Terminology - Discourse and Narrative Flashcards
What are additional events?
Secondary events that are not necessarily crucial to the overall story but, through being included, may have been highlighted as important
What is analepsis?
A literary device in narrative, in which past event is narrated at a point later than its chronological place in a story (similar to a flashback)
What is an antagonist?
Anything - person, creature, or force of nature - that advances the story through conflict with the protagonist, presenting barriers or obstruction to the protagonist’s desires
What is an audience surrogate?
A character who functions as a surrogate for the audience in terms of asking questions or reacting to another character’s narrative
What are central events?
Main events that are crucial to the overall story
What is defamiliarisation?
Presenting common things in an unfamiliar or strange way in order to enhance our perception of them or make us question our assumptions
What is external deviation?
Breaking a pattern which is understood to be a key part of language use in general
i.e. using made-up words, using a feature not expected in a particular genre
What is external evaluation?
Expressing an attitude to events outside the time frame of the narrative
e.g. “it makes me angry when people do that”
What is a first-person/homodiegetic narrator?
The narrator of a story who is also the protagonist or another character in the story
What is foregrounding?
Drawing particular attention to an aspect of a story
What is internal deviation?
Breaking a pattern which the text has set up
i.e. meter, form, viewpoint
What is internal evaluation?
Expressing an attitude to events in the same time frame as the narrative
e.g. “I was angry”
What is irony?
A state of affairs or an event that is contrary to what we expect, which is often wryly amusing or emotionally shocking as a result
What is abstract (Labov’s five narrative elements of anecdotes)?
Indication that the speaker wants attention and is beginning the story
“You’ll never believe who I met…”
“Oh, I’ll tell you something funny…”
What is orientation (Labov’s five narrative elements of anecdotes)?
The who/what/when/where/why of the story
“I was in town at the weekend…”
What is complicating action (Labov’s five narrative elements of anecdotes)?
The actual meat of the story, what happened
What is resolution (Labov’s five narrative elements of anecdotes)?
The ending of the narrative, explaining what happened
What is coda (Labov’s five narrative elements of anecdotes)?
Signals the story has ended
What is a narratee?
The person to who a narrative is told
What is a narrative?
Writing or speech that presents a series of events, characters and places in a coherent form
What is narrative discourse?
The shaping of the story through choices in language and structure
What is a narrator?
A person responsible for writing or speaking a narrative
What is poetic justice?
A literary device in which virtue is ultimately rewarded or vice punished, often in a way which provides emotional satisfaction for the audience
What is prolepsis?
A literary device in narrative in which a future event is narrated at a point earlier than its chronological place in the story (flashforward)
What is a protagonist?
Character at the centre of the story, makes the key decisions, and experiences the consequences of those decisions
What is retrospective?
A viewpoint where the narrator looks back on past events, often providing commentary on the significance of those events
What is a story?
The building blocks of a narrative in terms of events, characters, time and place
What is high tellability?
The feature of a story that make it worth telling to an audience
What is low tellability?
The characterisitcs of a narrative that presents uninteresting material in an uninspiring way
What is a third person/heterodiegetic narrator?
Describes the experiences of a narrative in the past, present and future
What is a time frame?
The positing of a narrative in the past, present or future
What is an unreliable narrator?
A narrating character or storyteller who provides inaccurate, misleading, conflicting, or otherwise questionable information to the reader or audience
