Formalism rejects or sometimes simply "brackets" (i.e., ignores for the purpose of analysis) notions of culture or societal influence, authorship and content, but instead focuses on modes, genres, discourse, and forms.
In literary theory, formalism refers to critical approaches that analyze, interpret, or evaluate the inherent features of a text.
Formalism was the dominant mode of academic literary study in the US at least from the end of the Second World War through the 1970s, especially as embodied in René Wellek and Austin Warren's Theory of Literature (1948, 1955, 1962).
Beginning in the late 1970s, formalism was substantially displaced by various approaches (often with political aims or assumptions) that were suspicious of the idea that a literary work could be separated from its origins or uses.
[citation needed] Some recent trends in academic literary criticism suggest that formalism may be making a comeback.
[2] Mary Ann Cain writes that “formalism asserts that the text stands on its own as a complete entity, apart from the writer who produced it”.
[3] Some ways formalism research is conducted involves allowing the text to speak to the readers versus cutting out unintended meaning in a written piece.
The leaders of the movement suffered political persecution beginning in the 1920s, when Joseph Stalin came to power, which largely put an end to their inquiries.