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Showing papers on "Narratology published in 2020"


DissertationDOI
04 Sep 2020
TL;DR: In this paper, a textual analysis of the English translation of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm's collection Kinder- und Hausmarchen (Childrenʼs and Household Tales, 1857) is presented.
Abstract: Owing to the lack of concrete information provided by the narratives and the genreʼs unspecified setting, narrative space in fairy tales has been largely overlooked or dismissed as an inactive background for the action. Research which has considered this topic typically views it in terms of its symbolic potential, studying space in order to learn about other narrative elements (e.g. characters) or the implied meanings of the texts. This dissertation views narrative space as a concrete, material aspect of the narrative which is significant in itself. The main research question posed in the dissertation is: what do fairy tales tell us about narrative space and what does narrative space tell us about fairy tales? The main aim of the dissertation is therefore twofold: first, it examines how narrative space is structured in fairy tales and how the fairy tale conveys space-related information; second, it asks whether there is anything about the traits and structure of fairy-tale space that can be seen as genre-specific, i.e. that sets the fairy tale apart from other short prose narrative genres. The research is based on a textual analysis of the English translation of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimmʼs collection Kinder- und Hausmarchen (Childrenʼs and Household Tales, 1857). While its primary focus is on fairy tales, the dissertation also considers other genres included in the collection (animal tales, legends, religious tales, etc.). The research combines the knowledge produced within fairy-tale scholarship (folklore and literature studies) with the methodological tools of narratology. By considering narrative space and spatial transference, the dissertation aims to prompt a reconsideration of the fairy-tale genre and its definitions. One of its key findings is therefore a revised definition of the fairy tale as a genre which encompasses two domains – the magical and the non-magical – separated by a firm boundary, which must be crossed in the course of the story. What sets this interdomain boundary apart is the fact that it can be crossed from both sides, but only temporarily and only if certain conditions are met. The examination of genres through the prism of the domain has led to a reconsideration of our initial genre classification and prompted the conclusion that aetiological tales, Schwank tales, and didactic tales, which were initially listed as independent genres, are modes (subgenres) rather than genres. The thesis also shows that fairy-tale space is dynamic and relational, and that the lack of explicit spatial information should not be seen as an indication of the insignificance of space, but rather an expression of the genreʼs stylistic parsimony. Although the findings are based on the study of the Grimmsʼ fairy tales, the dissertation aims to provide an analytical framework that is applicable to other fairy-tale corpora.

75 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
16 Jun 2020-PLOS ONE
TL;DR: An automated pipeline for the discovery and description of the generative narrative frameworks of conspiracy theories that circulate on social media, and actual conspiracies reported in the news media is presented, hypothesizing that the narrative framework of a conspiracy theory might stabilize quickly in contrast to the narratives of an actual conspiracy, which might develop more slowly as revelations come to light.
Abstract: Although a great deal of attention has been paid to how conspiracy theories circulate on social media, and the deleterious effect that they, and their factual counterpart conspiracies, have on political institutions, there has been little computational work done on describing their narrative structures. Predicating our work on narrative theory, we present an automated pipeline for the discovery and description of the generative narrative frameworks of conspiracy theories that circulate on social media, and actual conspiracies reported in the news media. We base this work on two separate comprehensive repositories of blog posts and news articles describing the well-known conspiracy theory Pizzagate from 2016, and the New Jersey political conspiracy Bridgegate from 2013. Inspired by the qualitative narrative theory of Greimas, we formulate a graphical generative machine learning model where nodes represent actors/actants, and multi-edges and self-loops among nodes capture context-specific relationships. Posts and news items are viewed as samples of subgraphs of the hidden narrative framework network. The problem of reconstructing the underlying narrative structure is then posed as a latent model estimation problem. To derive the narrative frameworks in our target corpora, we automatically extract and aggregate the actants (people, places, objects) and their relationships from the posts and articles. We capture context specific actants and interactant relationships by developing a system of supernodes and subnodes. We use these to construct an actant-relationship network, which constitutes the underlying generative narrative framework for each of the corpora. We show how the Pizzagate framework relies on the conspiracy theorists' interpretation of "hidden knowledge" to link otherwise unlinked domains of human interaction, and hypothesize that this multi-domain focus is an important feature of conspiracy theories. We contrast this to the single domain focus of an actual conspiracy. While Pizzagate relies on the alignment of multiple domains, Bridgegate remains firmly rooted in the single domain of New Jersey politics. We hypothesize that the narrative framework of a conspiracy theory might stabilize quickly in contrast to the narrative framework of an actual conspiracy, which might develop more slowly as revelations come to light. By highlighting the structural differences between the two narrative frameworks, our approach could be used by private and public analysts to help distinguish between conspiracy theories and conspiracies.

58 citations


Book
24 Feb 2020
TL;DR: Clark and Phelan as mentioned in this paper provide a model of lively, sharp, and good-natured scholarly exchange, and their debate is compelling testimony about the power of both narrative theory and narrative itself.
Abstract: In Debating Rhetorical Narratology: Matthew Clark and James Phelan provide a model of lively, sharp, and good-natured scholarly exchange. Clark proposes “friendly amendments” to Phelan’s theorizing of the synthetic, mimetic, and thematic aspects of narrative, and Phelan responds, often by explaining why he finds Clark’s amendments less-than-friendly. Clark rounds off the debate by offering a brief rejoinder. Clark and Phelan consistently ground their theoretical arguments in their analyses of particular narratives, drawing on a corpus that ranges from Homer’s Iliad to Tobias Wolff’s In Pharaoh’s Army and includes, among many others, Jane Austen’s Emma, George Orwell’s 1984, and Toni Morrison’s Beloved. Clark and Phelan’s deep dive into the synthetic, mimetic, and thematic leads them to explore many other aspects of narrative and narrative theory: style, audiences, the mimetic illusion, fictionality, and more. Their investigation also leads them into questions about rhetorical narratology’s relation to other projects in narrative theory, especially unnatural narratology, and, indeed, about how to assess the explanatory power of competing theories. Ultimately, their debate is compelling testimony about the power of both narrative theory and narrative itself.

35 citations


DOI
01 Jan 2020
TL;DR: The authors argue for a model of narrative-audience interactions that privileges immersion as affective and temporal entanglement in stories over the containment model, and use Le quattro volte, a 2010 film by Italian director Michelangelo Frammartino, to exemplify this alternative understanding of audiences' engagement with narrative.
Abstract: The language of “immersion” in a fictional text lends itself to a dualistic reading that is, at best, unwelcome when attempting to think about narrative experiences ecologically. In this article, I argue for a model of narrative-audience interactions that privileges immersion as affective and temporal entanglement in stories over the containment model. I use Le quattro volte, a 2010 film by Italian director Michelangelo Frammartino, to exemplify this alternative understanding of audiences’ engagement with narrative and discuss its ramifications for recent work at the intersection of narrative theory and ecocriticism.

17 citations


Posted ContentDOI
30 Apr 2020
TL;DR: Conviction Narrative Theory (CNT) as discussed by the authors proposes that people use narratives, structured causal hypotheses, rather than probabilities, as the currency of thought that unifies our sense-making and decision-making faculties.
Abstract: Real-world decisions often take place under radical uncertainty—where outcomes cannot be enumerated and probabilities cannot be assigned. Conviction Narrative Theory (CNT) is a theory of choice under radical uncertainty. Whereas most theories of choice assume that people rely on (potentially biased) probabilistic judgments, such theories cannot account for adaptive decision-making when probabilities cannot be assigned. CNT proposes that people use narratives—structured causal hypotheses—rather than probabilities, as the currency of thought that unifies our sense-making and decision-making faculties. According to CNT, narratives arise from the interplay between individual cognition and the social environment, with reasoners adopting a narrative to explain the available evidence; using that narrative to imagine plausible futures; and affectively evaluating those imagined futures to make a choice. Evidence from many different areas of the cognitive, behavioral, and social sciences supports this basic model, including lab experiments, interview studies, and econometric analyses. We describe several varieties of narratives that govern decisions, documenting the psychological mechanisms governing their evaluation and their use in decision-making. We suggest two ways in which narratives and affect work together to support adaptive decision-making—evaluating the compatibility of imagined futures and goals and maintaining conviction to act in the face of ambivalent reasons and changing information. We conclude by discussing practical implications of CNT and its generativity for future research.

15 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors describe the motivation for and the design of a novel primary physics course for student teachers at kindergarten and primary school levels that uses cognitive tools such as metaphor, analogy, and narrative.
Abstract: This is a theoretical paper in which we describe the motivation for and the design of a novel primary physics course for student teachers at kindergarten and primary school levels that uses cognitive tools such as metaphor, analogy, and narrative. The course has been taught in the master’s program in teacher education at three Universities over the last 5 years. It is based upon a model of the experience of forces of nature that draws upon four existing frameworks in physics, narratology, cognitive linguistics, and a theory of the development of cognitive tools. In short, the course is created upon the foundations of an imaginative, metaphoric and narrative, approach to physical science in general and to forces of nature in particular. Student teachers who learn science based upon this model can more directly relate to how children themselves experience nature and become confident narrators of stories of forces of nature. We describe the notion of Force of Nature (“The Gestalt of Force of Nature”) and explain what we mean by cognitive tools (“Cognitive Tools: Tools of Imagination”) before showing in what sense modern macroscopic physics is both metaphoric and narrative at its core (“An Imaginative Approach to Physical Science”). In “A Systemic Imaginative Approach to Primary Physics”, we give an outline of what is needed in order to apply the approach to a course for primary physics for student teachers. In the final section, we will discuss some questions and challenges raised by this approach and show that it is a viable avenue to bringing together science and the humanities, both for research and for teaching.

15 citations



Posted Content
TL;DR: Evaluation results indicate that the Narrative Map representation is a powerful method to communicate complex narratives to individuals, and has implications for intelligence analysts, computational journalists, and misinformation researchers.
Abstract: Narratives are fundamental to our perception of the world and are pervasive in all activities that involve the representation of events in time. Yet, modern online information systems do not incorporate narratives in their representation of events occurring over time. This article aims to bridge this gap, combining the theory of narrative representations with the data from modern online systems. We make three key contributions: a theory-driven computational representation of narratives, a novel extraction algorithm to obtain these representations from data, and an evaluation of our approach. In particular, given the effectiveness of visual metaphors, we employ a route map metaphor to design a narrative map representation. The narrative map representation illustrates the events and stories in the narrative as a series of landmarks and routes on the map. Each element of our representation is backed by a corresponding element from formal narrative theory, thus providing a solid theoretical background to our method. Our approach extracts the underlying graph structure of the narrative map using a novel optimization technique focused on maximizing coherence while respecting structural and coverage constraints. We showcase the effectiveness of our approach by performing a user evaluation to assess the quality of the representation, metaphor, and visualization. Evaluation results indicate that the Narrative Map representation is a powerful method to communicate complex narratives to individuals. Our findings have implications for intelligence analysts, computational journalists, and misinformation researchers.

10 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The non-profit organization Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep (NILMDTS) as mentioned in this paper hosts annual remembrance walks that gather bereaved families to honor babies who have died.
Abstract: The non-profit organization Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep (NILMDTS) hosts annual remembrance walks that gather bereaved families to honor babies who have died. Grounded in narrative theory and researc...

10 citations


Proceedings ArticleDOI
06 Jul 2020
TL;DR: Inspired by the qualitative narrative theory of Greimas, a graphical generative Machine Learning (ML) model is formulated where nodes represent actants, and multi-edges and self-loops among nodes capture context-specific relationships.
Abstract: Reader reviews of literary fiction on social media, especially those in persistent, dedicated forums, create and are in turn driven by underlying narrative frameworks In their comments about a novel, readers generally include only a subset of characters and their relationships, thus offering a limited perspective on that work Yet in aggregate, these reviews capture an underlying narrative framework comprised of different actants (people, places, things), their roles, and interactions that we label the “consensus narrative framework” We represent this framework in the form of an actant-relationship story graph Extracting this graph is a challenging computational problem, which we pose as a latent graphical model estimation problem Posts and reviews are viewed as samples of sub graphs/networks of the hidden narrative framework Inspired by the qualitative narrative theory of Greimas, we formulate a graphical generative Machine Learning (ML) model where nodes represent actants, and multi-edges and self-loops among nodes capture context-specific relationships We develop a pipeline of interlocking automated methods to extract key actants and their relationships, and apply it to thousands of reviews and comments posted on Goodreadscom We manually derive the ground truth narrative framework from SparkNotes, and then use word embedding tools to compare relationships in ground truth networks with our extracted networks We find that our automated methodology generates highly accurate consensus narrative frameworks: for our four target novels, with approximately 2900 reviews per novel, we report average coverage/recall of important relationships of >80% and an average edge detection rate of >89% These extracted narrative frameworks can generate insight into how people (or classes of people) read and how they recount what they have read to others 1

9 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
01 Jul 2020
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present an Embodied Plot model in which character not only drives plot, but embodies plot as well, and demonstrate how the dramatic arc of these stories can be explained in each case by the protagonist's experientiality.
Abstract: Abstract The classic view of narrative since the time of Aristotle is that plot structure is prioritized over characters in defining the nature of stories. According to this view, plot is an abstract structure external to the protagonist, and the protagonist’s actions are determined by the thematic goals of the plot. The current analysis calls for a reversal in the prioritization of these elements in creating a story. We present an Embodied Plot model in which character not only drives plot, but embodies plot as well. According to this model, the dramatic arc of plots is attributable to psychological processes occurring in the protagonist’s mind. Plot structure is thus isomorphic with the psychological and problem-solving experience of the protagonist inside the storyworld. We apply this model to a number of fairy tales to demonstrate how the dramatic arc of these stories can be explained in each case by the protagonist’s experientiality.


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The authors examines narratological changes made in Bhāī Vīr Singh's Purātan Janamsākhī (1926) to encode an alternate narrative logic for producing images of a past that entrenches the past.
Abstract: This paper examines narratological changes made in Bhāī Vīr Singh's Purātan Janamsākhī (1926). These changes encode an alternate narrative logic for producing images of a past that entrenches ‘reli...

ProceedingsDOI
TL;DR: A pipeline of interlocking automated methods to extract key actants and their relationships are developed and applied to thousands of reviews and comments posted on this http URL, and it is found that the automated methodology generates highly accurate consensus narrative frameworks.
Abstract: Reader reviews of literary fiction on social media, especially those in persistent, dedicated forums, create and are in turn driven by underlying narrative frameworks. In their comments about a novel, readers generally include only a subset of characters and their relationships, thus offering a limited perspective on that work. Yet in aggregate, these reviews capture an underlying narrative framework comprised of different actants (people, places, things), their roles, and interactions that we label the "consensus narrative framework". We represent this framework in the form of an actant-relationship story graph. Extracting this graph is a challenging computational problem, which we pose as a latent graphical model estimation problem. Posts and reviews are viewed as samples of sub graphs/networks of the hidden narrative framework. Inspired by the qualitative narrative theory of Greimas, we formulate a graphical generative Machine Learning (ML) model where nodes represent actants, and multi-edges and self-loops among nodes capture context-specific relationships. We develop a pipeline of interlocking automated methods to extract key actants and their relationships, and apply it to thousands of reviews and comments posted on this http URL. We manually derive the ground truth narrative framework from SparkNotes, and then use word embedding tools to compare relationships in ground truth networks with our extracted networks. We find that our automated methodology generates highly accurate consensus narrative frameworks: for our four target novels, with approximately 2900 reviews per novel, we report average coverage/recall of important relationships of > 80% and an average edge detection rate of >89\%. These extracted narrative frameworks can generate insight into how people (or classes of people) read and how they recount what they have read to others.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors explore the temporal unfolding of the Turkish issue by drawing on media analysis (n = 1120), interpretive process-tracing and narrative genre analysis of claims raised by political actors in German and Turkish newspapers.
Abstract: Germany is facing a contemporary mainstreaming of the far right, which has a long tradition of wanting “Turks out!” Turkish immigrants have been the main strangers in Germany following the guest-worker treaty signed in 1961, physically close as friends, yet culturally distant as foes. From September 2015 onwards, German–Turkish politics of belonging, the Turkish issue, underwent a contentious period resulting in secessions between German and Turkish authorities in September 2017. Against this background, this article asks: How did mainstream political actors in Germany emplot the Turkish issue while a far-right challenger party sought to establish a far-right narrative of ethno-national rebirth? The temporal unfolding of the Turkish issue is explored by drawing on media analysis (n = 1120), interpretive process-tracing and narrative genre analysis of claims raised by political actors in German and Turkish newspapers. In order to visualize how the Turkish issue evolved between 2000 and 2017 in media discourse, 546 articles in the mainstream quality newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung were collected. The Great Secession period between 2015 and 2017 was selected for an in-depth case study. To conduct interpretive process-tracing and narrative genre analysis of this case, another 574 articles in the German Suddeutsche Zeitung and Turkish Hurriyet were analysed. In so doing, this article contributes to (1) the study of belonging and identity by adopting a novel approach to boundary studies, combining narrative genre analysis with Habermas’ communicative action theory, and (2) the study of political strategies of adapting, ignoring or demarcating far-right contenders by, again, introducing a narrative approach to political communication and mobilization processes. The analysis shows that, in the first stage of the Great Secession period, inclusionary and exclusionary boundaries competed, while in later stages inclusionary boundaries were cast aside by exclusionary boundaries after reputable mainstream party-political actors adopted and thus legitimized far-right story elements.

Posted Content
TL;DR: This paper addresses the task of automatically detecting narrative structures in raw texts by designing a new narrative annotation scheme and using the annotated dataset to train several supervised models to identify the different narrative elements.
Abstract: This paper addresses the task of automatically detecting narrative structures in raw texts. Previous works have utilized the oral narrative theory by Labov and Waletzky to identify various narrative elements in personal stories texts. Instead, we direct our focus to news articles, motivated by their growing social impact as well as their role in creating and shaping public opinion. We introduce CompRes -- the first dataset for narrative structure in news media. We describe the process in which the dataset was constructed: first, we designed a new narrative annotation scheme, better suited for news media, by adapting elements from the narrative theory of Labov and Waletzky (Complication and Resolution) and adding a new narrative element of our own (Success); then, we used that scheme to annotate a set of 29 English news articles (containing 1,099 sentences) collected from news and partisan websites. We use the annotated dataset to train several supervised models to identify the different narrative elements, achieving an $F_1$ score of up to 0.7. We conclude by suggesting several promising directions for future work.

BookDOI
01 Jan 2020
TL;DR: This article explored the wide range of linguistic and narratological features brought into play to effect an immersive experience, discussing a number of immersive (and non-immersive) passages from Homer and Thucydides.
Abstract: A well-known psychological effect triggered by narrative texts is the reader’s (or listener’s) experience of being mentally drawn into the storyworld, a feeling which is often referred to as immersion. The intensity of the experience of being immersed is not only dependent on various cognitive and emotional propensities of the immersed subject but also determined by particular features of the narrative text. The more a text enables the reader to construct an embodied simulation of the described situation, the more intense the immersive experience will be. Linguistic phenomena relevant to immersion are tense-aspect, modality, deixis, discourse markers, and subjective-evaluative vocabulary. Narrative techniques contributing to immersion include descriptions rich in sensorimotor information, scenic spatial and temporal organization, character focalization, narratorial covertness, and the creation of empathy and suspense. This chapter explores the wide range of linguistic and narratological features brought into play to effect an immersive experience, discussing a number of immersive (and non-immersive) passages from Homer and Thucydides.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors used Greimas's actantial model and Todorov's equilibrium/disequilibrium model to depict how Hosseini's novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns, reinforces the orientalist discourse toward Afghanistan through certain narrative structures.
Abstract: Many readers and critics regard Khaled Hosseini’s fiction as an insider’s account of life in Afghanistan. This study, however, aims to depict how Hosseini’s novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns, reinforces the orientalist discourse toward Afghanistan through certain narrative structures. Greimas’s actantial model and Todorov’s equilibrium/disequilibrium model are used. Then, Said’s postcolonial theory is used to interpret the orientalist attitude revealed by those narrative studies. The deep structure of the novel suggests that all the positive actants have affiliations with the West and are exceptional to the East. In addition, the cause of disequilibrium is the East, whereas the West restores equilibrium. These narrative structures tend to naturalize in the readers the binary opposition of the West vs. the East and, in accordance with the post-9/11 media discourse, depict Afghanistan as the Other of the U.S. which needs to be saved from itself.

DOI
29 Dec 2020
TL;DR: In this paper, a case study of S-Town, a popular audio nonfiction novel, is presented, where the authors argue that in terms of broadcasting and reception, the podcast introduces a change of paradigm insofar as it offers a more immersive and interactive listening experience.
Abstract: The 2017 hit podcast S-Town has been hailed for inaugurating a new genre, the audio nonfiction novel . Drawing from the recent evolutions in the field of media-conscious narratology (Ryan and Thon; DeMair), this article envisions creative nonfiction podcasts as narrative constructs. Previous research has thus far tended to assimilate such original podcast productions to conventional radio programs, seldom taking into account the specificity of the podcast as a new medium. This article explores the implications of this innovation through the case study of S-Town . By reclaiming the model of the novel, S-Town ’s innovative load paradoxically relies on a return to traditional written forms. But in terms of broadcasting and reception, the podcast introduces a change of paradigm insofar as it offers a more immersive and interactive listening experience. This experience is in turn embedded in the creative process, and narrative nonfiction becomes as much storytelling as story listening .

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Although identified as a feature of the film by both critics and researchers, the narrative complexity of Perfect Blue (Satoshi Kon, Madhouse, 1997) has been ambiguously defined as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: Although identified as a feature of the film by both critics and researchers, the narrative complexity of Perfect Blue (Satoshi Kon, Madhouse, 1997) has been ambiguously defined. In this article, t...

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Digital story grammar (DSG) as mentioned in this paper is a methodology that combines narrative theory and computerised text analysis to identify patterns in narrative identity work and ex-clique analysis in text.
Abstract: Digital story grammar (DSG) is a methodology that combines narrative theory and computerised text analysis. The methodology offers new ways of identifying patterns in narrative identity work and ex...

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Using a methodology inspired by structural narratology and by James Hamilton's [2016. Democracy's Detectives: The Economics of Investigative Journalism] economic analysis of inv... as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: Using a methodology inspired by structural narratology and by James Hamilton’s [2016. Democracy’s Detectives: The Economics of Investigative Journalism. Cambridge: Harvard] economic analysis of inv...

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, Collado-Rodriguez et al. discuss how to solve a problem like Palahniuk: Transgressive Fiction Meets Defensive Criticism, and how to find a solution to a problem in a post-1945 US literature review.
Abstract: Three Review Essays: How Do You Solve a Problem Like Palahniuk? Transgressive Fiction Meets Defensive Criticism Review of:Francisco Collado-Rodriguez (ed), Chuck Palahniuk: Fight Club, Invisible Monsters, Choke Douglas Keesey, Understanding Chuck PalahniukDavid McCracken, Chuck Palahniuk, Parodist: Postmodern Irony in Six Transgressive Novels Against the Plaisir-ization of Translation Review of:Barcinski, A Study of Postmodern Literature in Translation as Illustrated through the Selected Works of Thomas PynchonWalkowitz, Born Translated: The Contemporary Novel in an Age of World LiteratureTrubikhina, The Translator’s Doubts: Vladimir Nabokov and the Ambiguity of Translation What Can the First Generation of Unnatural Narratology Offer the Study of “Postmodern” Fiction?Review of:Richardson, Unnatural Narrative: Theory, History, and PracticeAlber, Unnatural Narrative: Impossible Worlds in Fiction and DramaShang, Unnatural Narrative Across Borders: Transnational and Comparative PerspectivesAlber, Skov Nielsen, and Richardson (eds), A Poetics of Unnatural NarrativeAlber and Richardson (eds), Unnatural Narratology: Extensions, Revisions, and Challenges [a note from the Book Reviews Editor: if you’re interested in reviewing a book on any aspect of unconventional post-1945 US literature—especially in the present format of single review essays covering multiple related books—please send an email proposing a review to reviews@pynchon.net]

Journal ArticleDOI
24 Nov 2020
TL;DR: The Force of Circumstance by W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) as mentioned in this paper is a short story that concisely represents the conflicting attitudes to sex and family life among the British colonial employees.
Abstract: Set in the context of early 20 th century Malaya, W. Somerset Maugham’s (1874–1965) short story “The Force of Circumstance” (1926) concisely represents the conflicting attitudes to sex and family life among the British colonial employees. The narrative, which develops around the main hero Guy’s relationships with his English wife Doris and an unnamed Malay concubine, reflects a contrast between the attitudes to sex dominant in the official imperial ideology of that time and the practice in the colonies. The frameworks of narratology and Cognitive Poetics make it possible to read the complicated situation of the main hero as an extended metaphor of the British Empire, in which formal and informal family relations map onto the relations between Great Britain and the dependent states. Though the British imperial ideology used the concept of family to strengthen the relations between the metropole and the colonies, Maugham’s story represents the Empire as a not-so happy family – a result of circumstances rather than of mutual bond and consent.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The authors discourses the intricacies of Chinese narrative traditions in hope of promoting the understanding of Chinese historical texts and their translation, highlighting how different translation versions imitates the original writings and represent them into new narratives.
Abstract: In sharp comparison to the extensive research on Ruist Canon as the Four Books, studies on Chinese historical narratives remains a rarefaction. Interpreting Confucius’ only historical writing ─ the Spring and Autumn Annals with vivid and literary touches, Zuo Zhuan, or Tso Chuan, is one of the most important sources for understanding the history of the Spring and Autumn Period (Chunqiu), among the earliest Chinese work of narrative history, covering the period from 722 BC to 468 BC. With a variety of perspectives ranging from narratology to translation studies, this paper discourses the intricacies of Chinese narrative traditions in hope of promoting the understanding of Chinese historical texts and their translation, highlighting how different translation versions imitates the original writings and represent them into new narratives.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present the terminological instability and semantic vagueness of atmosphere and related terms within the narratological discourse of M. Merleau-Ponty and H. Schmitz.
Abstract: The change of methodological paradigms, introduced by postclassical narratology and especially its cognitivist orientation, has thus far not reflected on the phenomenon of atmosphere. This is somewhat surprising, if we consider that the contemporary conceptualization of atmosphere and the increased interest in the questions it brings forth arise from new phenomenology and phenomenological aesthetics, fields that have directly initiated the development of postclassical narratology. Starting with the phenomenological concept of atmosphere of M. Merleau-Ponty and H. Schmitz (atmosphere as an ecstasy of experience, a specific modus of presence with a quasi-objective and inter-subjective status fitting into the extra-linguistic framework, atmospheric perception as seizing the surfaceless space) and the aesthetic relevance of the concept (G. Bohme, T. Griffero, E. Fischer-Lichte), this article presents the terminological instability and semantic vagueness of atmosphere and related terms within the narratological discourse of M. Bal, G. Prince, M.L. Ryan and P. Abbott (atmosphere as receptive and narrative disposition, the accompanying factor of morphological categories, the thematic-psychological distinctive characteristic of genre). The primary objective of the paper is to reexamine the methodological legitimacy of the concept of atmosphere, both regarding the limits of narrative understanding and its interpretative potential which might become relevant within cognitive theories of intertextuality (E. Panagiotidy, M. Juvan), while also being a humanistic response to the challenges of new epistemological paradigms and a return to the transcendental essence of literature.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The findings show how mental health recovery involves unique and open-ended processes of narrative meaning-making, which unfold through an interplay between everyday activities, places and persons.
Abstract: Purpose: Guided by narrative theory and by use of a narrative-in-action approach, the aim of this study was to explore how mental health recovery unfolds through individuals’ engagement in everyday...

Proceedings ArticleDOI
15 Sep 2020
TL;DR: It is proposed that goals, as a constituent element of games, is a novel and fruitful nexus point between story and gameplay, and provides an analytical framework that articulates and bridges the relationship between the goal structures in games and their narrative counterparts.
Abstract: The intersection of gameplay and story has been widely debated in games scholarship (i.e. the ludology/narratology debate). It has also manifested in concepts used in game discourse (e.g. “ludonarrative dissonance”) and development (e.g. “what is narrative design?”). We propose that goals, as a constituent element of games, is a novel and fruitful nexus point between story and gameplay. We provide an analytical framework that articulates and bridges the relationship between the goal structures in games and their narrative counterparts. This framework is anchored upon what we define as a narrative goal: an interpretation of a ludological goal. We can thus formally account for a narrative goal (e.g. “Rescue the prince”) that requires players to act in a way that satisfies a corresponding game imperative (e.g. Reach-). Finally, we articulate our work’s foundational relevance to narrative design and associated issues.

Journal ArticleDOI
01 Jan 2020-Style
TL;DR: The authors argue that narrative can also foreground nonhuman assemblages (animals, plants, material objects, etc.) and can employ this focus to question anthropocentric assumptions, and they discuss two examples: Tinkers (2009), by Paul Harding, in which a more-than-human we emerges and brings together the human protagonists and cosmic realities; and The Overstory (2018), by Richard Powers, whose plot organization builds on an analogy between a group of environmental activists and a symbiotic collective of plants and fungi.
Abstract: Narrative theory is devoting increasing attention to we-narrative and, more generally, stories that center on groups. However, the we in question tends to be a human one. In this article, I argue that narrative can also foreground nonhuman assemblages (animals, plants, material objects, etc.) and can employ this focus to question anthropocentric assumptions. I discuss two examples: Tinkers (2009), by Paul Harding, in which a more-than-human we emerges and brings together the human protagonists and cosmic realities; and The Overstory (2018), by Richard Powers, whose plot organization builds on an analogy between a group of environmental activists and a symbiotic collective of plants and fungi. Through we-narrative (Harding) and formal engagement with collectivity (Powers), these contemporary works demonstrate how narrative (and narrative theory) can speak to current debates on the ecological crisis: imagining more-than-human assemblages through narrative form calls for a profound rethinking of collective behavior on a planetary scale.

DOI
01 Jan 2020
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors provide a thorough review of the theory of a literary motif and its modern adaptation in termsof cognitive narratology and cognitive stylistics in order to introduce methods of linguistic analysis into the research of the motif of pain in works of American and British modernists.
Abstract: The article provides a thorough review of the theory of a literary motif and its modern adaptation in termsof cognitive narratology and cognitive stylistics in order to introduce methods of linguistic analysis into the researchof the motif of pain in works of American and British modernists. Pain depiction in a literary text is studiedby encoding unpleasant emotions while using methods of conceptual metaphor and metonymy, as well as corpusanalysis. The research presupposes five stages: a) analysis of the keywords in the text which are eitherpain-indicative or pain-descriptive; b) corpus analysis of lemmas “pain”, “hurt” and others pain-related words;c) reconstruction of conceptual metaphors and metonymies of PAIN; d) reconstruction of narrative patternsof the motif of pain; e) analysis of affected character's profile. The initial research suggests the following:i) the motif of pain has a tendency to be marked by descriptive and indicating verbal units which are widely usedin the medical field; ii) conceptual metaphors and metonymies of PAIN tend to be less prototypical in a literarytext than those in a natural language; iii) the motif of pain appears in a literary narrative through a set of imagesand actions zoomed on the characters' traumatic unpleasant experience; iv) the two main sets of narrativeevents, that are structurally indicative of the motif of pain are believed to exist. The first set revolves aroundany explicit traumatic experience, with the latter becoming a salient point of the plot, while the second setresorts to depicting a more implicit process of a character accumulating discomfort and emotional traumain the studied novels.