IDENTIFYING YOUR

OWN PATH OF
WONDER
M.H ABRAMS 1953

- argued that all literary theories could be broadly classified under four
categories.
• Mimetic theories - interested in the way texts represent the world.

• Expressive theories - which concern the way works reveal the inner world of
the author

• Pragmatic theories - focus on the ways texts affect thier audiences

• Objective theories - look at the texts themselves as self-contaained objects

for aesthetic contemapltion.
J.L. AUSTIN 1955

- argued that language didn't merely give

expression to pre-existing thoughts and
constructs, but was an action in and of itself; that
is language actively creates what it seems to
merely describes.