criticism provides insights into the themes, characters,

symbols, and historical and cultural contexts that shape a piece of literature.

Literary criticism remains vital to our understanding of literature and human

experience. By engaging with the insights and perspectives of literary critics, we

can sincerely show our appreciation for literature works and gain new insights

into the complexities of other people's thoughts, emotions, and culture.

Manar of Hama by Mohja Kahf is a short story that explore the struggles

of Syrian family in the midst of war and violence. The story is narrated from

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perspective of the mother, who recall the events that led to the destruction of her

hometown, Hama. Overall, Manar of Hama is a powerful and moving portrayal of

the human impact of war. Through the mother’s perspective, we are able to look

back the struggle and strength of ordinary people in the face of extraordinary

circumstances. Finally, This Essay paper purpose is to give information to the

reader about a summary explanation of what is literature, literary criticism, and a

short story Manar of Hama in detail. So, that the reader can get an information for

what the writer has been conducted in the summary of this essay. Most of the

essay summary found was gained from books, and any other online resources.
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Bressler, C. E. (2011). Literary Criticism An Introduction to Theory and Practice Fifth Edition.

Chertian, V. G. (2022). Villainess Protagonists Performative Acts As The Representation Of

Modern Femininity. Lingua Cultura, 16(2), 133–140.
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Eagleton T. (1996). Literary Theory (2nd ed.). Blackwell Publishers Ltd.

Freud S. (1923). The Ego and the Id. Internationaler Psycho- analytischer Verlag (Wina), W. W.
Norton & Company.

Guerrin, W. L. (2005). A handbook of critical approaches to literature. Oxford University Press.

Hossain, D. M., Nik Ahmad, N. N., & Siraj, S. A. (2016). Marxist Feminist Perspective of
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EFL context: Cultural awareness and language skills. Journal of Language and Linguistic
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Kafh, m. (2005). Manar of Hama. University of Arkansas Press.

Lazere, D. (1983). ERIC Clearinghouse on Reading and Communication Skills.

Motta S. (2011). Interface: a journal for and about social movements. A Journal for and about
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