文体学课件5.ppt

Lecture Five Narrative Stylistics Topics covered 1. Narrative Stylistics A. a brief introduction B. A model of narrative structure 2. Developments in narratology A. Propp’s morphology of the folktale B. The morphology of contemporary narrative 3. A sociolinguistic model of narrative A. Labov’s narrative model B. constructing a narrative: an example A brief introduction: Narrative discourse provides a way of recapitulating felt experience by matching up patterns of language to a connected series of events. In its most minimal form, a narrative comprises two clauses which are temporarily ordered. E.g. John dropped the plates and Janet laughed suddenly. Narratives have rather more to offer than just two simply temporarily arranged clauses. Narrative requires development, elaboration, embellishment; and it requires a sufficient degree of stylistic flourish to give it an imprint of individuality or personality. William Labov has argued that narratives require certain essential elements of structure, the absence of which will make the narrative ‘ill-formed’. Activity: Read the following and then decide whether it is a good story and why or why not. well this person had a little too much to drink and he attacked me and the friend came in and she stopped it (Labov 1972) Analysis: The story, which is only a skeleton of a fully formed narrative, was told by an adult informant who had been asked to recall an experience where they felt they had been in real danger. ? 1)???? It lacks sufficient contextualization, 2)???? It offers little sense of closure or finality. 3) And it also lacks any dramatic or rhetorical embellishment. Distinction between two basic components: narrative plot and narrative discourse 1) The term plot is generally understood to refer to the abstract storyline of a narrative; 2) Narrative discourse, by contrast, encompasses the manner or means by which that plot is narrated. Abstract Represented Domain in storyline st