Narrative Production Research Articles

Schematic narrative templates in national remembering

James V. Wertsch coined the concept of schematic narrative template in his Voices of Collective Remembering, which has become a classic work in memory studies. The central argument of this article is that the analytical power of the concept of schematic narrative template can be increased, and its methodological implications clarified, by making a distinction between plot structures, narrative schemata, and the practices of narrative production, dissemination, and consumption. The article demonstrates that these entities and their associated mechanisms and processes are different in kind and should therefore be studied by using different types of methods. Furthermore, the article elaborates on the cognitive aspects of Wertsch’s notion of schematic narrative template by distinguishing between the pattern completion and pattern matching functions of narrative schemata as well as between the cognitive processes of assimilation and accommodation of narrative schemata.

The material and the moral: contradictory imperatives and the production of trafficking narratives in South India

ABSTRACT Transnational anti-trafficking networks seek to ‘rescue’ cisgender women who sell sex in India. This article puzzles out why cis female sex workers might narrate themselves as victims of trafficking in need of rescue despite making comfortable livings as independent sex workers who control their own labour. I draw data from my own ethnographic observations, interviews with 130 Telugu-speaking sex workers, as well as publicly circulating media clips, all from fieldwork conducted in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana between 2009 and 2018. The victim narratives analysed here were told by sex workers familiar with arguments in favour of decriminalising and destigmatizing sex work. My research suggests that many women who sell sex value the material goals of the sex workers’ rights movement while nevertheless longing for the immaterial moral security touted by anti-traffickers. I argue that publicly performing trafficking narratives allows women who sell sex to disavow moral agency in participating in what they often refer to as tappudu pani (bad work) while nevertheless accessing the material benefits of sex work. Participating in what Lindquist has called the aesthetic of trafficking, therefore, enables them to plead for sympathy from not only faceless donors but their own moral communities.

Narrative Skills in Mandarin–English Dual Language Immersion Learners

Abstract This article investigated the development of narrative production skills among Mandarin-English dual language immersion (DLI) students. A total of 60 children in first (N = 20), third (N = 21), and fifth-sixth (N = 19) grades generated oral narratives from wordless picture books in Mandarin and English. We examined variability in children’s macrostructure and microstructure production by language and grade level. We also examined within-language associations and cross-language transfer in narrative skills. Children in higher grades incorporated more macrostructure and microstructure elements in their narratives than children in lower grades. Within each language, microstructure skills were correlated with macrostructure skills. Evidence for development of shared skills across languages and language-specific patterns of narrative skills were also identified. Results contribute to the growing body of evidence for facilitative transfer in immersion contexts and highlight the importance of measuring outcomes in both the societal and the partner language.

Providing evidence for a well-worn stereotype: Italians and Swedes do gesture differently

Across cultures and languages spontaneous speech is often accompanied by gestures. It is a popular belief that people in Italy gesture more than people in Northern Europe, such as in Sweden. Despite this general assumption few studies empirically investigate cultural differences in gesture frequency and gesture function under similar circumstances. This study compares the spoken and gestural behaviours of Italian and Swedish speakers, assumed to represent gesture-rich vs. gesture-sparse cultures. We examine the groups' gestural behaviour for frequency, and in terms of possible differences in rhetorical style probing the distribution of gestural functions (referential vs. pragmatic) across narrative levels (narrative, metanarrative, and paranarrative). The results show that (1) Italians overall do gesture more than Swedes; (2) Italians produce more pragmatic gestures than Swedes who produce more referential gestures; (3) both groups show sensitivity to narrative level: referential gestures mainly occur with narrative clauses, and pragmatic gestures with meta- and paranarrative clauses. However, the overall group preferences for different functions still lead to different styles. These findings indicate that the two groups differ in gesture rate and, more interestingly, in rhetorical styles, one focused on events and actions in speech and gesture (Swedish), the other alternating between events in speech and gesture, and the highlighting of the presentation of new pieces of information in gesture only (Italian). We propose that the findings suggest that the two groups conceptualise narrative production in different ways reflected in two different rhetorical styles revealed by gesture production more than by speech.

In Scriptura Veritas? Exploring Measures for Identifying Increased Cognitive Load in Speaking and Writing

This study aims to establish a methodological framework for investigating deception in both spoken and written language production. A foundational premise is that the production of deceitful narratives induces a heightened cognitive load that has a discernable influence on linguistic processes during real-time language production. This study includes meticulous analysis of spoken and written data from two participants who told truthful and deceitful narratives. Spoken processes were captured through audio recordings and subsequently transcribed, while written processes were recorded using keystroke logging, resulting in final texts and corresponding linear representations of the writing activity. By grounding our study in a linguistic approach for understanding cognitive load indicators in language production, we demonstrate how linguistic processes, such as text length, pauses, fluency, revisions, repetitions, and reformulations can be used to capture instances of deception in both speaking and writing. Additionally, our findings underscore that markers of cognitive load are likely to be more discernible and more automatically measured in the written modality. This suggests that the collection and examination of writing processes have substantial potential for forensic applications. By highlighting the efficacy of analyzing both spoken and written modalities, this study provides a versatile methodological framework for studying deception during language production, which significantly enriches the existing forensic toolkit.

Becoming fictional storytellers: African American children's oral narrative development in early elementary school.

Oral storytelling skills are a complex oral discourse competency with implications for children's academic and social well-being, yet few studies have investigated the development of these skills among typically developing African Americanchildren. The current study used longitudinal data, collected between 2012 and 2013, from 130 African American children (59-95 months old; 66 girls) to explore the development of fictional oral narrative skills. Results showed growth in macrostructure (i.e., story grammar) and microstructure productivity (i.e., number of total words; number of different words) over the school year. There was no evidence of growth in microstructure complexity. Nonverbal cognitive skills emerged as an individual difference in predicting oral narrative production. This study contributes to increasing the knowledge base needed to support African American children's oral language development.

The role of input vs. output phonological working memory in narrative production: Evidence from case series and case study approaches

ABSTRACT Separable input and output phonological working memory (WM) capacities have been proposed, with the input capacity supporting speech recognition and the output capacity supporting production. We examined the role of input vs. output phonological WM in narrative production, examining speech rate and pronoun ratio – two measures with prior evidence of a relation to phonological WM. For speech rate, a case series approach with individuals with aphasia found no significant independent contribution of input or output phonological WM capacity after controlling for single-word production. For pronoun ratio, there was some suggestion of a role for input phonological WM. Thus, neither finding supported a specific role for an output phonological buffer in speech production. In contrast, two cases demonstrating dissociations between input and output phonological WM capacities provided suggestive evidence of predicted differences in narrative production, though follow-up research is needed. Implications for case series vs. case study approaches are discussed.

Analisis Atribut Produk Wisata Sejarah Di Candi Tanjung Medan

Indonesia is the largest archipelagic country in the world which has cultural diversity. The development of the tourism sector in Indonesia continues to be carried out in various regions until now, one of which is the Tanjung Medan Temple. This research aims to analyze the attributes of historical tourism products at Tanjung Medan Temple. This research uses a descriptive method with a qualitative approach, with data collection through interviews, observation and documentation. Using qualitative descriptive data analysis that describes the attributes of historical tourism products at Tanjung Medan Temple. Determining research informants used snowball sampling with a total of 11 informants, but if no conclusions were found, the researcher had the right to add further informants, with the criteria being figures from the Tourism Office, managers, ninik mamak, the community, visitors to the Tanjung Medan temple. The results of the research show that cultural products are in the form of movable cultural heritage in the form of linga yoni, peripih, and jars made of clay. The narrative product at Tanjung Medan Temple consists of a tour guide and interpretation panels. Tourist products consist of travel scenarios and product packaging. Destination products consist of main attractions, accommodation, transportation, restaurants, souvenir shops, infrastructure. It can be concluded that the results of the document study during pre-research show that there are no tourist packages available in West Sumatra which makes Tanjung Medan Temple one of the destinations for tourist visits. So it is necessary to develop historical tourism product attributes at Tanjung Medan Temple.

Moving Homes, Moving Histories: Displacement and Refuge in Remi Weekes' "His House"

Abstract The past few decades have witnessed a dramatic increase in the mass movements of people across borders owing to political turmoil(s) and uprising(s). Such displacements, especially towards continents like Europe and North America, have given rise to narrative and cultural productions introducing a crucial intersection of existing socio-cultural and historical debates around the larger rubric of refugee community and culture. One such instance of South Sudan, experiencing a recent civil unrest and administrative change, leading to forced migration, has been explored through the visual and visceral cinematic experience encapsulated by Remi Weekes’ independent Netflix film ‘His House.’ The film tells an evocatively poignant story of two Sudanese refugees, seeking home and refuge, who are given asylum in Britain under various oppressive conditions. The film is, quite literally, perched on the binaries of culture, tradition and memory that go on to become the foundation of certain necessarily imaginative ideas of home and livelihood the couple builds across borders, away from their homeland. My paper would discuss the desire for ‘home’ in an asylum seekers’ life highlighting journeys and (re)production of narratives as an essential part of their trans-cultural lives. My arguments attempt to discuss the re-construction of (cross)cultural topologies and reconfiguration of space/borders. Finally, my research seeks to incorporate larger debates on myth and memory-making by negotiating space and imagination within the corporeal reality of ‘home.’

Changes in Digital Speech Measures in Asymptomatic Carriers of Pathogenic Variants Associated With Frontotemporal Degeneration.

Clinical trials developing therapeutics for frontotemporal degeneration (FTD) focus on pathogenic variant carriers at preclinical stages. Objective, quantitative clinical assessment tools are needed to track stability and delayed disease onset. Natural speech can serve as an accessible, cost-effective assessment tool. We aimed to identify early changes in the natural speech of FTD pathogenic variant carriers before they become symptomatic. In this cohort study, speech samples of picture descriptions were collected longitudinally from healthy participants in observational studies at the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University between 2007 and 2020. Participants were asymptomatic but at risk for familial FTD. Status as "carrier" or "noncarrier" was based on screening for known pathogenic variants in the participant's family. Thirty previously validated digital speech measures derived from automatic speech processing pipelines were selected a priori based on previous studies in patients with FTD and compared between asymptomatic carriers and noncarriers cross-sectionally and longitudinally. A total of 105 participants, all asymptomatic, included 41 carriers: 12 men [30%], mean age 43 ± 13 years; education, 16 ± 2 years; MMSE 29 ± 1; and 64 noncarriers: 27 men [42%]; mean age, 48 ± 14 years; education, 15 ± 3 years; MMSE 29 ± 1. We identified 4 speech measures that differed between carriers and noncarriers at baseline: mean speech segment duration (mean difference -0.28 seconds, 95% CI -0.55 to -0.02, p = 0.04); word frequency (mean difference 0.07, 95% CI 0.008-0.14, p = 0.03); word ambiguity (mean difference 0.02, 95% CI 0.0008-0.05, p = 0.04); and interjection count per 100 words (mean difference 0.33, 95% CI 0.07-0.59, p = 0.01). Three speech measures deteriorated over time in carriers only: particle count per 100 words per month (β = -0.02, 95% CI -0.03 to -0.004, p = 0.009); total narrative production time in seconds per month (β = -0.24, 95% CI -0.37 to -0.12, p < 0.001); and total number of words per month (β = -0.48, 95% CI -0.78 to -0.19, p = 0.002) including in 3 carriers who later converted to symptomatic disease. Using automatic processing pipelines, we identified early changes in the natural speech of FTD pathogenic variant carriers in the presymptomatic stage. These findings highlight the potential utility of natural speech as a digital clinical outcome assessment tool in FTD, where objective and quantifiable measures for abnormal behavior and language are lacking.

The unbearable oldness of generative artificial intelligence: Or the re-making of digital narratives in times of ChatGPT

The emerging discourse catalyzed by the opening up of generative artificial intelligence (Gen-AI) applications for everyday usage often presents Gen-AI as radically and disruptively new. I revisit two moments in early conversations in computational history to offer a historicization of Chat GPT: the making of digital narratives through computational methods of storing, sorting and sequencing semantic units and the production of digital narratives through computational architecture of computability and stacks. I offer a framework of critical turns that unpack Gen-AI as a new form of digital narrative practice that challenges the future of meaning and function of narratives in everyday lives.

Metaverse film. The rising of immersive audiovisual through disrupting traditional moving image and its conventions

The development of the metaverse and its immersive technologies has had an impact on contemporary filmmaking. Associated with the concept of metaverse are the terms “VR film”, “VR cinema”, “cinematic virtual reality”, and “metaverse film”. As new expressions of digital media, virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) have become hotbeds of groundbreaking experiments with immersive audiovisual languages that have led to the production of numerous narrative works experiences that combine the real and the virtual using immersive devices.The term ‘metaverse film” could encompass all cinematic practices related to the metaverse, including videos shot in virtual worlds such as VRChat. In a sense, machinima, or films made in the last 15 years using game engines, could therefore be said to be the origin of metaverse films. Similarly, immersive VR audiovisual storytelling is part of the cinematic practices in this emerging metamedium that immerses the viewer in parallel virtual universes and makes them part of the story.Metaverse has a disrupting potential that may add new insights to the way we think of film and storytelling. Following these ideas, we consider relevant not only for the academic field, but also for the industry to frame the “metaverse film”. Using a bibliographic and different catalogs and databases review as well as major XR sections of major film festivals as main methodology, we conducted a research that goes through the immersive audiovisual fiction produced during the last decade, with the aim to set its current state of the art that might help conceptualize the term and all that surrounds fiction and non-fiction experiences of the metamedium.

TEACHING SENTENCE READING AND RETELLING AND ANSWERING COMPREHENSION QUESTIONS IN A CHILD WITH AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER

Children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) frequently show difficulties in the acquisition of multiple repertoires, including verbal behavior. One type of verbal operant behavior is the intraverbal. It involves the emission of a verbal response under the control of a verbal discriminative stimulus, without point-to-point correspondence between them, and the response is maintained by a generalized conditioned reinforcer. This study focused on narrative retelling, which is a skill that comprises intraverbal chains. It is also discussed in the literature that the teaching of this repertoire may improve gains in text comprehension, which also involves the emission of intraverbals, that is, answering questions. Regarding this skill, previous research investigated procedures that may produce the emergence of answering comprehension questions referred as complex ABC intraverbals (related to the stimulus equivalence paradigm) in typically developing children. In general, they were exposed to cycles in which they first read short texts/sentences relating information on three different stimuli (A, B, and C), Thereafter, the children answered several questions representing all possible complex intraverbal relations among the three stimuli from the sentences. Some learners demonstrated the emergence of all complex relations, and further investigations were carried out with the teaching of simpler intraverbal relations of the type of exemplars and categories before the cycles of reading sentences – probing complex ABC intraverbals. Data indicated that more learners showed the emergence of all, or nearly all, complex relations. The present study comprised two systematic replication experiments, with the inclusion of a child with ASD as participant. Both also involved the teaching of sentence reading and retelling through script fading, to analyze the effects of narrative production on the possible emergence of complex intraverbals. In Experiment 1, cycles of teaching sentence reading and retelling – probing ABC intraverbals were administered. As a result, all possible complex relations emerged. Experiment 2 involved the teaching of simpler intraverbal relations of the type of exemplars and categories before the cycles of teaching sentence reading and retelling – probing ABC intraverbals. All possible complex intraverbal relations also emerged. Data were discussed in the sense that, although positive, it is not clear whether the teaching of sentence retelling and simpler intraverbal relations facilitated the establishment of the complex intraverbals. It is possible that reading the sentences was sufficient. The limitations of the research were presented and discussed, as well as recommendations for future investigations that may more clearly isolate the effects of each manipulated independent variable. Anyway, the current study extended previous investigations by showing that complex intraverbal relations of the ABC type may also be established in a learner diagnosed with ASD.&lt;p&gt; &lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt; Article visualizations:&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="/-counters-/soc/0019/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

Il perturbante come strategia sovversiva: realismo magico ed elementi fantastici nei Racconti sardi di Grazia Deledda

This paper discusses the absence of Grazia Deledda both in Spanish university curricula and on the Spanish publishing market, an oblivion shared by other female authors of her time. This exclusion has a dual cause: the writers’ gender and the literary genre they cultivated. In this study, I offer a new reading of Deledda’s Racconti sardi (1894) through a critical analysis of its architectural elements, resonating with magic realism and the fantastic genre. These elements fit within the aesthetics of the liminal (Tomassini, 1992), which seeks to reinterpret the history of otherness as opposed to normative and legitimised histories. While magic realism proposes a world tailored to the experience of the other, which belies the official truth, the fantastic highlights the flaws of the uniform conception of reality. Such narratives may convey a subversive, albeit often overlooked, message as the mechanisms of the genres of the non-real promote readers’ estrangement, a revision of the contract of fiction and, therefore, multiple levels of reading. These accomplishments make Deledda a classic author whose narrative production, which starts from the local to become universal, is worth continual re-reading.

Realidade virtual, literatura e educação: narrativas imersivas para crianças e jovens

ABSTRACT In this article, we discuss the potential of Virtual Reality (VR) technologies for the creation and adaptation of stories aimed at children and young adult, focusing on the specificities of their usage protocols. We begin by introducing narratives in VR and their connection to the field of children and young adult literature. Subsequently, 360º videos targeted at children and young people are presented, along with the reading and engagement protocols that arise from their peculiarities. Starting from the field of Cinematic Virtual Reality (CVR), we discuss about the main challenges posed by this medium for the enjoyment of immersive works, based on the analysis of the work Invasion!, produced by the Baobab studio. Thus, we conclude that both the production and reception of narratives in Virtual Reality presuppose the management of the viewer’s vision and attentional focus, considering the reading protocols already learned and naturalized through other media.

Fim de emergências de saúde inacabadas e as redes de cuidados com a síndrome congênita do Zika vírus

Abstract Understanding health problems as always unfinished, this article examines consequences of the declaration of the end of a health emergency on the practice of different and interconnected care networks. As part of the “Action Ethnography on Care…” research project, this is a qualitative case study of three documents produced after the announcement of the end of the Congenital Zika Virus Syndrome epidemic. It shows the contexts of narrative production involving researchers, managers/ public service workers, mothers and families of the ill, and mothers’ associations and their different perspectives about what care is. Analyses of a presentation for researchers and of a working paper for the Applied Economics Research Institute (IPEA) question the technical narrative celebrating the end of the emergency based on knowledge and health service without taking into account the relational, affective and political care (of mothers, families and associations), leaving the latter invisible. It describes the process of elaboration of a motion by the Zika Pandemic Forum, listing and systematizing action proposals produced in an explicit dialogue among participants in different care networks to approach unfinished post-emergency questions. It suggests that similar practices of dialogue between networks can promote greater inclusion and sensitivity to care that contribute to reducing suffering and defending the rights of people who continue to live daily with a syndrome or disease whose consequences persist.

초등 1-4학년 언어발달지연 아동과 일반 아동의 이야기 산출 회상 능력과 작업기억과의 관계

This study investigated the relationship between narrative skills and working memory in&#x0D; typically developing children and children with language delay. The macrostructure of narrative was&#x0D; analyzed through story grammar scores, and the microstructure was measured using measures of&#x0D; mean length of utterance (MLU-m), number of different words (NDW), and syntactic complexity&#x0D; (T-unit). Additionally, this study aimed to identify the cognitive variables related to narrative skills,&#x0D; specifically phonological working memory, spatial working memory, and the episodic buffer.&#x0D; A total of 112 children in the age range of 6-10 years from Seoul participated in the study,&#x0D; with 81 being typically developing children and 31 having delayed language development. All&#x0D; participants completed tasks related to narrative production, recall, and working memory.&#x0D; The study’s results revealed that the typically developing children group showed significantly&#x0D; higher scores in story grammar, lexical diversity (NDW), and syntactic complexity (MLU) compared&#x0D; to the group with delayed language development. Additionally, the typically developing children&#x0D; group demonstrated a significantly higher performance in non-word repetition, the matrix task, and&#x0D; word list recall tasks compared to the language delay group. Within the typically developing&#x0D; children group, significant positive correlations were observed between the lexical diversity and&#x0D; episodic buffer, as well as between the visuospatial working memory and narrative recall task. In&#x0D; the language delay group, a significant positive correlation was found between story grammar&#x0D; scores in the narrative production task and episodic buffer. A positive correlation between mean&#x0D; length of utterance in the production task and spatial working memory was found.. Additionally,&#x0D; the episodic buffer significantly predicted lexcial diversity and story grammar.

Exploring the Utility of Narrative Comprehension and Production Tasks to Identify Vocabulary Delay Using Eye-Tracker

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to identify group differences in various aspects of narrative tasks performance (comprehension, production, and eye-tracking variables) and finally to explore whether narrative tasks can be used to detect vocabulary delay.Methods: Children in the 1st and 2nd grades (TD= 101, VD= 22) of elementary school participated in this study. All children participated in story comprehension and production tasks, and eye-tracking variables were extracted from two reading conditions (‘listening+reading’, and ‘reading’) in the story comprehension task.Results: There was a significant difference between the two groups in the ‘listening+reading’ condition in the story comprehension task, the ‘construction’ condition in the story production task, and the ‘total fixation duration (TFD)’ in the eye-tracking variables. We examined the ability of the story performances to discriminate vocabulary delays, and found that a total of 79.6% of the original cases based on the standardized vocabulary test could be correctly classified by the story performance variables. The ROC curve also showed that 84.6% of the children could be validly identified by a combination of narrative comprehension scores in the ‘listening+reading’ condition, narrative production scores in the ‘structure’ condition, and TFD in the ‘listening+reading’ condition of comprehension task.Conclusion: The significance of this study is that it explored the possibility of using narrative tasks as a useful tool for identifying micro-level vocabulary delays.

William Gibson’s Sprawl Trilogy: Connection between Humans and Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence as it is envisioned in literature, reflects moral and social standards, sculpts societal hopes and fears, spurs scientific progress, and perhaps even foretells the future. Artificial intelligence (AI) is being developed by humans, including programmers through their code and authors and readers through millennia of discourse, starting with ancient automatons and continuing with contemporary concepts of AI. The question of what we are producing as AI becomes more human—and possibly superhuman—and what literature can teach us about these AI imaginaries are also topics covered in this paper. The researcher seeks to explain the connections between artificial intelligence and literature in this work by highlighting the numerous ways that machine intelligence helps the production and comprehension of narrative. This study will also look at the connection between humans and artificial intelligence in William Gibson’s Sprawl trilogy and how his cyberpunk trilogy allows readers to think about how the lines between humans and technology are blurring and how technology can both liberate and enslave people.

Lexical skills in children with and without autism in the context of Arabic diglossia: Evidence from vocabulary and narrative tasks

ABSTRACT Arabic is characterized by diglossia, which involves the use of two language varieties within a single speech community: Spoken Arabic (SpA) for everyday speech and Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) for formal speech and reading/writing. Earlier research suggests that some Arabic-speaking children with Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) might favor MSA over SpA in informal settings, unlike those with Typical Language Development (TLD). Research on typical and atypical lexical abilities within the diglossic context of Arabic is limited. This study investigated the manifestation of diglossia in the lexical skills of Palestinian-Arabic speaking children with and without ASD. A total of 57 Palestinian-Arabic speaking children aged 4-11 were evaluated, comprising three groups: TLD, ASD with language Impairment (LI) (ASD+LI), and ASD with normal language skills (ASD+NL). Two vocabulary tasks were used: comprehension and production of nouns and verbs that manipulated the lexico-phonological distance between SpA and MSA. Moreover, a LITMUS-MAIN narrative production task in SpA was administered to all children. The vocabulary comprehension and production tasks were coded for accuracy of response. The production tasks (vocabulary and narrative) were also coded using a special coding rubric according to which all words used were categorized as either SpA or MSA. No differences emerged between the TLD and ASD+NL groups in any vocabulary measure, yet lower scores were observed in the ASD+LI group. In production tasks, all groups utilized SpA more than MSA. Nonetheless, some children with ASD overused MSA lexis. These findings highlight the heterogeneity of lexical skills among children with ASD. The results further underscore the role of diglossia in Arabic in lexical abilities in autism, and thus call for thorough language assessment procedures across different domains.