The idea of narrative has been widely discussed in the recent health care literature, including nursing, and has been portrayed as a resource for both clinical work and research studies. However, the use of the term 'narrative' is inconsistent, and various assumptions are made about the nature (and functions) of narrative: narrative as a naive account of events; narrative as the source of 'subjective truth'; narrative as intrinsically fictional; and narrative as a mode of explanation. All these assumptions have left (...) their mark on the nursing literature, and all of them (in our view) are misconceived. Here, we argue that a failure to distinguish between 'narrative' and 'story' is partly responsible for these misconceptions, and we offer an analysis that shows why the distinction between them is essential. In doing so, we borrow the concept of 'narrativity' from literary criticism. Narrativity is something that a text has degrees of, and our proposal is that the elements of narrativity can be 'sorted' roughly into a continuum, at the 'high narrativity' end of which we find 'story'. On our account, 'story' is an interweaving of plot and character, whose organization is designed to elicit a certain emotional response from the reader, while 'narrative' refers to the sequence of events and the (claimed) causal connections between them. We suggest that it is important not to confuse the emotional persuasiveness of the 'story' with the objective accuracy of the 'narrative', and to this end we recommend what might be called 'narrative vigilance'. There is nothing intrinsically authentic, or sacrosanct, or emancipatory, or paradigmatic about narrative itself, even though the recent health care literature has had a marked tendency to romanticize it. (shrink)

This article aims to study the main patterns of contemporaneity in the field of stage writing, especially in Europe. Particular reference is made to the problem and function of the text in the age of the image and other issues of special relevance. These notes or stage patterns are compared with those of the most publicized current texts of cinema in Spain, giving rise to the debate on the adequacy of these cinematographic texts to the signs of contemporaneity. The aim (...) of this study is to find out whether the mentioned film texts follow the current guidelines of European contemporary stage writing. (shrink)

In many films, story is presented in an order different from chronological. Deviations from the chronological order in a narrative are called anachronies. Narratological theory and the evidence from psychological experiments indicate that anachronies allow stories to be more interesting, as the non-chronological order evokes curiosity in viewers. In this paper we investigate the historical dynamics in the use of anachronies in film. Particularly, we follow the cultural attraction theory that suggests that, given certain conditions, cultural evolution should conform to (...) our cognitive preferences. We study this on a corpus of 80 most popular mystery films released in 1970–2009. We observe that anachronies have become used more frequently, and in a greater proportion of films. We also find that films that made substantial use of anachronies, on average, distributed the anachronies evenly along film length, while the films that made little use of anachronies placed them near the beginning and end. We argue that this can reflect a functional difference between these two types of using anachronies. The paper adds further support to the argument that popular culture may be influenced to a significant degree by our cognitive biases. (shrink)

The article is devoted to the consideration the problem of the phenomenon of an unreliable narration in the British intellectual prose of the second half of the twentieth century. The meaning of the words “narrator”, “unreliable narration” is investigated. The unreliable narration is reviewed based on the example of the novel “Rites of Passage” by Golding. It is noted that the aforementioned work has a vibrant didactic component. It has been found that Golding uses a wide range of narrative techniques. (...) The emphasis is made on the critical analysis by other literary scholars of the novel “Rites of Passage” by Golding. The use of narrative strategies in accordance with the scientific classification by Genette is investigated. The markers of unreliability of the narrators are emphasized. Attention is focused on the fact that a high degree of unreliability is based on the limited knowledge of the heroes, direct participation in the events, a problematic system of values. It is noted that the unreliability of narration in the novel “Rites of Passage” by Golding forces the reader to doubt not only the narrator but oneself. The use of the narrative method in the intellectual prose of the British writer Iris Murdoch is investi-gated. It has been found that the novel “The Black Prince” by Iris Murdock is one of the best examples of an unreliable narration. The genre specifics of the novel are emphasized, which combines the forms of the diary, of the memoir and of the confession. In addition, Murdoch creates a narrative strategy, which combines signs of various forms of “I am the narrator” within the framework of one narrative. In addition, “The Black Prince” is a unique model of modern artistic and philosophical metatext genre formation. (shrink)

In this article I develop tools for analyzing the identities that emerge in qualitative material. I approach identities as historically, socially and culturally produced subject positions, as processes that are in a constant state of becoming and that receive their temporary stability and meaning in concrete contexts and circumstances. I suggest that the identities and subject positions that materialize in qualitative material can be analyzed from four different perspectives. They can be approached by focusing on (1) classifications that define the (...) boundary lines between ‘us’ and ‘them’, as (2) participant roles that refer to the temporal aspect of subject positions and outline their meaning for action, as (3) structures of viewpoint and focalization that frame meaning and order to opinions and experiences of the world, and as (4) interactive positions that articulate the roles and identities taken by the participants of communication. (shrink)

While some literary scholars claim that their discipline's research practices do not fit the scholarship of teaching and learning, close reading — the signature critical practice of literary studies — provides a useful model. Close reading involves not only attention to the text but also the integration of text and theory. This article analyzes how literary scholars use close reading practices in writing about teaching and learning. The study finds that literary scholars use disciplinary methods effectively in analyzing their teaching, (...) integrating the text of teaching with theories about literature and learning, but they do not read the evidence of students learning in the same ways. (shrink)