Writing Help 129 | - ☆ Freelance Writer
Apr 06, 2013 | #1
Poetic Terms You Have to Learn
Although many of the terms we have been discussing so far are unique to poetry and the analysis of poetic texts, there are several vital concepts which have common meanings important outside the realm of poetry as well. Agency is just such a term, and unless you are very young or very, very sheltered, you have heard this word used at some point in your life, and it likely had nothing to do with poetry, or literature at all for that matter. If you have some idea of what it meant then, you are well on your way to understanding what it means in the context of poetic analysis.
The term agency comes from the word agent, which indicates an entity (usually a person) which takes, or has the ability to take, action. An agent is something that has autonomy, and is something (again, usually someone) that can take initiative on its own when it so desires. This term is very interestingly applied in The Matrix series of films to the character of Agent Smith, who is at once an agent in the common Hollywood sense of a special or secret government agent, and a computer program which is itself capable of taking action and making decisions on its own, an agent in the truest sense of the word.
Agency, therefore, is the ability of an entity to act as an agent, and the state of being in possession of a given action. Looking at the following sentence, we can see that Billy is the agent, meaning that he has the agency in this situation: "Billy was so angry that he slapped his horse." As we can see, Billy is the one doing something here, while the horse is having something done to it. In this situation, Billy is active, and the horse is passive. This series of related terms is absolutely necessary is determining poetic meaning, and agency is one of the first things you should try to determine whenever you are analyzing a poem.
In the following (very short) poem, note who has the agency, and who the active and passive figures are:
Undermined by sympathy 1
I was beaten to the punch 2
By my whole family. I didn't 3
Ask for much, and they gave me just that. 4
My dog peed on my shoe, 5
And my baby sister did too. 6
In order to determine agency, it is helpful to identify the various nouns and pronouns in the work, since only they can be agents at all. So, we have sympathy, I, family, I, punch, much, hey, that, dog, shoe, and sister. Going in order, we can see that sympathy undermines the I of the poem, so it has the agency, and the I is passive. I is also passive in relation to the family, since they beat her to the punch. Next, we see that the I is officially the agent, in "I didn't ask," but we can see that this is a negative statement where nothing is actually happening. We see next the family is giving me very little, and so again the family is the agent while the speaker is passive. The dog and baby are both active, while the poor shoe (again, attached to the speaker), is passive.
It becomes clear then that the agency of the poem is clearly in the hands of the family, and is clearly not in the hands of the speaker (the I or me figure). She has a central role in the poem, but it is one of receiving actions, not doing them herself. This echoes the content of the poem, which shows her as subservient to her family, and is a clear case of how understanding agency can enhance your experience and analysis of a poem.
Agency
Although many of the terms we have been discussing so far are unique to poetry and the analysis of poetic texts, there are several vital concepts which have common meanings important outside the realm of poetry as well. Agency is just such a term, and unless you are very young or very, very sheltered, you have heard this word used at some point in your life, and it likely had nothing to do with poetry, or literature at all for that matter. If you have some idea of what it meant then, you are well on your way to understanding what it means in the context of poetic analysis.
The term agency comes from the word agent, which indicates an entity (usually a person) which takes, or has the ability to take, action. An agent is something that has autonomy, and is something (again, usually someone) that can take initiative on its own when it so desires. This term is very interestingly applied in The Matrix series of films to the character of Agent Smith, who is at once an agent in the common Hollywood sense of a special or secret government agent, and a computer program which is itself capable of taking action and making decisions on its own, an agent in the truest sense of the word.Agency, therefore, is the ability of an entity to act as an agent, and the state of being in possession of a given action. Looking at the following sentence, we can see that Billy is the agent, meaning that he has the agency in this situation: "Billy was so angry that he slapped his horse." As we can see, Billy is the one doing something here, while the horse is having something done to it. In this situation, Billy is active, and the horse is passive. This series of related terms is absolutely necessary is determining poetic meaning, and agency is one of the first things you should try to determine whenever you are analyzing a poem.
In the following (very short) poem, note who has the agency, and who the active and passive figures are:
Undermined by sympathy 1
I was beaten to the punch 2
By my whole family. I didn't 3
Ask for much, and they gave me just that. 4
My dog peed on my shoe, 5
And my baby sister did too. 6
In order to determine agency, it is helpful to identify the various nouns and pronouns in the work, since only they can be agents at all. So, we have sympathy, I, family, I, punch, much, hey, that, dog, shoe, and sister. Going in order, we can see that sympathy undermines the I of the poem, so it has the agency, and the I is passive. I is also passive in relation to the family, since they beat her to the punch. Next, we see that the I is officially the agent, in "I didn't ask," but we can see that this is a negative statement where nothing is actually happening. We see next the family is giving me very little, and so again the family is the agent while the speaker is passive. The dog and baby are both active, while the poor shoe (again, attached to the speaker), is passive.
It becomes clear then that the agency of the poem is clearly in the hands of the family, and is clearly not in the hands of the speaker (the I or me figure). She has a central role in the poem, but it is one of receiving actions, not doing them herself. This echoes the content of the poem, which shows her as subservient to her family, and is a clear case of how understanding agency can enhance your experience and analysis of a poem.