Narratology

About: Narratology is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 2833 publications have been published within this topic receiving 50998 citations. The topic is also known as: narrative theory.

Author and narrator : transdisciplinary contributions to a narratological debate

Abstract: The distinction between author and narrator is one of the cornerstones of narrative theory. In the past two decades, however, scope, implications and consequences of this distinction have become the subjects of debate. This volume offers contributions to these debates from different vantage points: literary studies, linguistics, philosophy, and media studies. It thus manifests the status of narrative theory as a transdisciplinary project.

The Jamesonian unconscious

Abstract: Imagine Fredric Jameson—the world’s foremost Marxist critic—kidnapped and taken on a joyride through the cultural ephemera, generational hype, and Cold War fallout of our post-post-contemporary landscape. In The Jamesonian Unconscious , a book as joyful as it is critical and insightful, Clint Burnham devises unexpected encounters between Jameson and alternative rock groups, new movies, and subcultures. At the same time, Burnham offers an extraordinary analysis of Jameson’s work and career that refines and extends his most important themes. In an unusual biographical move, Burnham negotiates Jameson’s major works—including Marxism and Form , The Political Unconscious , and Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism —by way of his own working-class, queer-ish, Gen-X background and sensibility. Thus Burnham’s study draws upon an immense range of references familiar to the MTV generation, including Reservoir Dogs , theorists Slavoj Zizek and Pierre Bourdieu, The Satanic Verses , Language poetry, the collapse of state communism in Eastern Europe, and the indie band Killdozer. In the process, Burnham addresses such Jamesonian questions as how to imagine the future, the role of utopianism in capitalist culture, and the continuing relevance of Marxist theory. Through its redefinition of Jameson’s work and compelling reading of the political present, The Jamesonian Unconscious defines the leading edge of Marxist theory. Written in a style by turns conversational, playful, and academic, this book will appeal to students and scholars of Marxism, critical theory, aesthetics, narratology, and cultural studies, as well as the wide circle of readers who have felt and understood Jameson’s influence.

The Morphing Metaphor and the Question of Narrative Voice

Abstract: Over the last two decades, the advent of new narrative media has forced many in the field of narratology to grapple with the continuing questions and adjustments raised by such unconventional forms of story-telling. Among the leaders in this charge, Marie-Laure Ryan has worked to delineate the ramifications of new media, largely spawned from computer technology, on narrative theory.1 However, in her essay "Cyberage Narratology" which appears in David Herman's Narratologies: New Perspectives on Narrative Analysis, Ryan reverses this issue. Instead of asking how new technologies and narrative genres might necessitate "the broadening of the scope of narratology," here, Ryan seeks "to survey what computers can teach us about traditional forms of narrative" (115). Specifically, Ryan proposes applying four computer metaphors to narratological contexts. Among these four metaphors, Ryan suggests the metaphor of "morphing" may help define the changing nature of a narrator's voice throughout a text because the metaphor allows for "flexibility" within the discussion of the narrator's ontology (137). In this essay, I will further explore Ryan's morphing metaphor, specifically fo cusing on its usefulness as a method of discerning and describing the process of shifting textual voices within third-person narratives. I will examine this question from three perspectives. First, I propose that describing voice with a morphing metaphor has the potential to add specificity to ongoing discussions surrounding the nature of free indirect discourse because it introduces the possibility of identifying a transitional process of voice between narrator and character, while also illustrating, through visual terminology, the varying fluctuations between two speaking agents.

Habit Formation and Story Telling: A Theory for Guiding Ethical Action

Abstract: This article proposes retrospective narrative justifications combined with classical concepts of habit formation as a theory of ethics appropriate for practicing technical communicators. To explicate the theory, the article draws on Alasdair Maclntyre's ethical theory, which involves habit formation and narrative theory; on apologia and account-giving theory; and on traditional ethical stances, such as the teleological and deontological doctrines. Special attention is given to the ends-means relationship and the tension between individual and corporate identity in technical communication environments.