Contemporary issues in Comparative Literature: the literary crossroads

Abstract

This article aims to provide a brief overview of the changes that the Comparative Literature discipline has undergone over time, highlighting the main contemporary trends through the lens of highly influential scholars in the field. Beginning with a short contextualization of the discipline in the 19th century, we emphasize how contemporary Comparative Literature moves away from the paradigmatic methods of influence and familiarity, shifting its focus toward alterity, interdisciplinarity, and the intersection between different discursive mediums. In this contemporary moment, we highlight the concepts of teleopoiesis (Spivak, 2004), critical fabulation (Hartman, 2008), and the crossroads (Gates, 1988), which represent the discipline’s turn toward the other, to the engagement with the archive, and the crossing of disciplinary boundaries. In conclusion, we propose the image of the literary crossroads as a model that symbolizes the comparative act of the contemporary scholar in Comparative Literature.