narrative theory

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Narrative Theory

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Narrative Theory

Tim O'Sullivan argues that all media texts tells us some kind of story. Through careful mediation, media texts offer a way of telling stories, but the story of us as a culture or set of cultures. Narrative theory sets out to show that what we experience when consume a media text is an understanding of a particular set of conventions or constructions and that it is important for us to be aware of how these are put together.

Tim O'Sullivan (1998)

This theory states that every story ever told can be fitted into one of eight narrative types. Each of these narrative types has a source, an original story upon which the others are based. These stories are as follows:

AchillesThe fatal flaw that leads to the destruction of the previously flawless or almost flawless individual e.g. Superman, Fatal Attraction.

CandideThe indomitable hero who cannot be put down e.g. Indiana Jones, James Bond.

CinderellaThe dream come true e.g. Pretty Woman.

CirceThe chase, the spider and the fly, the innocent victim e.g. Smokey and the Bandit, Duel, The Terminator.

FaustSelling your soul to the devil may bring riches but eventually your soul belongs to him e.g. Bedazzled, Wall Street.

OrpheusThe loss of something personal, the gift that is taken away, the tragedy of loss or the journey which follows the loss e.g. The Sixth Sense, Love Story.

Romeo and JulietThe love story e.g. Titanic

Tristan and IseultThe love triangle: man loves woman, unfortunately one of both of them are already spoken for or a third party intervenes e.g. Casablanca.

Kate Domaille (2001)

Bordwell and Thompson 1997

inferred events

what happens

what we see non-diegetic

material

How we are shown what happensPlot

Story

This theory suggests that music videos generally fall into two groups, performance and conceptual. Performance is when the audience can see the artist singing and dancing in the video. Conceptual is when the audience can see something with artistic ambition.

AbstractAbstract videos do not have any performance or narrative in them and are considered artistic.

PerformanceA video that has performance includes clips of the artist lip syncing and dancing. Also, if the artist is a band then they can be seen playing their instruments.

NarrativeA video with a narrative has a story that either goes with the lyrics of the song or does not. This narrative is often easily understood by the audience as it is easy to follow.

Sven Carlsson (1999)

Boy

Girl

Disruption Quest Resolution

re-equilibrium

Equilibrium of Diegesis

cause and effect

linearity

Todorov 1977

Pam Cook's theory states that Standard Hollywood narrative structure should include:

•A high degree of narrative closure

•Linearity of cause and effect within an overall trajectory of enigma resolution

•A fictional world that contains verisimilitude governed by a spatial and temporal coherence

Pam Cook (1985)

Levi-Strauss argues that human cultural understanding is based upon binary opposites such as good v bad, rich v poor, male v female.

Claude Levi-Strauss (1958)

Michael Shore argues that music videos are 'recycled styles that contain an information overload'. This means that newer music videos are similar to existing ones as they are using the same style or theme.

An example of this would be Weezer's Buddy Holly Video as it looks like it has been taken from the show Happy Days. Another example is the music video for the song The Importance of Being Idle by Oasis.

Michael Shore (1984)

Weezer – Buddy Holly Oasis – The Importance of Being Idle

This theory states that narrative relations are highly complex and meaning can be created from the individual audio-viewer's musical personal taste to sophisticated intertextuality that uses multi-discursive phenomena of Western culture.

Andrew Goodwin (1992)