The Interrelationship of Contemporary, Popular and Emergent Literature

   The Interrelationship of Contemporary, Popular, and Emergent Literature 

(Cherry Mae M. Salvo)

Contemporary literature is literature written after World War II through the current day. Works of contemporary literature reflect a society's social and/or political viewpoints, shown through realistic characters, connections to current events, and socioeconomic messages. 

The writers are looking for trends that illuminate societal strengths and weaknesses to remind society of lessons they should learn and questions they should ask. Popular literature includes those writings intended for the masses and those that find favor with large audiences. It can be distinguished from artistic literature in that it is designed primarily to entertain. 

Contemporary literature refers to the literary works published post-WWII to the current day. It can also be defined as the literature that came from postmodern literature. The contemporary word signifies the prevalent culture encompassing popular art, music, and literature. Popular literature refers to literary work written for a very huge audience. It doesn’t have to do anything with a strict time period but the work should cater to a large audience to classify it into popular literature.

Emergent literature is more of an adjective used for the literature work that’s emerging and trending. There could be an emerging theme/genre of literature that is being written about during the current period.

A contemporary work of literature could be both popular and emerging. Mostly, we don’t emphasize the specificity of each word and often string them together to label a piece of literature.