The Usage of
the "Literalogy" Term in the Writings
Anwer Ghani
The usage of the "literology" word
in the writings is very scanty and with different purpose .There is no "literology"
word or term in the dictionaries or encyclopedia and all what I found in the
all the sites which had used "literology" word are the followings:
1- Literology. Net by Caitlin Brodie (1)
Under the section "WHAT IS
LITEROLOGY?" The author said: Literology is a book review site that tries
to break out of the common format that book reviews typically follow. Each book
will be given a score out of 10 in each of 5 categories (plot, character
development, world building, diversity, and fun), and those scores will be
added up to create an overall rating."
In fact, this attitude is a part of what I
call " The quantitative study of the literature" which can be applied
on the physical components, the meanings or on the symbolic aspect. This quantitative
approach represents the cornerstone of the scientific approach in the literary
studies, or what we call " literology", but the author of"
Literology.net" didn't crystalize the scientific idea in his work, where
he said: " so you’re just writing normal reviews, but with more numbers."
which makes the quantitation a merely superficial processes.
The
author used "How much" phrase, which is so important where he said:
"each review will have a non-spoiler section and a spoiler-y section, so
you can decide how much you want to know about the book in question." and
in fact this is an aspect in the quantitative study of literature.
Under
the section titled "Welcome to Literology 101" she said: "For
each book review, I will rate the book from 1 to 10 in a series of categories.
10 being AMAZING, and 1 being THE WORST. The categories are:
PLOT (Is it full of clichés? Is it boring?
Does it even make sense?)
CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT (Are the characters
well-developed, or are they a bunch of nonsensical “Mary Sue”s?)
WORLD BUILDING (How well do we get to know the
world? Is the world-building spread out, or all in one big info-dump?)
DIVERSITY (Are there female characters? POC
characters? LGBTQ+ characters? Disabled characters? Are they stereotypes, or
are they written like real people?)
FUN (Is the book enjoyable to read, or does it
make me want to gouge my eyes out?)"
We can see the essential traditional
considerations in his views, which doesn't differ greatly from the critical
works, but her emphasis on the scoring and partitioning and separation of each
part make the work has an organized proberty.
The important part in her essays is the
following paragraph:
"Why am I doing this? Because I believe
that book reviews should take into account how fun a book was to read. And
because I think that quantifying your opinions (along with providing evidence)
will help people understand my point of view, and will help eliminate some of
the “I’m right and you’re wrong and dumb” aspects of writing on the
internet."
Here we see the clear term of "quantifying"
where she said "quantifying your opinions (along with providing evidence)
will help people understand my point of view", and I add that the quantification
is the important step towards the literology, the science of the literature. But
the big declining from the scientific idea is the subjectivity in her approach,
where she said "Obviously all of my reviews will be massively, massively
subjective, because that’s how a review should be. No one else can tell you
what to think or how to respond to a story. But I have 2 hopes for this
blog:" This approach and view antagonize the scientific process. Of course
the author didn't thinking in the scientific literature, but her ideas have
many steps in this road. The author applied his subjectivity on the "Harry
Potter and the Cursed Child" and show the very unscientific approach.
So the term was used here in an approach which is different from the scientific
approach.
In the site there is only "Caitlin"
but in the following twitter account I find an address. On twitter account. (2)
Under the name of "literology" which is related to the
"literology. Net", where Caitlin put a twitter address
"Guernica322" and I found that the author is Caitlin Brodie on
twitter. (3) And there is a Tumblr address of Caitlin. (4) On her Tumblr, the writing is a creative
non-fiction and a it is away totally
from the scientific literature..
2- Rogue Homilies by Deidre Price
They use the term in the meaning of literature
where poems lie under its category. (5)
3- Literology; a blog on word press
They explain their "Literology" by this
sentence: "A study of modern and classic literature." (6) And you
know that is the literature theory. There are in the archive two pages; Book
reviews and Thoughtful Thursday, but they are empty. In the contact site, there
is a place for submission of a letter, but without a name, so the blog for us is
by unknown.
4- Free dictionary by the Farlex
There is on item under the word of
"Literology", but it redirected into the "Literary
criticism", and this is not right. (7)
5- Morris
Educational Foundation
They used the
"Literology" in the meaning of literacy aided by technology. In the
post of "Literology" they said " Literology: Literacy and
Technology Coming Together. This pilot program gives students the opportunity
to utilize technology during Language Acts instruction. The grant will be
used to purchase a class set of Mini ipads with storage, as well as books and
magazines for reading on each device and literacy applications." (8)
It is clear
that this meaning is far away from the scientific approach in the analysis of
literature. And is it right to use the term "literology" in this
meaning? I think the correct one is the term "Technological
Literacy".
6- The word; a
philosophy of words; by Edna Sarah Beardsley.
In the title,
"The word; A philosophy of words; a literology or science of literate
characters: a psychology or logic of the Logos (soul); a word analysis or word
treatise". It is important usage because of the word "science" (9),
but here the science is of literate and no literature.
8- Literology
Publishing, LLC
This title had
appeared in Georgia register.com,(10) without further explanation.
9- literology
.org
This title was
appeared in the Websitepart (11) without explanation.
10- A Defense
of Poetry: Reflections on the Occasion of Writing by Paul H Fry. (12)
He used "literology"
in three place; the first when he said: "literology, the spirit of the
criticism. Second;" I mean the discourse of the history, one branch of
which is the storytelling- fiction- and another that goes far word necessarily
in the service of history." The third place where he said:" While it
is writing about literature, the search for the historical significance of and
in literature that Joel Weinshiemer has called "literology" which
return us to our human fate"
We can see the material foundation of all the meanings which he used
them, and they are confined on the literature.
In the dictionaries and as we said there is no
" literology" word, but there is :
literacy: The ability to read and write
Literariness: Of or relating to or
characteristic of literature
Literary: Of or relating to or characteristic
of literature
literature: Creative writing of recognized
artistic value, The humanistic study of a body of literature, Published
writings in a particular style on a particular subject, The profession or art
of a writer.
When we analysis the literature by a
scientific method, and when we deal with the literary pieces as materials and
phenomena, in this situation we can use the term " literology" to
describe this approach. So the literology is the scientific approach in the
study of literature.
Refernces
10-
https://www.georgia-register.com/16074373-literology-publishing-llc
