This study explores the literature of late Choson in its material context, examining how the physical aspects of the production and circulation of texts impacted the practice of writing. By analyzing various travelogues from Beijing (yonhaengnok) and private collections (munjip) from the late seventeenth to the early nineteenth century, I examine how transcultural contacts across borders and changing textual environments influenced intellectual circles and literary trends in late Choson Korea. Interpreting the literary text as the material product of a culture, my study shifts the emphasis from the author as the creator of a text to the editors, publishers, collectors, and readers, through whose hands a text is reshaped and given new meaning. In light of the concept of social authorship, the written culture of late Choson will be revisited in relation to complex networks of social interactions. The print and manuscript culture of the day, socio-political groups that the author belonged to, the book market, and the government policies of that time provide interesting information on the practices of literary production, based on the larger cultural dynamics of East Asia. This dissertation revolves around a series of questions about circulation networks and their impact. In regard to the social and cultural condition of literary production in the eighteenth century, I examine transnational interactions with foreign intellectuals as well as collective coterie activities of reading and writing among the literati in Seoul. How did the flourishing of print culture of the Jiangnan area and the book markets in Beijing change the textual dynamics of Korea? Did the government censorship carried out by the Qing and the Choson governments effectively control the circulation of books? How did the Choson literati consume the foreign books and why did they form so many literary communities in Seoul? By investigating the large scope of these textual situations, I explore how the transcultural contacts "across borders" and the changing textual environments influenced intellectual circles and literary trends in late Choson. With respect to textual dynamics, I emphasize the various "informal networks" that have been placed at the center of book reception and consumption. For example, a number of book brokers in the Qing and Choson facilitated the distribution of books, and the sharing of manuscripts among friends in literary coteries was influential in the shaping of new literary tastes and public culture. These unconventional routes outside of established channels functioned as the actual key drivers of book culture in late Choson. My argument throughout this dissertation is that "informal circulation" is a central, rather than marginal, feature of eighteenth-century book culture and literary production. Through a specific case study of a literatus-official, Yi Tong-mu (1741-1793), my dissertation addresses these issues in three parts that consist of seven chapters: (1) Part One, "Social Authorship and Manuscript Production," examines how the writings of Yi Tong-mu were constructed and transmitted through a complex of social interactions and how the physical aspects of texts inform various transactions of human and non-human agencies in the production of texts. (2) Part Two, "The Location of Texts: Circulation of Books, Censorship, and Community Activities" traces how social networks among the domestic literati as well as among foreign intellectuals facilitated the circulation of books. First, I examine the large scope of transnational interaction between China and Korea, and the literary inquisition carried out by the Choson government in response to the changing textual environment. This is followed by a discussion of the poetry communities in Seoul, in which the Choson literati shared their reading practices and produced their common aesthetic tastes in their writings. (3) Part Three, "Making Meaning: Reading Self and Social Discourses," examines how Yi Tong-mu read books from the Ming and the Qing--such as those by Yuan Hongdao of the Ming and Wang Shizhen of the Qing--and wrote his own poetry and literary criticism and embodied his interpretive activities in his own works. / East Asian Languages and Civilizations

L’étude retrace l’évolution de la critique littéraire en France à l’ère numérique, en se référant à sa fonction prescriptive. Dans son approche, l’auteure s’appuie sur une enquête de terrain auprès des acteurs de l’espace critique – éditeurs, blogueurs, fondateurs de sites participatifs et sur l’observation des blogs et sites littéraires français. Elle analyse les mutations de la critique du web à la fois sur le plan social et discursif. La phase interactive de l’internet, qui a libéré des voix de profanes, s’imposant comme de nouveaux évaluateurs, crée un espace critique parallèle, et en conséquence force le champ littéraire à se réorganiser. En même temps, sur le plan formel, le nouveau médium façonne et transforme le discours critique lui-même, tout autant dans la phase de la création que celle de la diffusion et de la réception de la parole critique. Les nouvelles formes de médiation, ouvertes aux échanges, privilégient de plus en plus la dimension collective. Il en résulte des formes de sociabilités littéraires numériques, dont les membres, par leur activité critique, créent non seulement une nouvelle force de prescription sur le marché du livre, mais ils contribuent également à la fabrication d’un canon littéraire alternatif. Le changement le plus significatif se traduit notamment par ces manifestations collectives de la critique contemporaine. Nourries d’échanges de lecteurs passionnés et renforcées par des résultats d’agrégations de données, pouvant être ainsi considérées comme le fruit d’une alliance de la subjectivité individuelle et de l’objectivité produite par la machine, elles transforment fondamentalement le mode de fabrication du discours critique actuel. / The study traces the evolution of literary criticism in France in the digital age, referring to its prescriptive function. In her approach, the author relies on a field survey among actors of the critical space - publishers, bloggers, founders of participatory sites and on the observation of French blogs and literary sites. She analyzes the mutations of web critique, both social and discursive. The interactive phase of the Internet which has released voices of amateurs, self-appointed as new evaluators, creates a parallel critical space, and consequently forces the literary field to reorganize itself. At the same time, on the formal plane, the new medium shapes and transforms the critical discourse itself, both in the phase of creation and in the diffusion and reception of critical speech. The new forms of mediation, open to exchange, more and more favour the collective dimension. As a result, many digital literary communities are being formed whose critical activity not only create a new prescriptive force on the book market but also contribute to the making of an alternative literary canon. The most significant change is reflected in these collective manifestations of contemporary criticism – nourished by passionate exchange of readers and reinforced by the results of data aggregation (which can thus be considered as the result of an alliance of individual subjectivity and the objectivity produced by the machine) - which transform fundamentally the way of constructing the current critical discourse.

Since the 1990s, urban cultural policy in the UK has been bound to the cause of urban regeneration. Much has been written in examination and critique of this relationship, but what happens when the direction of strategic attention is reversed and civic leadership seeks to regenerate culture itself? The city of Glasgow, having made capital of culture over many decades, has moved towards a strategy for the development of literary Glasgow. This thesis documents a search for those factors crucial to that strategy. The research focuses on literary Glasgow as one aspect of the city’s cultural sector; identifies and examines gaps in the relationship between the civic cultural organisation and literary communities; and highlights those elements vital to the formation of a strategy for development of the literary in Glasgow. An extended period of participatory ethnographic research within the Aye Write! book festival and Sunny Govan Community Radio, is supplemented with data from interviews conducted across the literary sector and analysis of organisational documentation. Through these a gap has been identified between the policies and operations of a civic cultural organisation, and the desires of those engaged within the literary community. This gap is caused, in part, by the lack of a mechanism with which to reconcile contrasting narratives about the cultural essence of the city, or to negotiate the variations in definitions of value in relation to cultural engagement. The interdisciplinary approach builds upon insights from existing work within publishing studies, cultural policy, complexity theory and organisational studies to construct an understanding of the dynamics of Glasgow’s literary sector. This reveals the need for a framework in support of a landscape of practice, a desire for the placement of boundary objects to facilitate engagement, and the significance of value in relation to participation in literary activity. This work informs a strategy for literary Glasgow and contributes to conversations on strategies for cultural development in other cities.