K@ta: A Biannual Publication on the Study of Language and Literature (Jan 1999)
THE CONSTRUCTIVIST THEORY OF REALITY IN LITERARY RESEARCH
Abstract
As a sign system, literature is not limited to the imaginative world only. Literature, however, is also a system which involves the author, the work, the reader, and the field of knowledge (society). Although the facts presented tend to be mental facts, it does not mean that facts in literature cannot be seen as data about the existing social reality. Referring to literature as a sign system, which stresses the mimetic and creative aspects, literature as a construction can be seen as the reflection of reality with two dimensions, subjective and objective. Therefore, the assumption that facts in literature are not the reflections of reality cannot be accepted. Based on the framework of semiotic thinking which emphasizes literature as a sign system, the social dimension could be applied in literary approaches, one of them is the constructivist theory of reality by Berger and Luckman. Through the constructivist theory of reality, literature can be analyzed as the reflections of subjective and objective realities. In other words, literary approach can be directed from literature as the product and its author.
