En apologi för nyttan

Abstract

"An apology for usefulness" is discussing the crisis of Comparative Literature in Sweden in terms of tradition and usefulness. The origin of literary history both as genre and discipline is connected to the nineteenth century's nationalism and the project of creating a national identity. The golden age of comparative literature, from the end of the nineteenth century up to the midst of the twentieth, is connected to the modern interest in humanity and the ongoing process of defining the human. After the linguistic turn and during the latter part of the twentieth century the discipline became a combination of canon studies and text analytical exercise. Opposing the established focus on modernist texts and text analysis and the common view of the literary text as autonomous the article argues for the need of including the problems focused in the proliferating uses of literature and text analysis in other scientific fields after the narrative turn in the end of the twentieth century.