B Williams / R Williams

Right off the bat, Raymond Williams lays out for us so nicely how form is taken up by various critical camps:

For a social theory of literature, the problem of form is a problem of the relations between social (collective) moves and individual projects. For a social and historical theory, it is a problem of these relations as necessary variable. For a social and historical theory based on the materiality of language and the related materiality of cultural production, it is a problem of the description of these variable relations within specifiable material practices. (187)

Let's unpack each of these claims with a little additional detail he provides throughout the text:

1. Social theories focus on:
form as the relation between (social + individual) / (perception + creation)

where social process becomes social product (187)

2. Socio-historical theories focus on:
 the historical variability of form
As function of real social relationships, general and specific (190)
as relation between social and individual 

3. Material theories focus on:
 the physical and material description of
relational processes (person to person + person to things) (190)
the variability of form 

as a relation between social and individual

I think this could go on and on - but let me give it a test run (on a VERY basic knowledge of psychoanalysis):

4. Psychoanalytic theories focus on:

form as a relation between 

what is apparent and what is obscured

to reveal a textual consciousness and/or unconsciousness

Obviously this is a grossly oversimplified (and potentially dead wrong) description of psychoanalytic theory's concerns with form. I have no idea what psychoanalysis makes of form or hopes to use it form, but by using this a model and building on the idea of form as a relational process, it led me to a not-so-bad description. It's not perfect, but gives an idea of the ways a theory might process/use/realize form. Could this be used for various theories on gender or queerness? Ecocriticism? Deconstruction?

**Could be a great comment - apply this idea to the theory you know best?

Form provides us an individual or local but always-already historicized glimpse into an idea. It is at once unique and part of the whole. Williams' acknowledges this in stating that "the range and ambiguity of a concept, far from being an invitation to mere listing, or an eclectic tolerance, constitute the key to its significance. We have seen this already in the concepts of culture and determination. The case of form is perhaps even more striking example" (186). 

In all of my recent theory-reading, it's easy for me to forget the power of form. Spivak really helped lead me back to my belief. Her reading of praxis as identifying the individual, the unique, the subject, within a larger theoretical narrative was genius. And while you'd be hard pressed to find such a specific formal tool that happens to go with your preconceived theory in all texts, you'll be able to identify within the form something that reveals the larger relationships that led to its formation. 

But uh-oh! But does this cross the line into symptomatic reading? Looking for the relationships between structure and subject or social and individual that led to a particular text might insinuate that there's something to find or identify not readily available in the text. Where does that leave us?