Context

CONTEXT

What it is

Context refers to factors acting upon composers and responders that impinge on meaning. Context and text are in a symbiotic relationship in the production of meaning. To understand context we need to look beyond the text and consider the world in which it was produced and the worlds of its reception. This goes beyond historical and cultural background to a consideration of how the personal, situational, social, literary, cultural, and historical environments of the responder and composer as well as the mode of production pervade a text. Different contexts of the acts of composition and response can have an effect on the meanings and values of similar content.

However, even when all of these factors are taken into consideration, complete understanding of the effect of context on a text is impossible as we cannot tell where context ends and text begins. Our own knowledge and representation of the world is filtered through our own context, colouring all we see and all we say and do, impossible to escape. All we can do is recognise that it is there.

Why it is important

By considering the effects of context (their own, that of the composer and other contexts of response) on making meaning students recognise that

• there can be no single reading of a text,

• all meaning is contingent upon a range of factors not simply in the text but also outside it, the text/context relationship, and

• values and attitudes may change over time and cultures.