Lecture/Seminar Series – Digital Narratives
Week 1
Narratology and Film
Week 2
Cinematic Narrative Models
Week 3
Visual Storytelling
Week 4
Anti-Narrative
Week 5
Student Presentations
What is Narratology?
• Narratology or the ‘study of narrative’ provides a means of analysing
narrative forms and their underlying structures
• Narratology as a theory establishes a discourse through which we can
examine a number of recurring elements in narrative construction (the
‘system of narrative’ or the ‘language of narration’)
• Narratology concerns itself with how we tell stories, through what means,
what voices and through what media
Mieke Bal
Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative (2009)
Narratology - the complex nature of storytelling, some definitions:
Narrative means a spoken or written (or visual) account of connected events
Narratology asks how do these processes ( speaking, accounting, connecting)
occur?
A Narrative is:
‘a text in which an agent or subject conveys to an addressee (‘tells’ the reader)
a story in a particular medium, such as language, imagery, sound, buildings or
a combination thereof’
Narrative should therefore not to be confused with Story
Mieke Bal
Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative (2009)
We should add two other terms here:
Focalisation
The particular manner in which an addressee is addressed by the text (how the
story is told (first, third person narration) and from what perspective (subjective
addressor or by extension subjective characterisation)
Occularisation
The particular way in which the story is told using imagery that replicates or
mimics a certain position e.g.‘through the eyes of’ (see film language)
Both create very deliberate forms of audience identification
Mieke Bal
Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative (2009)
Narratology - the complex nature of storytelling, further definitions
A Story is:
‘the content of that text, and produces a particular manifestation, inflection and
‘colouring’ of a fabula’
Story is therefore
‘the fabula …presented in a certain manner’
A Fabula is:
‘a series of logically and chronologically related events that are caused or
experienced by actors’
We should add another term here:
Syuzhet (from Russian)
Means how that chronology follows particular patterns, what we often call plot
Levi –Strauss and Binary Oppositions
Our understanding of words id based on the difference between a certain word and its
'opposite' or its 'binary opposite’ (e.g. good/evil, hero/villain, society/wilderness,
insider/outsider etc.). Narratives are often structured around these binaries.
When studying any kind of narrative, it is worth looking for the ways in which the meanings
we make from the story are guided by these 'binary oppositions'
Todorov: Equilibrium and Disequilibrium
Ways of understanding film narrative - Propp
Propp in his study of folk tales discovered a number of characteristics in the structure of
narratives. His ideas are also very useful when studying film.
His ideas suggest that narratives contain a number of character functions (types) :
The hero
who is the character who seeks something
The villain
who opposes or blocks the hero’s quest
The donor
who provides an object which has a magical property
The dispatcher
who sends the hero on his way by providing a message
The false hero
who disrupts the hero’s hope
The helper
who aids the hero
The princess
who acts as a reward for the hero and as an object of the villain’s scheming
The father
who acts to reward the hero for his efforts
Actions / Events
Preparation
Complication
Transference
Struggle
Return
Recognition
http://www.gardensandmachines.com/AD30400/Downloads_S2012/AD30400_montage_con
tinuity.pdf