Narrative Investigation

Jordan Harrison

What is narrative?

A narrative is a constructive format (as a work of speech, writing, song, film, television, video games, photography or theatre) that describes a sequence of non-fictional or fictional events.

What theorists relate to narrative?

Vladimir Propp proposed that it was possible to classify the characters and their actions into clearly defined roles and functions. Films such as Star Wars fit Propp’s model precisely.

Tzvetan Todorov suggests most narratives start with a state of equilibrium in which life is ‘normal’ and protagonists happy. This state of normality is disrupted by an outside force, which has to be fought against in order to return to a state of equilibrium.

Roland Barthes suggested that narrative works with five different codes (action, enigma, symbolic, semic, cultural) which activate the reader to make sense of it.

Claude Levi-Strauss examined how stories unconsciously reflect the values, beliefs and myths of a culture. These are usually expressed in the form of binary oppositions. His research has been adapted by media theorists, to reveal underlying themes and symbolic oppositions in media texts.

What narrative theories relate to the horror genre?

Todorov’s narrative theory of equilibrium as we commonly see the protagonist in the film living a normal happy day to day life who will later become the victim to an outside forces.

Also Levi-Strauss’ theory on how narrative can unconsciously reflect values and beliefs such as the paranormal in the horror genre.