Critiquing Literature Through A Psychological Lens

At the beginning of the term I was faced with the challenge of earning 12 credit hours in my Psychology concentration, while at the same time fulfilling my Liberal Studies literature criteria. I feel I met my goals through the broad, yet focused range of sources I read, total pages written and final project. As one of the options given in the syllabus, I chose to keep an online study journal instead of the reflection letters http://studyjournalfall2013.wordpress.com/.

After study exploration week and consulting with my professor, I was confident I could examine literature through the lens of psychology to meet the 12 credit hour requirement in my concentration in psychology and the LS requirement for literature. In my study plan, I developed

I accomplished this critique through Jung’s theory of human functions, Karen Horney and Abraham Maslow theories on inner peace and self-actualization, and also the emotion theories of Charles Darwin, James Cannon, Philip Bard, William James and Carl Lange. I also studied the psychology behind emotion and why novels are an emotional experience for readers as theorized by Karen Horney, Abraham Maslow. Finally, I examined the circumstances of emotion as a strong motivating factor in driving people to act on those emotions. This was the basis for the Cannon-Bard and the James-Lange theories. This was the case with Harriet Beecher Stowe’s books Uncle Tom’s Cabin and The Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin as an influencing factor leading up to the Civil War. (Paris, 1997; Stowe,

This study was no different. I used the required number of seventeen scholarly psychology resources. I then added eight popular 19th century novels. Finally, I chose five sources on character development and psychological analysis of the characters. I was careful to ensure the bulk of the character development resources were written by people with degrees in psychology and related fields. In order to insure all my resources were used and discussed, I completed far more pages of academic writing than was required. It is my practice to do this to ensure that both the writing require for 12 credit hours were met for my concentration in Psychology as well as any additional writing to cover the LS requirement for