Narrative Theory Research Articles

The Popularity and Enlightenment of Japanese Fantasy Travel-Themed Animation in China

Japanese animation is widely spread in China with its wide variety and exquisite production, among which animation with fantasy travel as the theme has several loyal fans, such as Kino’s Journey: the Beautiful World, MUSHISHI, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End and other animation works have always maintained a high quality of reputation. However, there is little research on this kind of animation in learning. This paper starts with representative animations, introduces the secondary world theory and travel narrative theory, and analyzes that fantasy travel-themed animations are popular because of their high quality, healing effect, and ability to cater to the audience’s yearning. At the same time, it has the double aesthetic value of fantasy and life meaning. Therefore, it is suggested that Chinese animations can make further progress in terms of sensory experience, popular fashion, and cultural value, as well as expand the development space of Chinese animations by enriching themes and improving characters, fitting the popular points, and strengthening cultural integration.

Conflict of Interpretations on Ricoeur’s Contributions to the Philosophy of Technology

Recent literature regarding how Ricoeur’s work relates to the philosophy of technology appears prima facie to be contradictory. In one established interpretation, Ricoeur’s contributions are merely indirect as he did not engage with the empirical turn of the discipline in the 1980s and maintained a suspicious view of technology based on a profound concern with the distinction between persons and things. In this view, Ricoeur’s work does not add anything new to the discipline but is still valuable to the philosophy of technology through other features of his corpus, such as his critical hermeneutics and narrative theory. In another interpretative approach, some argue Ricoeur adds to the field by directly thematizing technology when studying ethics and human capability–he cannot be thought of as merely ignoring the complex relationship between the social sphere and technology. The present paper offers a dialectical analysis of these interpretative approaches and argues that these positions are not mutually exclusive, but rather capture complementary aspects about the nature of Ricoeur’s hermeneutic and political projects. At one level, Ricoeur engages with core themes of philosophy of technology by exploring the ambiguity of specific technologies and techniques and their implications to social, cultural, and political spheres; in doing so, Ricoeur contributes directly to the field by avoiding the reduction of meaning into merely technical questions. On the other hand, it is also true that Ricoeur, particularly in the main thematic areas of his great works since the 1970s, has not been directly involved with specific questions of how different recent technologies are intertwined with social, political, and ethical aspects, and his emphasis against a reductionist type of technical mentality distanced him from a closer engagement with specific technological issues. In this sense, most of his contributions to the philosophy of technology are indirect. Nevertheless, this paper wants to emphasize that this dialectic analysis invites us to recognize the richness and potential of Ricoeur’s thought to understand how technologies are shaping our experiences in the world. The recently published volume Interpreting Technology, edited by Wessel Reijers, Alberto Romele, and Mark Coeckelbergh, is a powerful example of such potential.

The Use of Turning Points in Understanding Homelessness Transitions: A Critical Social Psychological Perspective

ABSTRACT We argue for use of the narrative concept of the “turning point” in homelessness research from a critical social psychology perspective. BackgroundTurning points are often understood as rifts in the life course followed by significant change in direction. However, within narrative theory they are not events but subjectively significant features of the person’s life-story. The turning point as narrative toolThe analysis identified how turning points were deployed by participants in a study of homelessness experiences. Participants used the turning point in constructing themselves as agentic, reformed individuals who had gained insight. However, this did not necessarily bring positive life changes. Data extracts are used to illustrate the power of adopting a constructivist, narrative theoretical orientation in understanding turning points in accounts of homelessness. Implications for practiceViewing turning points in this way may help us understand how best to provide support for people without housing.

Effect of short video storytelling on festival attractiveness: the moderating role of temporal orientation and novelty

ABSTRACT Short video storytelling has become an important channel for destination marketing. However, how to take advantage of short video storytelling to enhance festival attractiveness is unclear. Based on narrative transportation theory, this study analysed 494 questionnaires through the hybrid exploration method of structural equation model (SEM) and fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), to deeply explore the mechanism and conditional configuration of short video storytelling affecting festival attractiveness. The findings reveal that the effect of short video storytelling on festival attractiveness is significant, and partly mediated by narrative transportation. Moreover, compared with future-oriented people, present-oriented people are more likely to immerse themselves in short video storytelling and be attracted by festivals. Additionally, novelty, a core condition for high festival attractiveness, significantly strengthens the effects of storytelling and narrative transportation on attractiveness. Overall, this study expands the theoretical knowledge of short video storytelling in festival marketing and supports destination managers to formulate effective short video marketing strategies for destination festivals.

Investigating Collective Emotional Structures: Theoretical and Analytical Implications of the ‘Deep Story’ Concept

Since Hochschild proposed the notion of a ‘deep story’ to address a collective emotional structure (particularly resentment) underpinning political attitudes and social divisions in the contemporary USA, this category has been widely embraced across social sciences to reflect upon links between sedimented emotions, motivations, actions and means of social mobilization. Simultaneously, however, criticism of this concept has been articulated which pointed out that Hochschild was inconsistent in her understanding of deep stories and the role this category performs in a sociological investigation. Acknowledging critical addresses presented so far, the article aims at the reconstruction of this concept as an analytical device which can be used to account for collective emotional dynamics accompanying prolonged social transformations. I propose that a deep story can be best understood as a social space in which emotions emerge through an interactional, collaborative process of storytelling. I draw, first, from social-psychological investigations into collective processes of meaning-making to analyse the interplay between the emergence of group-based cognitive categories and their affective implications. Second, I employ narrative theories to account for socio-psychological processes in which group-based, collectively generated cognitive and affective elements are integrated into actual lifeworlds and deployed in sense-making. Finally, I consider the insights pertaining to emotions collectively felt and practised to reflect upon the social dynamic of emotion-sharing. I argue that the notion of a ‘deep story’ is analytically useful only insofar it is embedded in clearly articulated theoretical assertions about cognitive and affective, collective and interpersonal, dynamics of meaning-making.

Returns and Recalls in Julius Ocwinyo’s <em>Fate of the Banished</em> and <em>Footprints of the Outsider</em>

The generic treatment of analepsis as a narrative technique has left some of its sub-aspects, like returns and recalls, understudied. Returns and recalls were first introduced by Gerald Genette (1980) as analepses drawn from the same line of action as the first narrative. Returns fill in after the event, a gap in the narrative while recalls constitute the narrative’s allusion to its past. By extension, therefore, they are posterior to the start of the first narrative and anterior to its end. Recalls and returns get a raw deal from narrative critics and theorists; one hardly finds an article-long discussion of these aspects, even in books primarily about narrative time. Yet, rarely if ever, do novelists craft a narrative without incidents of returns and recalls; hardly do real-life stories unfold without them. Adopting an interpretive paradigm, this paper analyzed returns and recalls and their functioning in Julius Ocwinyo’s Fate of the Banished and Footprints of the Outsider. This paper embraced a qualitative research approach; specifically, a descriptive case study design was deployed. Data was collected through close reading and documentary analysis; the paper was anchored on the Genettian discoursal perspective of narrative theory.

Preliminary Danish Norms for the Odense Child Trauma Screening (OCTS)

The Odense Child Trauma Screening (OCTS) is Danish story stem screening tool applicable for assessment of preschoolers and young children in risk of being traumatized. Having shown initial evidence of validation, Danish norms are needed to strengthen the clinical assessment with the OCTS by serving as a baseline comparison for assessment of potentially traumatized children. We tested 169 children from the Danish general population aged 4–8 with the OCTS and investigated sex and age differences in play-based behavior and narrative representations. Caregivers reported electronically on child demographic information, psychosocial functioning, and history of trauma exposure using The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) and The Diagnostic Infant and Preschool Assessment (DIPA) trauma list. Across the 145 scores of the OCTS coding scheme, significant sex and age differences were only found in five and sixteen scores respectively. In the five codes where significant sex differences were observed, boys’ normative scores were higher. No significant sex differences were found in the partial story scores or the OCTS total score. Three significant age differences in partial story and OCTS total scores emerged with 4-year-olds scoring higher than 6–8-year-olds. We further found 13 significant age differences in code scores with higher scores among the youngest of the two groups in question suggesting that scores tend to decrease along older age. Few significant sex and age differences were found in children’s OCTS play-based behavior and narrative representations. Indicative of few sex and age biases of the OCTS coding scheme and stories, results suggest that the OCTS can be applied across the intended target group of children aged 4 to 8 years. As higher scores were found in the younger age groups, clinicians should be attentive to age in certain codes of the OCTS coding scheme in their assessment of children in clinical practice. The preliminary normative scores must be interpreted and clinically applied with caution due to our non-representative sample and lack of analyses on factors potentially influencing children’s responses to the OCTS (e.g., developmental, contextual, cultural factors).

Telling the story of the opioid crisis: A narrative analysis of the TV series Dopesick.

Dopesick (2021) is the first TV series whose plot deals exclusively with the opioid crisis in the United States. The current study uses narrative analysis and framing theory to explore this series, discussing its portrayal of the people and themes involved in the opioid crisis. Our analysis found that although Dopesick attempts to portray multiple dimensions of the opioid crisis, its narrative oversimplifies the story in attributing the cause of the problem almost exclusively to Purdue Pharma and its director Richard Sackler, while downplaying other factors that contributed to the opioid crisis. Thus, the narrative in this TV series tends to offer simple explanations to a complex problem for which simple solutions are likely to be inadequate.

Understanding the Dynamics of Materials Adaptation in An English-Chinese Bilingual Storytelling Curriculum for First Graders

This cross-sectional study examined materials adaptation within an English-Chinese bilingual storytelling curriculum for first graders to identify the potential factors influencing adaptation choice. It delved into the relationship between curriculum objectives, perceptions of picture books, and the use of tense and narrative. A survey (N=352) gathered demographic data of English teachers from China, and the data was analyzed using Partial Least Square (PLS) structural equation modeling. Findings illuminate how teachers’ perception of picture books fully mediate the interplay between bilingual storytelling curriculum objectives and teachers’ narrative in a picture book adaptation. Analyzing the results by narrative theory, it found that the essence of storytelling and narrative is making meanings; stories play a leading role in the curriculum for first graders to develop their bilingual narrative through sharing, reading, and telling stories. Consequently, teachers’ understanding of picture books’ possibilities as teaching materials, benefits for fostering students’ bilingual development, and perception of the intertextuality of illustration and words can significantly facilitate teachers’ narrative in a picture book adaptation. This study contributes by elucidating the mediating role of picture books, emphasizing the importance of linking curriculum objectives with teaching materials adaptation in practice. Furthermore, longitudinal research is to overcome the limitations of this cross-sectional correlation analysis.

The Undisciplined Campus Forms of Université Cheikh Anta Diop

ABSTRACT This article explores representations and lived experience of the Université Cheikh Anta Diop (UCAD), the largest public university in Senegal. While UCAD houses “disciplined” knowledges grounded in ideas of national development, this landmark institution also yields multidirectional forms of knowledge and solidarity located in student-led work and cultural production. Our analysis discusses the symbolic significance on campus of Cheikh Anta Diop, after whom the university was renamed in 1986. His body of work incarnates a fundamentally decolonial and pan-African vision, in the sense of an Africa liberated from colonial tutelage and carried forth by a young generation. In Dakar, this perspective is materialised through visual, musical and intellectual homages on campus. Yet his published writing remains marginal within the academic curriculum. The second part of the article discusses narrative representations of the university that further complicate the campus space and its Diopian promise of Afrofuturity. Infrastructural abjection, conservative societal values and gendered inequalities find expression through Mohamed Mbougar Sarr’s novel De purs hommes and through films produced by the student-led Ciné-UCAD collective. Our emphasis is on expressive creativity and entangled temporalities that rub up against institutional strategies, surging into their pressure points, and questioning anew higher education’s social role.

Building Suspense: A Critical Examination of Foreshadowing Devices in TV Series Opening Credits

This paper explores the intricate use of foreshadowing devices within the opening credits of television series, unraveling the artful integration of visual, musical, and textual elements. Through detailed case studies of iconic shows such as Game of Thrones, Stranger Things, and Westworld, we dissect the deliberate choices made by creators to engage audiences from the very beginning. The analysis uncovers the narrative nuances embedded in symbols, musical scores, and textual clues, highlighting their role in setting the stage for complex and immersive storylines. Ethical considerations, methodological challenges, and the limitations of the study are also addressed. By contributing insights to television studies and narrative theory, this paper emphasizes the significance of opening credits as a canvas for storytelling in the evolving landscape of contemporary television.

Sharing the Spotlight: The Benefits of Having a Celebrity Competitor

Drawing from media routines and narrative theory research, we theorize that benefits spill over to competitors who are cognitively linked to a celebrity via media narratives. Specifically, we argue that actors with direct competitive relationships with a celebrity will receive increased media attention and emotive media content, as well as increased performance. Due to the nature of these narratives, we further argue that this effect continues into periods after the direct relationship has ended. We test our hypotheses using a novel, eight-year data set from the Ultimate Fighting Championship. Our findings support our theoretical arguments, providing evidence on how celebrities benefit others in ways that other social evaluation assets—namely, high reputation and high status—do not.

Propp's Narrative Functions: Deciphering Hamlet's Character Transformation

Narrative analysis serves as a potent tool to unravel the subtleties of character progression and thematic resonance within storytelling. This study investigates the character transformation of Hamlet, the iconic protagonist of William Shakespeare's "Hamlet," employing Vladimir Propp's Morphology of the Folktale as an analytical framework. Through the lens of Proppian functions, the study explores Hamlet's journey from grief-stricken prince to tormented tragic hero, shedding light on the interplay between structural narrative components and emotional development. The research employs Propp's functions ranging from Absentation and Interdiction to Violation and Struggle to dissect pivotal moments in the play. These functions elucidate Hamlet's responses to absence, his internal conflicts, and his quest for justice. By mapping Hamlet's trajectory onto Propp's archetypal functions, this study unveils the intricate relationship between narrative structure and character metamorphosis. The analysis not only deepens our understanding of "Hamlet" as a timeless masterpiece but also exemplifies the synergy between traditional character analysis and structural narrative theory.

Narrative influence on support of a public policy: The case of nuclear power in The Netherlands.

We propose a new methodology to systematically transform presurveyed argument preferences into fictional narratives, that can help people to imagine the consequences of future events, and measure how they impact willingness to pay for a public policy. We apply narrative theory to construct two short narratives that depict an imaginary future, bleak due to climate change or energy dependence, and show experimentally that exposure to these narratives increases contributions in a Public Goods game, framed as payments toward the construction of new nuclear plant in The Netherlands. Our results suggest that fictional narratives can be used (and misused) as a tool of economic policy that allows conveying relevant information to people about complex issues. We discuss the ethical use of narratives and the value of their transparent construction for democratic will-formation and policy implementation when abstract factual information can be difficult to process or comprehend.

Literary reading as a web of relationships: Implications for pedagogy at a South African university

We teach English literature in South Africa, to third- or fourth-language English speakers. Increasingly dissatisfied with the effectiveness of our pedagogy under conditions of massification, we seek to agitate propositions about our students’ reading and what these propositions means for our pedagogy. Drawing on narrative theory we analyse our students’ written responses to a portfolio assessment designed to scaffold their reading of a setwork novel, Lauren Beukes’ Zoo City. Six patterns emerge, around paraphrase, compensation strategies that replace literary reading, repertoires of knowledge and how these relate to access, personal salience and dissonance, reader discomfort, and decolonial opportunities. Understanding the students’ reading for our course as a complex web of material, social and affective relations opens avenues for pedagogy and assessment design that frames literary reading as communal encounter.

Crafting emotional engagement and immersive experiences: Comprehensive scale development for and validation of hospitality marketing storytelling involvement

AbstractThis study develops and validates a scale for gauging consumer involvement in storytelling (to create memorable and emotionally resonant experiences) in hospitality marketing through four phases: qualitative inquiry, construct definition, item refinement, and nomological validation. Validation involves 24 in‐depth video interviews and consecutive online surveys. The hospitality marketing storytelling involvement scale, with four dimensions—contextual cues, emotional engagement, mental cognition, and immersive experience—comprising 14 items, precisely measures consumer involvement. The scale integrates narrative transportation theory and the elaboration likelihood model to enhance understanding of consumer engagement with fundamental human cognitive and emotional processes. The validated scale offers a valuable tool for marketers to precisely assess consumer involvement and strategically leverage storytelling to evoke emotions, foster brand loyalty, and judge campaign effectiveness. In diverse marketing contexts that elicit emotions, resonate with individuals, and foster immersive experiences, the scale demonstrates remarkable adaptability. Ultimately, it can help marketers craft compelling narratives, enhance brand perception, and strengthen consumer relationships, thereby contributing to emotional connections, optimizing strategies, and enhancing consumer engagement effectiveness.

The Impact of Narrative Perspectives and Emotional Characteristics on User Participation in Short Video Advertisements: The Regulatory Role of Product Types

Short video advertising is an important channel for businesses to promote and sell their products. Therefore, studying user engagement in short video advertising is of great significance in helping video authors and brand companies improve advertising effectiveness and reduce advertising costs. This article uses theoretical methods such as narrative transportation theory, SPSS statistical analysis, Python sentiment analysis, etc. to study the impact of narrative perspective and emotional characteristics on user engagement, as well as the moderating effect of product types.

Mimetic desire in Augustine’s Confessiones as a model for natural theology and virtue ethics

This article examined the concept and notability of mimetic desire in Augustine’s autobiographical work Confessiones. Mimetic desire is based primarily on the knowledge that there is a Perfect Being, viz. God, ideal forms (in Platonic idiom), which may be known and imitated by humans. Mimesis demonstrates that humans have a natural capacity and tendency to imitate and possess what others have. Despite this, in popular culture, mimesis has the connotation of feyness and is discouraged in place of inventiveness. The culture and spirit of our day promote originality and inventiveness without an understanding of the human nature and its inherent mimetic desires. The concept of mimetic desire is rooted in Rene Girard’s theory of anthropology but can be traced back as far as Plato’s Republic. Therefore, this interdisciplinary concept has been explored through Augustine’s narratological composition of Confessiones. The introspective tone and cultural forming narratives that make up Confessiones were succinctly examined in the context of mimetic theory. The triangular structure of mimetic desire was further explored to gain a better understanding of how Augustine relied on mimesis in his conversion to Christianity. The choice of imitating authentic models led to Augustine’s moral renewal, and likewise such implications are relevant to modern-day Christians. Moreover, this article aims to promote the concept of mimesis as an ideal practise concerning human nature and conditioning, towards a virtuous and morally acceptable society. The results of this article underline the importance of narrative theory and friendship in developing positive cultures through mimesis. Through contrasting Augustine’s earlier Manichaean life and his later Christian life, an illustration of mimetic desire can be drawn, and for Augustine, this could only mean Christ.Contribution: This article contributes to the ongoing interdisciplinary studies of ontology, anthropology, theology, and sociology. By interpreting or reading Augustine’s Confessiones through the lens of mimetic desire, this article offers an alternative perspective on Augustine’s natural theology and virtue ethics. It further presents the conceptual framework of mimesis on Christian and Platonist praxis of the ideal forms. Moreover, the article of the narratological composition of Confessiones expounds the importance of interpersonal relationships in our spiritual growth. The triangular structure of mimesis was further expounded in the context of interior life, viz. interior homo [inner man] as the ultimate model.

Emotional responses to narrative content: A comparative study on consumer food choice intentions

Influencing consumer food choices has evolved as a multidisciplinary research area that bridges marketing, food science, and sensory experiences. However, little is known about the impact of mixed reality (MR) or interactive content narratives in MR on influencing consumers to make specific food choices. Drawing on narrative transportation theory, the current research examines the effect of MR content narratives on consumer food choice intentions and the underlying mechanism of emotional response. A single-factor between-subjects experiment with four conditions (narrative format: mixed reality, video, audio, text) was conducted with 175 participants. Results revealed a significant indirect effect of media format on food choice intention through emotional response. More specifically, our results demonstrated that, as compared to MR, audio and video narrative formats had negative effects on choice of plant-based foods due to lower levels of consumer happiness and liveliness. Our results also demonstrated that, as compared to MR, audio-based narratives had a positive effect on choice of plant-based foods due to higher levels of consumer distress. The study contributes to literature in immersive technologies and consumer choice by providing empirical evidence of the role of emotions in food choice intentions that can be triggered through mixed reality technology. This can assist restaurateurs and food marketers in leveraging immersive technologies to stimulate the food experience and choice.

Introduction to the Translation of "Como está Hecho el Ulises " ("How Ulysses Is Made")

ABSTRACT: This is a translation of the 2005 essay, "How Ulysses is Made," by the Argentinean novelist and critic Ricardo Piglia (1941-2017), author of some of the most celebrated Latin American novels of the dictatorship and post-dictatorship periods, and one of the continent's most influential essayists and narrative theorists. His essay on Ulysses is a key contribution to international readings of Joyce, offering a profound reflection on practices of interpretation and translation across languages and contexts. The essay explores how meaning accrues across the process of reading—and rereading—Joyce's novel, for characters and readers alike. Looking first at the ways in which characters in Ulysses make sense of their world with reference to their readings and vice versa, he then explores how Ulysses made its way into Spanish, to probe how translation works as a mode of reading, even when it makes mistakes. Zooming in on the little-known figure of the translator José Salas Subirat—an uncanny avatar of Bloom, as Lucas Petersen's 2016 biography would reveal—Piglia shows how translator and reader alike must quest their way through the novel like modern-day Odysseuses, trying to make sense of the signs they encounter even as they encounter moments that clearly block sense.