Liberal humanism
A literary critical tradition (dominant in mid-20th century) emphasising texts' universal truths about human experience, individual character development, and aesthetic greatness. Liberal humanism assumes literature transcends historical context to reveal timeless human values.
Real World
F.R. Leavis's 'The Great Tradition' championed Austen, Eliot, and James as expressing timeless moral seriousness — a liberal humanist canon that later critics like Terry Eagleton challenged for ignoring class, gender, and colonial contexts entirely.
Exam Focus
Use liberal humanism as a foil: acknowledge its reading, then show how a contextual or political approach reveals what it obscures.
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