Speaking with the Dead: New Historicism, Its Roots and Development as an Epoch-making Approach

Abstract

This paper aims to examine the status, roots and development of New Historicism as an epoch-making approach in the context of critical analysis. After Stephen Greenblatt coined the term “New Historicism,” Louis Montrose and Greenblatt improved the theory and applied it in different studies, thus contributing to the area. Afterwards, Catherine Gallagher and Greenblatt edited Practicing New Historicism as a guidebook to New Historicists, and through their studies, various critics contributed to the embodiment of this theory in the critical environment. Alternative to Historicism, New Historicism as a theory provides unconventional ways for the analysis of historical processes from different angles. This theory allows multiple perspectives in historiography, thus featuring the experiences, struggles and contributions of the minorities, the weak, the suppressed, or the invisible social groups in history. Thereby, it aims to create a more comprehensive understanding by evaluating the historical background from the eyes of different social units. New Historicism also claims that historical events are to be considered within their social, cultural, environmental and economic context, which provides a new and unconventional method of criticism. Therefore, this paper analyses New Historicism as an epochal approach with the analysis of its roots, arguments, challenges, and techniques, in addition to its relation to various theories such as Marxism, Foucauldian theory, Thick Description, Deconstruction, Historicism, and Cultural Materialism.