Clayton George Wickham - final thesis

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is a series of patterns, lines and colours, not a mountain at sunset).
Some of these arguments are accurate, and some either misrepresentative or
misunderstanding of the aims of formalism. To begin, I will show the research of
those who oppose formalism, how these arguments are framed, and ways in which
formalists respond to these accusations.
I have made reference throughout the thesis to interpretive criticism,
psychoanalytic reading, socio-political analysis, and sociocultural analysis, each time
positioning my work as providing an alternate reading to these previously utilised
methods. These methods are often referred to, usually by formalists, as “theory”, a
categorisation which “theorists” seem uncomfortable with, as I will discuss in a
moment. As a result, the methodological argument tends to configure into a battle of
Form vs Theory. Currently, two of the most vocal and recognizable names engaging
in this debate are David Bordwell on the side of Form, and Slavoj Žižek on the side
of Theory.
Engaging in the debate between form and theory, or as Žižek dubs the
tension, “between Theory and Post-Theory,” (2001) becomes problematic, as the two
sides of the argument rarely fully engage with each other. The only work on either
side that extensively engages in this is Bordwell and Carroll’s anthology Post-
Theory: Reconstructing Film Studies (1996), which is comprised of multiple essays
arguing for ways to move forward from what is perceived as the demise of theory in
academia. However, one thing I have discovered throughout the course of my
studies is that theory is still prevalent amongst graduate students as well as
established academics, and both sides, assuming they are in opposition, continue to
carry the same misconceptions of both. Post-Theory, however, and the ensuing