Evaluation Schema in the Sendong Survivors’ Narratives

Abstract

The conversational/everyday story is the least studied of the two primary forms of narratives: literary and conversational/everyday. Though some studies on the schemas or elements comprising conversational narratives, most of these are from Western perspectives. To address this gap, this paper determines the types and features of the evaluation schema reflected in the oral narratives of personal experiences of the typhoon Sendong (Washi) survivors in the barangays of Sta. Filomena, Hinaplanon, and Santiago of Iligan City, Philippines. Forty informants (40) were asked to describe their Sendong experiences orally, and audio-recorded interviews were transcribed. The narrative clauses were coded using Labov and Waletzky’s six narrative schema model as the main framework highlighting the evaluation schemas of these narratives. Results showed two general evaluation schemas in the Sendong narratives: the external evaluation and the embedded/internal evaluation. It is also revealed in the study that evaluation schemas can also be categorized based on content. These typologies include individual evaluation, collective evaluation (which could be inclusive or exclusive), outsider’s evaluation, and the “you” evaluation. The study concludes that the presence of these culture-specific types of evaluation (other than the individual evaluation) reflects the collectivistic culture of the Filipinos, that of focusing more on the “we” than the “I” as depicted in the evaluative comments of the Sendong survivors in this study.