| Chapter 2: | Narrative and Its Structures |
|
|
This is a limited free preview of this book. Please buy full access.
like folk tales (Genette, 1980). However, with the growing interest in narrative as a social and psychological phenomenon, rather than solely as a formal literary or historical genre, attempts to discover basic story structures have extended into studies on structural principles in other forms of narrative.
One such well-known study was conducted by Labov and Waletzky (1967). Unlike Propp, they proposed, first, that the clause is the smallest unit of linguistic expression that defines the functions of narrative. Second, they claimed that ‘any sequence of clauses which contains at least one temporal juncture’ is a minimum structure that provides a unit of analysis (Labov & Waletzky, 1967, p. 28). They presented an analytical framework for the analysis of oral versions of personal experience in English. A fully formed oral narrative is shown to have a six-part structure as follows:
- 1. Abstract: What was the story about?
- 2. Orientation: Who, when, what, where?
- 3. Complication action: Then what happened?
- 4. Evaluation: So what?
- 5. Result or resolution: What finally happened?
- 6. Coda: The sealing off of a narrative, which signals that the narrative is finished.
Labov (1972) contended that this sequencing can be taken as the ‘default’ or simplest format. The study also asserted that in simpler oral narratives, and in fables and fairy tales, the six elements listed tend to occur, and it will be in the given order if they do occur. His study has been recognised as providing the basis for the analysis of the narrative structure in spoken discourse. However, it has been criticised as having left out the context of the telling of the story (Lepper, 2000). Although the study is