Re-defining the Character Arc through Berger and Luckmann’s The Social Construction of Reality

Abstract

Although a prominent characteristic of western cinematic narratives, the structure of psychological transformation known as the Character Arc remains ill-defined. Currently popular models based on value judgements demonstrate significant shortcomings, particularly the inability to account for the relativity of such judgements from one narrative context to the next. To rectify such issues, this article proposes a re-definition of the cinematic Character Arc using concepts obtained from Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann’s book, The Social Construction of Reality. This new definition reframes the Character Arc as a dialectic between the ‘subjective reality’ of the protagonist and the ‘objective reality’ of the primary sphere of diegetic action. Through environmental friction and the acquisition of new knowledge, a protagonist’s initially incongruent mental model undergoes a process of re-socialization, creating a more objective comprehension of the demands or necessities of the story world and its social phenomena. The drama of a Character Arc is frequently informed by a clash of multiple ‘realities’, producing various complexities in form.