In this blog post, I will be researching some key theorists who have created different methodologies of narrative.
Roland Barthes
Roland Gerard Barthes born November 12th 1915, was a French literary theorist, philosopher, linguist, critic and semiotician. Barthes explored a diverse range of fields and he was a major influence on the development of schools. Barthes described a text as "a galaxy of signifiers, not a structure of signifieds; it has no beginning; it is reversible; we gain access to it by several entrances, none of which cab be authoritatively declared to be the main one...". He concluded that texts have many meanings and people can interpret them differently - "a ball of threads waiting to be unravelled". He also said that texts can either be 'open' or 'closed' - narrowed this down to five codes:
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Claude Levi-Strauss
Claude Levi-Strauss born November 28th 1908 was a French anthropologist and ethnologist. His work was key in the development of the theory of structuralism and structural anthropology. Levi-Strauss studied hundreds of myths and legends across the world. From this he concluded that we as humans make sense of the world, people and events by seeing/using binary opposites. He also concluded that narratives are arranged around the conflict of binary opposites. For example, Good vs. Evil, Weak vs. Strong, Male vs. Female, etc. |
Vladimir Propp
Vladimir Propp born April 17th 1895 was a literary critic and scholar. Propp studied many fairy tales and came to the conclusion that all narratives have the same structure. He observed that they are structured by certain types of characters and their specific actions. Props stated that there are 31 different types of stages/functions in any narrative. He also stated that there are eight roles in ever narrative structure.
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Tzevtan Todorov
Tzevtan Todorov born March 1st 1939 is a Bulgarian-French historian, philosopher, literary critic, sociologist and essayist. He is the author of many books and essays which have a significant influence on anthropology, sociology, semiotics and etc. Todorov's theory states that most narratives follow the same pattern/path. He states that there are five steps in the pattern:
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