02.03.13Theme, defined. At last! At least almost.
Theme, I’ve always thought, is one of the most important concepts we (English and reading teachers, I mean) teach and also one that almost no one can really define. This should probably suggest that we don’t understand it very well either. And this is cause for concern.
We all talk about theme… but can we define it? Explain it and how it is different from a main idea for example? (I see these two ideas routinely conflated even on state tests—especially there, perhaps.)
Can we go a step further and clearly help a student understand why their first effort at describing a theme is not in fact a theme and then tell them what they need to add to make them into legitimate themes. For most of us, I’m pretty sure, the answer is no. So we go on teaching theme without being able to really define it and just hoping perhaps that our stude
nts infer the general idea from enough mucking about. And perhaps as a result we graduate students who become teachers with hazy ideas of how to define theme.
Include me in the ranks of said teachers. Always had a difficult time describing how and why I think Theme is different about Main Idea and how they get conflated even if I believe both to be true.
So I was really happy a few weeks ago when I watched my esteemed colleague Colleen Driggs model a mini-lesson at a workshop. Colleen chose to model a lesson where students had to discuss the theme of a poem. Her definition—which she taught explicitly, a fact that made her lesson quite possibly a rarity in itself—was really good. I added some a minor tweak or two and, well, I think it’s worth sharing in the hopes of tweaking it to even better.
Colleen’s Definition: “Theme is the message conveyed by a text that applies to multiple other texts.” In other words it’s not just the important idea a text is about. For that idea to be a theme it has to be relevant to the discussion of multiple other texts. What I love about this definition is that it’s testable for students. If a student said the theme of Macbeth was “Macbeth’s ambition” you could say, “Well are there other books about Macbeth? Have you read book after book about Macbeth’s ambition? No? Well then it sounds like that can’t be a theme.”
The tweak I’d like to add to Colleen’s definition of ‘theme’ the observation that a theme cannot be a single word. “Justice” is not a theme. A theme could be about justice—how it is hard to come by when people dehumanize each other, for example, or even “man’s inhumanity to man,” which I remember learning was an all-time most important theme in high school. A theme also should reflect on a conflict or an argument and usually both. This is because all literature has a problem and/or conflict of some sort and its resolution is why we write books. The two plausible themes, “justice is hard to come by when people dehumanize each other,” and “man’s inhumanity to man,” both pass this test. There’s a problem implicit in a shortage of justice or in the presence of inhumanity. “Goodness overcomes” could also be a theme… it implies the difficulty in goodness’ transcendence. But on the “must contain an argument” from “man’s inhumanity to man” fails… what about it? Man’s inhumanity to man endures? Wears many faces? Dehumanizes the inhuman?” For me a theme has to say something about the idea.
So… where does that leave us?
How about here as a version 1.0:
Definition: Theme is the message conveyed by a text that applies to multiple other texts. Sub-definition: It cannot be described in a single word and it implies a conflict or an argument about the core idea and usually both.
Again, what I like best here is that the definition implies a series of tests you can pretty easily apply and say: ‘yes that qualifies’ or ‘no it doesn’t too.’
Now on to readers for improvement and discussion!
This is an important point of confusion. Interestingly, history teachers often define theme differently from ELA teachers, in our experience. History teachers are perfectly happy to call ‘Justice’ a theme or strand of looking at history. They’ll say things like ‘the quest for social justice’ is a theme of the last 100 years in US history, for example.
This relates to UbD. I much prefer saying that a theme is an “understanding” or claim about meaning. Thus “All’s Fair in Love & War” is a theme. “The enemy of my enemy is my friend” would be another. “The devil is in the details” is a theme in science, math, and economics, etc.
Put in plain terms: “a theme is the moral of (many) stories”.
Thanks for the insight. I like your language better: a theme is a “claim” and to make a claim i guess you must have a verb (i think). I like that rule of thumb because it is “testable”–gotta be more than one word; gotta have a verb; gotta relate to other texts.
Would you agree to that “rule” for themes? And not to push my luck but would you offer a definition of theme? I’m sure my draft here could use some work and I sincerely think it’s one of the most important topics in literature and one of the most poorly taught. Finally as an aside i think i am refering to it specifically in the literary sense here. I think there’s a “lay definition” that’s fair to refer to and that a History teacher might mean when she says, “That’s a theme in history.” In that case i’m not going to be all bee-in-bonnet about a full phrase with a verb etc. I suppose what people really mean there is a motif, but i can live with it.
Hmmm: from Ask.Com on ‘theme’: Definition: A theme is the central idea or ideas explored by a literary work. John Gardner puts it this way: “By theme here we mean not a message — a word no good writer likes applied to his work — but the general subject, as the theme of an evening of debates may be World Wide Inflation.”
With all due respect, John…
Here’s an interesting definition, going in both directions, from a college English Dept:
THEME: A central idea or statement that unifies and controls an entire literary work. The theme can take the form of a brief and meaningful insight or a comprehensive vision of life; it may be a single idea such as “progress” (in many Victorian works), “order and duty” (in many early Roman works), “seize-the-day” (in many late Roman works), or “jealousy” (in Shakespeare’s Othello). The theme may also be a more complicated doctrine, such as Milton’s theme in Paradise Lost, “to justify the ways of God to men,” or “Socialism is the only sane reaction to the labor abuses in Chicago meat-packing plants” (Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle). A theme is the author’s way of communicating and sharing ideas, perceptions, and feelings with readers, and it may be directly stated in the book, or it may only be implied. Compare with motif and leitmotif.
If you Google on it, the overwhelming trend, alas, is to define it as a word or phrase.
Yeah. Great observation. To me that’s muddling of the technical and ‘lay’ definitions. The definition you noted above, “A central idea or statement that unifies and controls an entire literary work,” is interesting becuase a ‘statement’ meets your definition–it’s another word for claim–but an ‘idea,’ doesn’t. It really could be anything. And the definition does not distinguish between the two. That to me is where we start to drift–an idea is not a statement and under duress it is always easier to fall back on the sweeping generality of an idea: “Justice! It’s about justice!” “Yes,” I wish we’d say. “What about justice???” (The ‘we’ being some undetermined proxy for the profession. Or else me when I was a teacher and now failing under retrospective examination).
Yesterday i might have said “i could live with ‘order and duty'” but today i’m intrigued by the rigor of asking students to make that a claim… what about order and duty? “Order and duty enoble us… and can come at a cost.”
This is precisely why we framed the idea of an ‘understanding’ as a statement claim in the Template – as opposed to just letting designers say: “I want students to understand the Constitution and the 3 branches of government.” To which we say: “Great, that’s the topic; what’s an understanding about that topic you wish them to leave with?” So, our little trick is to make them write: “I want them to understand THAT…” which forces a claim/inference/generalization.
Thanks for your interesting discussion, Doug.
As a fellow English (and history) teacher, I have also been bedeviled by “theme”. My problem is cast a bit differently. In many sources I encounter the argument that “theme” and “moral” are not the same, but it can be difficult for students – and the occasional teacher! – to avoid jumping to that conclusion. While I use the phrase “central organizing concept”, I also like to think that “theme” grows from the conflict, and that it involves a challenge of the human condition.
http://learn.lexiconic.net/humancondition.htm
In history, “theme” can indeed be a one word concept, much like a topic, but I think it’s somewhat more complicated in English.
Thanks. Really interesting. Re., ‘I also like to think that “theme” grows from the conflict, and that it involves a challenge of the human condition,’ i was immensely grateful to a teacher in HS who taught me the 7 great conflcits literature… (ie man vs man; man vs the environment etc.. pardon the dated sexism of the phrase, btw) Not sure i still think of it that way but WOW was having apull down menu of seven viable options to use and then, over time, adapt useful to me as a student. Seems like comparable to what you’re talking about, maybe?
Yes, that sounds about right. My students do better on theme questions when they look to the conflict(s), so I usually pair up theme and conflict as related concepts.
I think another good way of thinking about theme is first to ask, “Why is it so important for kids to learn how to construct thematic interpretations?” Some, like Peter Rabinowitz, argue very convincingly that when you construct themes, you end up turning rich complex texts into reductive or simplistic statements. One of the themes of Toni Morrison’s “Beloved” is something like “Slavery haunts you forever,” but most people kind of know that. It’s the individual story and world that Morrison creates that allows us to feel that truth. So why do we want kids to be able to make these thematic statements?
Ultimately I think there are some good reasons for being able to make thematic interpretations – for example, doing so requires synthesizing a whole bunch of details, ideas, and feelings – and themes are the ideas that remain with you long after you’ve forgotten the details of a text. They are part of the way we connect to texts and to each other.
So with that out of the way for now, I like to think about themes like this: A text is a whole world created by an author. An author has a set of attitudes about that world — worldviews — that we get to interpret. Themes are your vision of an author’s worldview. (You can get rid of “author” if you like, and use “text” instead. I prefer “author,” but it’s up for debate.)
When we explore literary worlds, we get to interpret the author’s attitudes about those worlds. Then we get to test those worldviews against our own: “I do not like the way Camus sees the world in “The Stranger.” That is not the kind of world I want to live in. I reject his worldview. Here’s mine.” And we get to examine our interpretation of those worldviews against others’ interpretations: “Wait, I think this world is kind of depressing. How do you see it as kind of uplifting?” (That’s why it’s really important to choose texts that offer the possibility of different and maybe conflicting interpretations of worldviews).
So theme is about fictional worlds (events, experiences, people, things) and authorial worldviews (attitudes).
This is true when it comes to conflicts or tensions in literature: Who or what prevailed? In “The Giver,” does the individual prevail? Does the community prevail? Does no one prevail? And in the worldview of the author, does that seem to be a good thing? Bad thing? Both? Why?
Elementary school students can learn to ask themselves, “After reading this whole text, do I think this world is more of a happy world? Or more of a sad world? And why?” Older students can learn to ask themselves: “Ultimately, is this text more optimistic about the world and humanity? Or more pessimistic? And why?” “In this world, are people more sympathetic? ore unsympathetic? Why?”
Short hand: Positive? Negative? Both? Why?
WIthout some kind of judgment of the positive/negative aspects of the fictional world, you’ve only got yourself topics or kind of meaningless statements: “When people are enslaved, they become haunted.” And we want more for our kids when it comes to reading literature.
Thanks for letting me add my two cents.
I teach my students that theme is one of the main topics of the work plus what the author was trying to convey about that topic–not a moral, but a possibility. “Progress” cannot be a theme (at least not in literature). One word says nothing about the author’s purpose or the reader’s judgment. What was the author attempting to convey about progress that is both specific to the text and relevant beyond the text (without being trite)? Reducing themes to one word closes off the possibility of thinking beyond oneself or envisioning potential problems and solutions or recognizing that “love” means vastly different things to different people. A one-word theme is like the Hokey-Pokey: “That’s what it’s all about!” Except that it is about much more and it is never that simple.
Thanks, Lorraine. You said this so much more eloquently than i could have. But i completely agree. -Doug
I found an exercise that I really enjoy doing with my students:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKjw-bQdBY8
It breaks down how to write theme statements into three steps. The follow-up with this activity has students finding evidence to support their theme statements. As an aside, I’ve noticed that adding “statement” to the end of the term usually reminds my students that these shouldn’t be single word answers. 😉
Step One:
What are the subjects of your story? (or topics, or big ideas, or what-have-you). These are your one and two-word answers that you’d normally see on a “what is this story’s theme?” quiz. When provided with this prompt, students usually come up with accurate lists: “war,” “family,” “father/son relationships,” “greed,” “making progress,” etc. Choose the biggest of the big ideas.
Step Two:
Provide the sentence frame: “The author wants me to know that ….” Well, what was the author saying about your chosen topic? “The author wants me to know that progress shouldn’t come at the cost of human lives.”
Step Three:
Delete the frame part of that sentence and clean up any grammar that may have been broken along the way. You are left with the following theme statement: “Progress shouldn’t come at the cost of human lives.”
Follow-up:
Find the evidence that supports your theme statement! The video has a fun activity where groups come up with their own theme statements, then exchange it with other groups who have to find the evidence to support the other’s statements. In the end, we reviewed the evidence and chose the theme statement that was best supported. It was great fun, and the students found it easy and intuitive.
This explanation is great for some, however, can you explain theme to 5th graders with a third grade academic level. It would be helpful.
I am currently teaching an English unit to 6th graders about theme. I have become quite frustrated with the variety of definitions for theme and especially the contradictions that occur. For my sixth graders I defined theme in two ways. First theme is the lesson, message, or moral of a story. In this way it does not need to be a moral but could be a message that the author is attempting to communicate with the reader. My second definition describes theme as what the author believes about a topic that is discussed in the story. In this sense topic becomes the one word idea that some refer to as theme (e.g. justice, love, friendship etc.). Theme becomes what the author believes about one or more topics (e.g. friendship can cross racial and cultural barriers). By these definitions theme is a claim that the author is making through their writing. Theme cannot be expressed as one word. The final element of theme is that it must be expressed in general terms that relate universally to life experience and not specifically to the story.