Literary Darwinism in the Context of the Humanities Crisis

Abstract

Since 2009, literary darwinism gain momentum in American universities and in anglophone countries. This new trend in literary theory and criticism have barely been considered in Spain. On one hand, this article exposes its main theoretical assumptions and offers a critique of the spurious use it makes of evolutionary theory. On the other hand, it explicates its birth and rise in relation to the normative conflicts provoked by the dispute on the canon in the nineties. Lastly, this article defends naturalized approaches to literary studies which do not incur in the functionalist reductionism which define literary Darwinism.