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Lingüística literaria - Introduction to stylistics in prose narrative - Prof. Patricia Green — Transcript

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0:02[music]
0:10>> Good morning, everybody. Good evening
0:12for some. Good afternoon.
0:15So, welcome to unit three.
0:17This unit is basically the study of
0:20prose narrative.
0:22Mind you, these two words are very
0:23important because in the future of your
0:25analysis, you will have to
0:28uh
0:28frame your analysis of prose narrative,
0:31first of all, from what are the elements
0:35of prose, which are those conventions of
0:38prose that make it such. And secondly,
0:42as prose,
0:44uh and as a as a type of genre, this is
0:47a narrative genre in terms of literary
0:50studies. So, um in this very small
0:53agenda for this unit, I will just brief
0:57you with uh the objectives of this uh
1:01proposition of approaching uh prose
1:05narrative, first of all, from the
1:07elements of prose, and then how to
1:10articulate these elements of literary
1:12linguistics or stylistics into the study
1:16of narrative prose. So, mind you,
1:18whenever you're going to tackle a text
1:20that has to do with prose fiction, we
1:23are understanding prose fiction from the
1:25framework of prose narrative fiction.
1:29That is to say, the elements that make
1:31prose
1:32uh such, and those elements that make
1:35prose a narrative, right? Because prose
1:38can be just a discourse, it could be any
1:41form of writing, but in this
1:44uh
1:45specific area, we're going to dedicate
1:49or orient ourselves into the study of
1:51narrative.
1:52The first um
1:54distinction I want to make is that prose
1:56fiction narrative is different to to
1:59poetry, right? There there is um a
2:02highlighting in poetry of poetic devices
2:05as meaning-making elements.
2:07Whereas in prose, we do have a
2:10manipulation of language in the
2:12rhetorics of prose elements.
2:15That's why we say that prose
2:17in uh distinction of poetry has a
2:22difference, which is marked in a
2:25continuous of a syntagmatic and
2:27paradigmatic dimension.
2:30Uh
2:31secondly, poetry and prose differ
2:34uh in aspects of um
2:37I would say structure, in aspects of um
2:41rhythm, in aspects of phonology, even
2:44though we do find elements of rhythm and
2:47elements of phonology in prose. Prose is
2:50more poetry is more implicated in an
2:54analysis in an analysis when we talk
2:56about stylistics of the structure of
2:59poetry in terms of the stanzaic forms,
3:02in terms of the number of lines for each
3:04stanza, in terms of the rhythm for each
3:07stanza, and in terms of of course the um
3:12iambic pentameter in the case of the
3:15English studies, and how this uh rhythm
3:18or the iambic foot changes the meter in
3:22rhythm.
3:24In prose it is different because prose,
3:26all these elements of prose, which we
3:28also find in poetry, which are the
3:32literary elements that make a literary
3:35discourse, which is a manipulation of
3:38linguistic elements such as the lexical,
3:40the phonological, the semantic, the
3:43graphological aspects of any a
3:46linguistic realm, are also shaped in
3:49prose in order to make meaning. But to
3:52make meaning of prose, we have to take
3:54into account that not only the
3:56linguistic surface that I have already
3:59mentioned takes place into the analysis,
4:03but also the narrative function. Because
4:06prose fiction is about
4:09a narration, the act of narrating that,
4:13of course, implies a narrator, implies
4:15an addressee, implies a speaker, an
4:18utterance
4:19in the course
4:21of a dimension, which is syntagmatic,
4:24which is a unit, the sentence, and that
4:27follows a chronology from the beginning
4:30to the end with an expected end or end
4:34point.
4:35So,
4:37um I would say that stylistic analysis
4:41of prose requires an attention to both
4:45elements, to the elements of the
4:47rhetorics, which are proper of any study
4:51of stylistics, and are common in both
4:53genres, prose and poetry, but in this
4:58case, the narrative aspect. And most of
5:01the failures in uh bridging or
5:04approaching a stylistic
5:07um model, in implementing a stylistic
5:10model for the analysis of prose fiction,
5:13is forgetting about this narrative
5:15framework, right? That establishes first
5:18of all, itself
5:20in the unit of poetry would be the line,
5:23but the unit of uh narrative prose would
5:27be the sentence. But, a sentence that
5:30has its particularities.
5:32Right, I would like to talk about which
5:35were the most important influential
5:38schools
5:39in the
5:41development of stylistics as from the
5:4520th century onwards, no? in the current
5:49century, the 21st century, we are also
5:51applying these models from these two
5:54frameworks. The first framework is
5:57the European formalist that are brothers
6:01to the Russian formalist. That the focus
6:05of this framework is entirely placed on
6:09the aspects of rhetoric of the prose.
6:12That is to say, the poetic devices such
6:16as the lexical, the figurative language,
6:19the semantic, and of course, aspects of
6:23phonology and graphology.
6:25These two influential
6:28schools, European and Russian formalist,
6:31form, I would say, the key framework
6:36through which every student and every
6:38critic would draw elements as tools for
6:42analysis and also develop models,
6:46stylistic models for analysis of
6:49different prose narrative text. Right.
6:53During the 1960,
6:56as from we are talking about the
6:59development of this formalism in Europe
7:01and in Russia with great influence in
7:05America and in the UK, the Americans and
7:09the English adopt certain traits and
7:12certain aspects of this formalist
7:14school,
7:15but give it a new name
7:18during the 1960s, which is the new
7:21critique.
7:22New critiques or new criticism, the
7:25school of new criticism, with certain
7:27differences in America and in England.
7:31Right? What is this school keen on?
7:34First of all, there is a great emphasis
7:38on the overlap between
7:41the rhetoric, purely the rhetoric of
7:44poetic language, and the linguistic
7:47aspect with the articulation of
7:50narrative, right? So, I would say that
7:53this since 1960,
7:55the academic predominance of this school
7:58is, of course,
8:00um descendants of formalism, so they're
8:03going to pay a lot of focus on the
8:07rhetoric aspects of prose narrative, but
8:11at the same time, during this, I would
8:14say, decade, the 1960s,
8:17um this a new beginning of a new
8:20literary period called uh postmodernism
8:24is uh highly influential in the uh I
8:28would say, integration of several
8:31schools of fields of knowledge that are
8:34going to contribute to the analysis of
8:37stylistics
8:38in prose fiction.
8:40That is to say, besides having
8:43what you have already uh
8:45apprehended from the previous unit on
8:48the study of poetic language and how
8:51stylistic is analyzed in the poetic
8:55language and at different points by
8:57applying different models of stylistic
9:01to different poems, in this unit, you're
9:04going to apply
9:06the same framework, that is to say,
9:08you're going to still be look at the
9:10rhetoric of narrative prose fiction,
9:14but
9:16um articulated through a components, I
9:20would say, knowledge fields uh
9:23that are firstly and utmost predominant
9:28in the dimension of feminism,
9:31post-structuralism,
9:32structuralism,
9:34and these, I would say, they are not
9:38they are approaches, they are
9:39philosophical approaches to the study of
9:42fiction.
9:43And as such, they
9:47contribute to conceptual tools that help
9:50you articulate what you already know
9:53about rhetorics in poetic language, yes?
9:58The lexical, the phonological, the
10:00rhythmical,
10:03the semantic, right?
10:05And the syntactic. All these are also
10:08going to be enriched by a field of
10:12knowledge that is mostly conceptual, but
10:15at the same time technical. Right. Which
10:19are
10:20I would say, or who are the most
10:22influential, which are the works from
10:25whose authors are the most influential
10:28in this stage of the study of stylistics
10:33in the 1960s?
10:35Are, of course, the school of
10:36structuralism, post-structuralism,
10:39and feminism with the study of
10:42postmodernism.
10:45So,
10:46what is it that they they say? Okay.
10:48Style is the merging
10:52of two fields of study, the literary and
10:55the linguistic, right? They become
10:57friends because before there was in
11:02terms of formalism and in terms of a
11:05formalist school, the study of of of
11:08style, how a literary text makes meaning
11:12was only oriented towards the surface of
11:16the text, that is to say, only the the
11:20rhetoric, the linguistic aspects, but
11:23there was something lacking there. There
11:25was
11:27a lack or a void or an emptiness in the
11:31sense that this was not enough to create
11:34what we know, the concept of literary
11:37discourse. What is literary discourse?
11:40Literary discourse is the interaction
11:43between
11:44I would say an interlocutor and an
11:47addressee, right? In the middle, there
11:50is a message. And this message is
11:52conveyed through narrative prospection.
11:56We have a narrator that narrates the
11:59style of the narrator is what makes that
12:03proper of that prospection and typical
12:07of that author, right? We can say, I
12:10don't know, McEwan, we can say
12:15and and
12:16Martin, we can say many authors have
12:20their proper style, which you know
12:22already, have to do with aspects that
12:25manipulate linguistic properties of
12:28language in such a way as to create
12:31meaning and to look at the familiar from
12:34a different perspective. That is mainly
12:37literary linguistics or stylistics. Now,
12:41here we have
12:42I wouldn't say a problem, but we have
12:44another feature that prose,
12:47even though we can term certain poems
12:49narrative, is not entirely about a
12:52narrative story, but it has to do with a
12:56field of reference, right?
12:58What is an epic? An epic is
13:01a prose narrative, right? Not exactly a
13:05novel, but it's a prose narrative
13:09whose I would say which elements make up
13:13epic are not necessarily the poetic
13:15elements, but the
13:17referential
13:19frame that has to do with telling a
13:21story. Because from the epic in
13:24Aristotle is I would say the
13:26foundational realm from which stems the
13:29novel, right? So, the referential frame
13:32here, sorry, is the
13:36telling of a story, which is a function
13:38of prose fiction narrative in this case.
13:42So,
13:43uh first of all,
13:45what are the contributions of the
13:47feminist? The feminist [snorts] say,
13:49and this is a question whether style is
13:52a is a product of the context that is to
13:55say, style is an ideological input that
14:00uh uses certain elements of language or
14:03uses the manipulation of certain
14:05elements of language in such an order as
14:08to respond to an ideological framework,
14:11right? Or the other way round, style is
14:16what
14:17um an author chooses from a series of
14:22tools, which are linguistic tools,
14:24whereby the dimension of selection,
14:28whether I select a certain noun, uh a
14:31synonym for that noun or another, there
14:34is a a an I would say an array of terms
14:38for one thing, right? And from that
14:42array of terms, I choose or I select one
14:46and therefore I project into that
14:50selection a combination of other
14:52elements to make it literary. This is
14:55quite complex, no? But what they have in
14:58common is that that post-structuralism
15:02and structuralism and these currents in
15:05the 1960
15:06um bring into the uh study of stylistics
15:12the reader into the text. That is to
15:14say, they amplify
15:17the study of stylistics by introducing
15:19context. And context means there is a uh
15:23target there. There is a reader. There
15:25is an audience that is going to read and
15:28I'm going to interpret. And also that
15:30reader is already determined, right? Or
15:33shaped by its own his or her own
15:37context, cultural, social, political
15:40context.
15:41Right.
15:42Uh and that reader, of course,
15:45the perception of the stylistic forms
15:49and aspects of a prose narrative is
15:52going to be greatly furnished by the
15:55horizons of expectations
15:58and, of course, the literary competence
16:01that that reader brings into the study
16:04of stylistics in prose narrative.
16:07Now, feminist narratives and feminist
16:10critics have examined uh style less as
16:13an enclosed
16:15characteristic of a particular text and
16:18more as a reflection of the social
16:21cultural hierarchies proper of
16:24patriarchy, yes? Predominantly male.
16:27That's why feminist critics are
16:31of two types, right? They revise texts,
16:35prior texts written by men and by women
16:39whose social, cultural, and political
16:41contexts were um determinant or were
16:45shaping the way they wrote, the elements
16:49they chose from an array of tools in the
16:51linguistic dimension, and how they shape
16:54them in order to be functional to the
16:58hegemonic discourse of patriarchal
17:00institutional at that time. This is a
17:02critique of feminists, right?
17:05Um Marxists and new historics or new
17:08historicism revise texts
17:11uh in terms of seeing style as an
17:15element of more productive agenda of
17:18forces, cultural and ideological forces
17:22that change and and mutate and are also
17:26function to the social, cultural,
17:29political framework of that time. So,
17:32style would be in this sense a function
17:35of
17:36the context, not not a proper inherent
17:39quality in the text. These are the two,
17:42I would say, predominant differences
17:45between critics. And we saw already in
17:47Eagleton and Color
17:49that they they they should be
17:52articulated, right? Style is not only
17:54what
17:55the the resources or the tools that a
17:58writer implements to make linguistic,
18:01language, literary in order to say
18:03something or to make meaning, but also
18:06it is how that selection or combination
18:10that a
18:11an author makes is is also determined by
18:14the context of production of his or her
18:18own work. I hope I'm not going too fast.
18:21So,
18:23uh in terms of this, we have uh prose as
18:27a literary medium.
18:29And as I say here, we have to
18:30distinguish prose in different fields
18:33because prose could be the academic
18:36discourse par excellence, it could be a
18:38political discourse, but in this unit we
18:41are analyzing prose as narrative
18:44fiction.
18:46Um we distinguished it already, but we
18:49are going to talk about prose now.
18:52Uh in the difference, the basic
18:54difference from
18:57uh
18:58poetry is, as I said before, the units,
19:00right? The units of poetry is the line.
19:04And the unit of prose narrative fiction
19:06is a sentence, which is the syntagmatic
19:10uh,
19:10unit.
19:11Uh the arrangement, I would say the the
19:16uh, arrangement or uh, composition of a
19:18sentence is both syntactic,
19:21graphological, phonological, and
19:24rhythmical, and it has a purpose, which
19:26is called the end focus. The end fo-
19:29focus of the syntagmatic realm of the
19:32sentence is the a narrative focus, which
19:36is we speak
19:39to uh, about. The narrator speaks or
19:42actors or narrates within the sentence
19:47with a with an object, with a name,
19:49which is giving a final end, and of
19:53course, involving an action, a subject,
19:57and an object, or an adverb of place,
20:00manner, or time.
20:02Um,
20:04and of course, the different types of
20:06modes of these adverbials and
20:09adjectives. Therefore, this is a most
20:12important difference between prose and
20:15poetry for those who are not versed in
20:17the study of poetry, prose, and drama.
20:21Um, but prose also incorporates another
20:24feature, which is dialogue, right?
20:26Bringing in another voice into the text,
20:29and together with bringing in another
20:31voice is incorporating another type of
20:34discourse, which is the direct speech,
20:38right?
20:40In so far, this makes it narrative,
20:43because bringing another voice is
20:45telling from the point of a narrator how
20:48a dialogue is integrated to uh,
20:52in the syntagmatic sentence, and opens,
20:56of course, another dimension of
20:59narrative. Whereas, the sentence
21:03comprehends a subject, a verb,
21:06uh, an object, a direct object or
21:08indirect object, and a verbial,
21:11and a full stop, and that makes it the
21:13syntagmatic dimension.
21:16The incorporation
21:17of dialogue opens up a sec- uh I would
21:21say a second hypo-diegetic level in
21:25which different um I would say
21:28characters or voices in are integrated
21:32into the diegetic level, and we are
21:35talking about a structure of narrative.
21:39Here we have a story, whereas poetry
21:42does not have a story, even though
21:45sometimes some types of poetry
21:48are [snorts] narrative. Right.
21:52Um
21:54Uh
21:55this incorporation of dialogue talks
21:57about the pragmatic, that is to to say
22:00the study of the use of language in
22:04speech in the context of the occurrence
22:06of that language. So, not only we're
22:09going to have style as looking at the
22:12aesthetic properties of language
22:15manipulated by the author and converting
22:18them into stylistic elements, right? But
22:22also we're going to have a narrative
22:24form that greatly influences the way we
22:27read and the the way we make meaning,
22:31and the way that meaning in itself
22:34contributes to framing what we call
22:36literary discourse, right?
22:39Um so, narrative stylistic, which is our
22:42topic,
22:44is a bridge or I say a dimension between
22:48the study of narrative proper,
22:50narratology, and the linguistic realm,
22:53right?
22:54Uh if I say
22:56uh John grabbed a Coke and sat down to
22:59watch TV, we have what we call a unit of
23:03narrative, which is a sentence, and
23:05within that unit we have also two type
23:09of clauses. So, the difference is
23:11evident here, right? Narrative then
23:14becomes a complex term in the figure of
23:18an elaboration of an act by a
23:21protagonist that a narrator narrates,
23:24and in the elaboration of this act there
23:27is also an embellishment of the act, of
23:32what happens, by the devices proposed
23:36operatori. Yes? And whether that sitting
23:41down and watching TV is going to be
23:43embellished by an author or not in the
23:46way that corporates certain elements of
23:50a rhetoric or poetic, we are going to
23:53study that as well.
23:56Okay.
23:58Um we're going to uh talk about the
24:02study of style in narrative prose from
24:06two different uh schools or narrative
24:09perspectives.
24:11One is a contextualist school that focus
24:14on how the elements of the context,
24:18right, whereby the narrative was
24:21produced and received influences the way
24:25the writer implements a critical style
24:30or stylistic choice. The other one is
24:33the school of textualist that rely
24:37heavily
24:38on the text as the meaning-making
24:42agent for the analysis and
24:44interpretation of literary discourse,
24:48right? What I want to say here,
24:51which um
24:53is important, is at the end of
24:56stylistic, because this I'm going to
24:59repeat and I I am going to highlight as
25:01a most important aspect we are dealing
25:04now is why do we study stylistics or
25:07literary linguistics in all the three
25:10genders is to
25:12uh give an empirical weight
25:15to the literary discourse. Is such a
25:19thing as literary discourse? What is
25:21literary discourse? Literary discourse
25:25per se is an utterance, right? A
25:27discourse is in fact analyzed from the
25:30context of production but also about the
25:33message. A discourse implies an utterer,
25:37an addresser,
25:38uh a speech act, a message, and also an
25:42addressee, the target. So, discourse is
25:46an interaction
25:47whereby the vehicle of the discourse,
25:50which is that message, that meaning we
25:53want to convey to the other end is in a
25:57in a way conveyed through certain
26:00choices a writer makes and these choices
26:04have to do have to do with the
26:07linguistic choices of manipulation
26:10through foregrounding, through uh
26:12backgrounding,
26:14through um
26:16I would say defamiliarization
26:19with uh functional linguistic grammar.
26:22All these tools at your service from the
26:25different stylistic models are the tools
26:28that the authors implement to make the
26:32linguistic realm strange. That is to
26:35say, how do we make meaning of that
26:37message by understanding first and
26:41utmost in a narrative fiction is how
26:45these linguistic choices
26:47made by the author contribute to a
26:51typical or differentiation stylistic
26:54form
26:55that helps to look
26:57at a reality or to a configuration of an
27:01event because fiction or narrative
27:04fiction is about representing reality.
27:06What other thing would
27:10a fiction represent if it's not reality?
27:13From a different perspective, from a
27:15different way. That is to say, through
27:18um
27:19uh estrangement or strange and immediate
27:22familiarization,
27:24backgrounding, foregrounding,
27:27um many stylistics or repetition or
27:30structural repetition or graphological
27:34or phonological devices that make
27:39the construction of meaning different to
27:42the literal or the formal way we speak
27:46every day, right? Okay.
27:50Now,
27:51so from the uh school of contextualists,
27:54those who are the most important authors
27:58of contextualist uh approach to
28:01narrative prose fiction are derived from
28:05the school of formalism, which are the
28:07Russians, Victor Shklovsky, Vladimir
28:11Propp from structuralism.
28:14Uh Greimas and Tzvetan Todorov, right?
28:19From the Anglo-American school of uh
28:22contextualists, we have Barthes, we have
28:25uh
28:26we have
28:28um
28:29Jacobson, and we have also uh
28:33Chapman. Uh sorry, we're still the
28:37Anglo-American school from textualists,
28:39we have we have sorry, Leech, we have
28:42Booth, we have Chapman, and we have
28:45Fowler. These are textualists. Then
28:47we're going to go to contextualists.
28:50Also, through the
28:53contribution, the French contribution to
28:56the textualist school is
28:59Gérard Genette, right? And the
29:02contribution of narrative prose from
29:06a very, very, I would say, descriptive
29:10study of temporality,
29:12of
29:14narrative forms in terms of narrative
29:16discourse, in terms of focalization,
29:20in terms of perspective, in terms of
29:23different types of speech, or different
29:25types of
29:26discourses in narrative.
29:29So,
29:30basically, I resume the textualist
29:33school derives from two influential
29:37focus, the European and Russian, which
29:40are Tzvetan Todorov, Victor Shklovsky,
29:44and, of course, Vladimir Propp, and the
29:47Anglo-American, which are Chatman,
29:49Seymour Chatman,
29:51Chatman,
29:53Cleanth Brooks. We have also Leech and
29:57Short, which are
29:59two important authors, English authors,
30:01with who are, of course, permanently
30:05being in discussion in terms of how
30:08their work has been
30:11greatly influential in the study of
30:13stylistics, okay?
30:15Okay, models of narrative. What is a
30:17model of narrative? A model of narrative
30:20is
30:21what I'm going to choose, what type of
30:25framework I'm going to choose to study
30:27narrative, right? Um
30:31Is
30:32there for such a thing as
30:34a model, a priori model for
30:38the analysis of narrative?
30:43I want to say this because this is
30:44important, no?
30:46Do we, when we encounter an active text,
30:49and this will be part of your exercise
30:51now, do we have a model in mind?
30:54Or is the text as it is structured or
30:58configured that in a way
31:01uh lays its objects [snorts]
31:04to you, and from reading the text you
31:07already understand how its structuration
31:11or configuration
31:13lies itself open to you to choose a
31:16model. So, this is a great question you
31:19have to ask yourselves before
31:22you um start the journey of choosing
31:26what
31:27analytical stylistic model would you um
31:32employ for a study of a narrative text.
31:35And this will be the core matter of the
31:38uh exercise C of this unit three. Sorry.
31:43So, um
31:45the most important, I would say here,
31:48>> [cough]
31:49>> uh
31:50in terms of of um
31:53the
31:54the the models
31:57and we're talking about textualist
31:58model. What does this imply? That there
32:01are models basically uh functioning from
32:05an analysis of the text structure. What
32:07is a text structure?
32:09Um as I said, we are talking about
32:12narrative fiction, so there is an
32:13articulation of two dimensions.
32:16The prose,
32:18the aspects of prose which are already
32:20similar to those of poetry, the
32:23rhetoric, the linguistic, the semantic,
32:25graphological, the
32:27>> [cough and clears throat]
32:27>> figurative realms,
32:29which integrate any study of poetry, and
32:32similarly, in prose we also approach
32:34that because prose
32:36uh language is poetic par excellence.
32:40And there could be prose and
32:42non-fictional prose which could be
32:44formal, right? With a without any poetic
32:48device or element that makes it
32:50literary. And also in a formal speech we
32:54could be applying figurative language
32:56and rhetorical elements proper of um
33:00uh
33:01literary linguistics.
33:04Now, the most important relation here is
33:07that besides analyzing the text from the
33:10realm of the poetic devices that I've
33:12just mentioned, we are also talking
33:16about a narrative, right? Something that
33:18happens that has an end, that has a
33:21beginning and has an end. The the
33:23referential frame of proc- prose fiction
33:26narrative is a telling of a story. In
33:30fact, only the unit, the syntagmatic
33:34unit, which is a unit of prose
33:37narrative, which is a sentence, as a J-
33:40uh John grabbed a Coke and he sat down
33:42to watch TV, that is a story. In itself,
33:46it's in the minute [snorts] dimension of
33:48the syntagmatic dimension, it configures
33:52a short story. So, narrative prose
33:55fiction, again I repeat, has to
33:58incorporate the dimension of narrative
34:01and articulated with the dimension of
34:05the poetics or the uh stylistics
34:09of language also, too, in order to make
34:14meaning of the text. And to
34:16[clears throat]
34:17to make meaning is, of course, the first
34:20stylistic exercise you have to do is to
34:22analyze how the poetic elements, whether
34:27it's lexical,
34:28um
34:29um syntactic, semantic, morphological,
34:34phonological, or rhythmical, all those
34:37elements, how are they incorporated into
34:40the sentence and by which stylistic
34:44model and today could be foregrounded,
34:48it could be different realization, it
34:50could be structural patterning, it could
34:53be
34:54I don't know, many functionality,
34:56functional stylistics.
34:59>> [clears throat]
34:59>> So, the aspect of style is a first type
35:04type of analysis you're going to incur.
35:07Now, this aspect of style, which I just
35:09mentioned, has to be incorporated to a
35:12study of narrative forms or narrative
35:15structure. A narrative structure
35:17comprehends
35:19a narrator, comprehends what Vladimir
35:23Propp is going to arrive after studying,
35:27I think they were about 170
35:31fables,
35:33Russian fables, whereby
35:36the I would say the conclusion of his
35:38study arrived to a very important
35:41finding, which is that all fables had a
35:45similar narrative pattern, which was
35:49related basically to the functions
35:54of narrative structure.
35:56And what is the functional structure
35:59that he finds in all fables? He finds
36:02that fables have
36:05a repetition of
36:07I would say functional formal patterns
36:11where there is a narrator, there is
36:15a protagonist, the narrator narrates a
36:18story of the protagonist, that
36:20protagonist becomes a sort of stereotype
36:24across all these 170 fables that follows
36:30a kind of narrative configuration path
36:34whereby first he leaves home then upon
36:39leaving home he is going to uh a
36:43confront the first uh obstacle which
36:47emerges as a result of a conflict all
36:51narratives in a way in the longer term
36:55that we frame them as stories and novels
36:57or fables have a conflict which has to
37:01be solved by the hero and the hero is
37:04going to resort to secondary characters
37:08which are helpers, assistants, and also
37:12villains or antagonists in the figures
37:15of the king, the damsel in distress, the
37:19villain uh I don't know, the pauper all
37:23these elements which are proper of a
37:26narrative which is
37:28configured in a temporal frame, occurs
37:32across a period of time it cross it is
37:37it incorporates a setting, time and
37:39place, it the setting could be varied,
37:43it incorporates certain different realms
37:46uh whereby there is a chain of events
37:50that leads that this chain is
37:53interlocked by the logics of cause and
37:57effect
37:58and whereby certain events are going to
38:01be described as most important, as
38:05fueling pivotal moments which are called
38:09kernel, yes, the pivotal events and
38:12which are also
38:15um
38:17a anchored uh
38:20they're anchoring subsequent events or
38:24satellites which make the narrative plot
38:28develop until the conflict is solved
38:32after several um
38:36confrontations with obstacles and
38:38upon the way. It could be an animal, it
38:40could be an antagonist with a spade, I
38:43don't know. But this is a pattern and
38:45the pattern that Vladimir Propp is
38:49discovering after studying all the
38:51similarities and I would say the
38:53difference, he establishes, of course,
38:56like kind of template
38:59to analyze narrative uh prose fiction,
39:03right?
39:04Um so,
39:07this functional study of narrative
39:10structure gives functions to all
39:14the elements of prose narrative, which
39:18is the protagonist, the hero, the
39:20narrator,
39:22the setting, right? And the secondary
39:26characters which perform actions in the
39:30benefit or perhaps
39:33uh in a way as jeopardizing
39:35the objects of this
39:38uh hero until the hero
39:41finds or achieves his um
39:45I would say his aim, his object, yes? Uh
39:49it could be the philosophical stone if
39:51you want, but there's always an object,
39:54a target, or my or marrying the damsel
39:58until he
39:59uh in a way accomplishes that, there's a
40:02series of obstacles which are configured
40:06as narrative events and all these
40:08narrative events are also configured in
40:11terms of their function in the plot. As
40:14I said before, when you analyze a style,
40:18once you have devoted yourself to the
40:21superficial,
40:23rhetorical, or poetic elements, you're
40:26going to consider the narrative
40:28structure. And in this narrative
40:30structure, there is stylistic elements
40:34as well. How the narrative is
40:37manipulated,
40:39how the narrative is configured through
40:42a first, second, third person, a
40:46homodiegetic, heterodiegetic narrator,
40:49internal, external focalization,
40:52and
40:54the type of speech discourses through
40:56which
40:57the narrator is going to convey
41:01the contents of the mind of the hero, or
41:04perhaps a dialogue between the hero and
41:07the opponent. All these contribute
41:11to the narrative functional frame, which
41:15Propp has discovered, as the stylistic
41:19core of narrative study.
41:22Right?
41:23Yes.
41:26And the
41:27And this structural-functional analysis
41:30of narrative is proper of narrative
41:33stylistics. So, you understand the
41:35difference between a stylistic proper of
41:39poetic devices, which entail a
41:41manipulation of language, of linguistic
41:43elements only, which were the core
41:47methods we applied in the first unit,
41:51sorry, in the second unit. This is also
41:54articulated, what we studied is
41:57articulated with the framework we are
42:00studying now.
42:04Okay.
42:06The second type of structural is
42:09analysis is already
42:12um
42:14uh informed by us by
42:17um
42:18Greimas. Greimas also, like Propp,
42:21because Propp gives
42:23uh the narrative, the narrative
42:25structure. Events have functions,
42:28characters have functions, narrators
42:30have functions. All that is in terms of
42:34the function of the narrative
42:36configuration. Greimas is very similar,
42:40a Greimas, yes? Is very similar to um
42:45to Propp in terms of viewing narrative
42:49as a system of patterns, yes? As a
42:51system of configuration, also. And these
42:54configurations have to do with um
43:01the whole what is a narrative? A
43:03narrative, also, if you want to to
43:06analyze it its basic unit, we analyze
43:09the paragraph of a story or a novel,
43:13we are going to implement a model of
43:16stylistic onto that paragraph of or yes,
43:20extraction from a story or a novel,
43:23whereby we apply the poetic one, but
43:26also we're going to apply this
43:28narrative, either the Propp model of
43:30narrative functions, narrative function
43:33of narrator, of protagonist, of
43:36antagonist, of the characters, of the
43:39events, and of course of time and place.
43:43In what we call a
43:46a extract of a prose or a novel, we have
43:50in that paragraph several sentences,
43:53yes? The sentences are the syntagmatic
43:56units, but the
43:59uh
43:59arrangement of these syntagmatic units
44:03in order, chronological, the first
44:06sentence, the second, the third
44:08constitute or configure what we call the
44:11pattern of narrative. What is going to
44:13make sense to the story or the making
44:16meaning of that paragraph? Because as
44:19you know, paragraphs in prose fiction
44:21and in narrative fiction have to do with
44:24topics. Each paragraph in a way bridges
44:28or breaches a topic. A a different
44:31theme. Therefore, that theme is the
44:35topic content which is stipulated in the
44:39first sentence or syntagmatic dimension.
44:43Thereby, the following sentences in a
44:47narrative prose fiction are going to
44:50constitute
44:52the development of that topic in
44:55chronological
44:57temporal order and also in a a place
45:02order in different situations where
45:04events take place
45:06in a certain place. Sorry about the
45:09redundancy. Yes, in a certain space. And
45:13the end of the paragraph is the end of
45:16making meaning of what happened in that
45:19paragraph. Because we're talking about
45:21narrative, right? So every paragraph is
45:25a unit of meaning whereby this first
45:28sentence which is a syntagmatic unit of
45:32prose is going to frame the topic and
45:37that topic is going to be subsequently
45:40elaborated or developed subsequently
45:44through the rest of the sentences whose
45:47order in a way are functional to the
45:51story. Yes, what happens is a story.
45:56And the way this what happens is
45:59configured is actually performed through
46:03the subsequent sentences in the way
46:08the author manages
46:11the I would say the hierarchy
46:14of the events
46:16their time and place, their telling,
46:20yes, and their showing. Yes, showing is
46:23through description and telling is
46:26through the narrator narrating, right?
46:29So, Greimas as prop incorporates what we
46:33call
46:35um uh fictional narratives as syntagms,
46:40yes, as what we call syntagms.
46:43Which are
46:44um fictional narratives configuration in
46:48terms of um
46:51contracts, right? The contract the first
46:53syntagm is a formal contract in a
46:56typical narrative, which is formal
46:59contract what that we find in a
47:01narrative is in relation to
47:04the narrator, the protagonist to others,
47:06whether he is related by family bonds,
47:09whether he is a husband, whether she's a
47:11wife, whether she's a teacher. Is the
47:13syntagm that talks about the
47:16contractual, yes, the contract, the type
47:19of formal contract that individual, that
47:23protagonist has with the institution,
47:27whether it's a family, a school, or
47:30I would say a a a
47:31society, right? The second type of
47:35syntagm
47:36is s y n t a g m e, syntagms,
47:42is performative. Apart from the the the
47:46contract that is typical of a narrative
47:49configuration, we also find events, and
47:52these events are performance of these
47:55events are the actions of a narrative,
47:57that's why it's very similar to prop in
48:01terms of trials, argument, tasks,
48:05performance. And the third syntagma
48:09is the disjoint,
48:12the one that is disjointingly, that is
48:15to say, breaking of these events into
48:19physical movements, departure, arrivals,
48:23breaking of a certain event by other.
48:29Uh it is based basically in a in a
48:32synthetic logic. Greimas said,
48:36"To make meaning of a narrative, we look
48:39at the sentence. As I said before, John
48:42grabbed a Coke and sat down to watch TV.
48:45That is the
48:46syntagmatic unit,
48:49which is a sentence of narrative, and in
48:51itself is a very short story. Whereas,
48:54in prose narrative fiction, as I said
48:56before, in a paragraph, let's say a
49:00paragraph that has 10 lines, within
49:03those 10 lines, we have what we call
49:07a an open field,
49:09the text is showing is um lying bare to
49:13you the own tools for its inspection.
49:17That is to say, whether you are apply
49:20uh Propp's model or Greimas' model of
49:23syntagms,
49:25is
49:26um is the same because uh what we want
49:29is the making meaning towards the end
49:31that has to do with the target. The
49:34narrative
49:36in John grabs a Coke and sits down to
49:38watch TV is watching TV, the end, right?
49:42But first, we have a protagonist, we
49:45have a narrator, we have a physical act,
49:48we have a contract, which is within the
49:50family, yes? He is part of a value. He
49:53sits down. He's not at school. He's not
49:56working. Therefore, he's not a priest.
49:59He sits down at home, grabs a Coke and
50:02in a familiar domestic environment and
50:04watches a video. That is a final object
50:07of a narrative. It's an end point what
50:10the structuralists call the end form of
50:13a narrative. And the discourse, this
50:16literary discourse, can be interpreted
50:20in the way
50:21that the narrator has already uttered
50:26the sentence, the sentence becomes a
50:29syntagmatic unit, but in itself is a
50:32little story, right? He is relaxing. He
50:35is at home. He is going to take some
50:37time off.
50:38The same happens in a paragraph, right?
50:41The first sentence establishes the topic
50:44content of the whole paragraph, whereby
50:48the subsequent sentences have a
50:51hierarchical level that is already
50:55this hierarchical level is
50:58um
50:59I would say
51:01um functional to the development of a
51:04plot, that is to say, the story is what
51:07happens. The plot is
51:09a
51:10um
51:11Mary went to her party and she fell in
51:15love. Okay.
51:17This is a short sentence is a
51:20syntagmatic unit that tells a story.
51:23This is a story, yes? But what happens
51:27here?
51:28In the story, we have what we call the
51:31fabula. I ask you, uh you've been to to
51:35the movies. What have you watched? Oh, I
51:37watched this film. And I ask you, what
51:40is it about? Oh, it's about young girls
51:43at university. And what happens to them?
51:46It it's about adventure. All right.
51:49You're telling me what is it about? That
51:52is what we call the story, the fabula.
51:56What Prop
51:57uh named or I would say Vladimir uh
52:01Vladimir Prop and Septan Todorov named
52:05the fabula or the story. What is it
52:08about? Now, the plot is a configuration,
52:13the narrative configuration of that what
52:17happens. That is to say, she went to a
52:19party, what time was it, what was she
52:22wearing, who did she meet, did she
52:24dance, all the arrangement of
52:27chronological instance of events, the
52:29chaining by casual logic arrangement of
52:34cause and effect gives the syntagmatic
52:38units a paradigmatic
52:41meaning, a making meaning of what does
52:45the story about this movie you have
52:48watched tell you in terms of literary
52:51discourse. The way the story of a girl
52:55going to a party and falling in love can
52:58be
52:59narratively configured in so many
53:02different ways as to arrive at two
53:06different literary interpretations.
53:09This is stylistics of narrative. The way
53:12the plot elements narrate the
53:15protagonist, narrative temporality,
53:18uh place and time, chronological
53:20chronological order of fragmentation of
53:23order
53:24has in a way to do with a sujet.
53:29That is to say, with a chronological or
53:33the configuration,
53:34the narrative configuration of the
53:37events, the manner, the place and the
53:41time in which the author decides to
53:46manipulate or configure these events in
53:49order to make a certain particular
53:53meaning read and interpreted by the
53:58reader. So, the first task of narrative
54:02prose analysis has to do with your
54:06analysis of poetic elements at the
54:09linguistic level which are also
54:12are in articulation with every
54:14syntagmatic unit and the narrative study
54:19of fabula
54:22yes, and sujet, which is the narrativity
54:26or the configuration of what happens.
54:30Right.
54:32Uh let's go.
54:33Now to
54:36I want to go to another subject now
54:38because we've been dealing a lot with
54:40textualist and we have hardly I I I I am
54:44to blame, eh? Um
54:49we are going to do now a little a
54:52summary of the textualist. Um
54:56as what is it that we study of the
55:00narrative prose
55:02uh fiction when we study it.
55:05Um when we regard novels as literature,
55:09we can regard novels and short stories
55:11capable of extending on even perhaps
55:14transcending the structures of language
55:18and um
55:20the context, right?
55:23Okay. Um
55:26Basic unit of narrative, I said the
55:29basic units are
55:31uh place and time
55:33a narrator, a protagonist, secondary
55:35characters, a plot
55:38which is the sujet, the way the author
55:41tells a story, right? Is the way the
55:45stylistic elements of narratives are
55:47going to be manipulated in such a way as
55:51to create or make meaning of a story.
55:54You can have different ways of telling
55:56Little Red Riding Hood and the different
55:58ways which are the stylistic input of a
56:01narrative choices that the author has
56:04made is going to derive into different
56:06meanings. Right.
56:09Um
56:11the discourse or or
56:14discourse sujet, which is the narrative
56:17configuration,
56:19um
56:21and um
56:24you have also a social linguistic code,
56:26which is a code that
56:28has to do with a meaning
56:30uh that the social cultural um uses of
56:36language are going to be interpreted
56:38here.
56:39Okay.
56:41>> [cough]
56:42>> Um
56:44How to start? Let's see how we can uh
56:48already um
56:52indicate the ways how to apply a
56:54stylistic meaning. We're talking about
56:57text analysis, right?
56:58Um emphasize the first of all the core
57:02elements of a text are all the core
57:04elements you have analyzed through
57:05poetry, yeah?
57:07Uh the assumptions a researcher makes
57:09about a text are already the input the
57:13text has. Emphasize the reader's role,
57:15that is to say every reader, each one of
57:18you, is going to read the text in a
57:20different way. Each one of you is
57:23already coming with a baggage of
57:25knowledge, with a literary competence,
57:28with frameworks or expectations of
57:30reading that have to do with a selection
57:33of a typical model that will make
57:36uh the interpretation of analysis of
57:39discourse.
57:40Um
57:44What should you ask yourself, right? Uh
57:48first of all, when you approach a
57:50narrative prose fiction, you should look
57:54at the syntagmatic arrangement of the
57:56sentences and of course um
58:01what interpretative common ground is
58:04there that we can already fix.
58:07Uh
58:08For example, in a poem,
58:10uh we look for meaning in the poem in
58:13the combination of figurative language
58:16and the combination of rhythm,
58:18phonology, all right? In prose
58:20narrative, it's of course um the
58:23linguistics and the narrative structure
58:26in this passage to convey meaning. The
58:28two things are complementary and
58:31contribute to uh the study of the text,
58:35right?
58:36Um
58:41Now,
58:42the rhetorics of the text are all those
58:45rhetorics that we studied uh
58:48when we studied poetry, right?
58:51And the text is anything which is spoken
58:54or written, right? It could be oral or
58:57it could be written, and that makes what
58:59we call a text.
59:01Uh
59:02the difference between discourse and
59:04text is
59:06uh that in a way um
59:10the texts are communication seen as
59:13physical utterances or transactions
59:15between an addressee and
59:18uh an addresser, right? Uh and of course
59:22um
59:23the physical aspect of communication is
59:27uh the auditory or the the the physical
59:30written, whether it's spoken or written.
59:33Yes, an utterance is a text in linear
59:36pattern of sound waves.
59:39Right. Um
59:42And the discourse, which is the making
59:45meaning of that utterance in terms of
59:48interpretation, because there is no
59:51discourse if it we don't involve the
59:54aspects of
59:56communication. When we talk about
59:58narrative, we are talking about now
1:00:00literary discourse. Why? Because there
1:00:02is a narrator behind, because there is a
1:00:05reader uh at the end of the text, and
1:00:10there is a message, which is a text
1:00:12itself. The interpretation is therefore
1:00:15subjective, but also framed by the
1:00:17stylistic choices of the author. So,
1:00:19there is an an articulation or a
1:00:21combination between the textualist and
1:00:24the reader's own baggage, competence,
1:00:27literal competence,
1:00:29uh framework, or or baggage of
1:00:31expectations that brings about to the
1:00:34reading.
1:00:35Okay.
1:00:36Um
1:00:39What are the things that make a
1:00:41stylistic choices? E, the uses of um
1:00:47disruption of syntactic units, um
1:00:50uh distortion of phonological levels, or
1:00:54typology,
1:00:56uh graphology, any disruption or
1:01:00transgression of these levels, which are
1:01:02linguistic, which are graphological,
1:01:05which are phonological,
1:01:07are of course aspects of narrative
1:01:09style.
1:01:11Now, two important aspects of narrative
1:01:13style are segmentation and salience.
1:01:17Salience is highlighting, right? Uh
1:01:20segmentation and syntax make up what we
1:01:23call the three main factors.
1:01:26Segmentation,
1:01:28uh, syntax, and salience are the three
1:01:31main factors, and these are very
1:01:33important for your analysis of prose
1:01:36narrative text that make a stylistic.
1:01:39The single stylistic unit is a sentence,
1:01:42right? And the sentence is segmented or
1:01:46not by full stop, comma, semicolon,
1:01:50um, and colons. And of course, they
1:01:53constitute what we call, when we look at
1:01:56it, graphic units. In both syntactic and
1:02:00graphological text, involves the major
1:02:03unit, which is the syntagm of the
1:02:05sentence.
1:02:07So,
1:02:09we start again. Which are the main
1:02:11stylistic units of narrative prose
1:02:15fiction to take into account after,
1:02:19yes, we have proceeded an analysis of
1:02:23the literal linguistic realms of the use
1:02:27of language or the stylistics of
1:02:30language in prose fiction. So, the three
1:02:32main aspects are segmentation,
1:02:36three S's, segmentation, salience, and
1:02:40uh, syntax. Right.
1:02:43At the graphological level, the sentence
1:02:46is still a unit beginning, yes, and both
1:02:51levels assume that these definitions for
1:02:53sentences
1:02:54are coextensive.
1:02:56Yes, we begin with a capital letters and
1:02:59we end with a full stop, and we have
1:03:01commas, right?
1:03:03Um,
1:03:04and
1:03:06um,
1:03:08all these levels of segmentation
1:03:11of the sequence of one sentence as being
1:03:14followed by another through the
1:03:17insertion clauses that could be
1:03:19subordinate to the main salient
1:03:23uh clause
1:03:24are of course part of what we call uh
1:03:29this level of syntax. Yes, the
1:03:31segmentation, the sequence of the
1:03:34salient, and what is salient, what is
1:03:37highlighted or foregrounded at the
1:03:40textile level of a sentence, whether
1:03:42there is a break by phonology, a
1:03:45distortion by phonology, or
1:03:48graphologically,
1:03:49typology,
1:03:51uh full stops, comma, breaks, etc.
1:03:54Uh sentences have got tensile capital
1:03:57letters, full stops, and commas.
1:04:00Um
1:04:01Graphologically is not a a question in
1:04:04style, not exactly about uh punctuation,
1:04:09but um graphological has to do with how
1:04:13heavy this graphological stylistic
1:04:17aspect is made evident here.
1:04:21The graphological, I would say the
1:04:23heaviest is a full stop. It's an end
1:04:26point in itself. And the full stop
1:04:29establishes already an order or a
1:04:32sequence. Yes?
1:04:34Um
1:04:36Then we go, apart from this uh order or
1:04:39sequential
1:04:41um aspects, factors, marked by the
1:04:45graphological order of a full stop, and
1:04:47therefore also previously marked by
1:04:51units through the commas, semicolons, a
1:04:54full stop, uh the
1:04:56um
1:04:57colon,
1:04:58and um
1:05:00these also mark the the sequencing of
1:05:03the sentence uh segmenting.
1:05:05Now we go to um
1:05:08the part of uh
1:05:10syntactic salience, or foregrounding or
1:05:14highlighting.
1:05:16The most important aspect of salience is
1:05:19topicality.
1:05:21How the ideas in a sentences are linked,
1:05:25are related in order to frame a topic.
1:05:29That is to say, a theme. Something the
1:05:32sentence or the paragraph is talking
1:05:35about. Something the paragraph is
1:05:38configuring in terms of aspects, right?
1:05:42So,
1:05:43uh, when we talk about topic sentence,
1:05:47I would say that the topic sentence is
1:05:49already framed in the first syntagmatic
1:05:52unit of a paragraph. That is to say, a
1:05:55paragraph is a topic of meaning. Is a
1:05:59unit of meaning of prose narrative.
1:06:03Therefore, a paragraph's first sentence
1:06:05contains the salience. That is to say,
1:06:09the topic the paragraph is going to
1:06:12elaborate
1:06:14successively
1:06:15throughout a configuration, a
1:06:19hierarchical configuration of the
1:06:22sentences through segmentation,
1:06:25through syntax and itself.
1:06:28Full stop, etc. Now, the topic is also
1:06:32framed by the combination of the
1:06:36stylistic,
1:06:37or let's just say the linguistic literal
1:06:40linguistic manipulation, or the the
1:06:43stylistic manipulation of the language.
1:06:45Whether there is a lot of poetic devices
1:06:48in the forms of figures of speech,
1:06:51whether is patterning, whether is
1:06:53parallelism,
1:06:54um,
1:06:55sentence parallelism, sentence
1:06:58patterning, or uh, there are sentences,
1:07:02um,
1:07:03only with one verb or with several
1:07:06adverbials, all these
1:07:09um aspects which have to do with
1:07:12narrative are strictly correlated to the
1:07:16aspects of the rhetorics
1:07:19or stylistics of language. So, the
1:07:22inclusion of a metaphor, of a
1:07:24personification,
1:07:26or certain functional stylistics of
1:07:30verbs, actions, situations
1:07:34are important in analyzing, in taking
1:07:38into account to making meaning of the
1:07:41paragraph. Therefore,
1:07:44the conclusion, which is a literary
1:07:46interpretation of that paragraph. So,
1:07:50to summarize, topicality is a salience
1:07:55of the topic of a paragraph.
1:07:57How is it achieved? It is the con- the
1:08:01narrative configuration by
1:08:04uh segmentation,
1:08:06by sequence, that is to say, what
1:08:08happens first, what happens next, and
1:08:10how the paragraph ends, the functions of
1:08:14the characters through Greimas or
1:08:16through Propp, who is who in this
1:08:19paragraph,
1:08:20and also you see how these are
1:08:22articulated and how the language which
1:08:25is used to describe the actions, the
1:08:28characters, their speech is also the
1:08:31stylistic, the literal stylistic input
1:08:34that comes from the first unit we have
1:08:36already studied in accommodating this
1:08:40topicality
1:08:41to
1:08:42the narrative configuration and ergo the
1:08:46making meaning of the full paragraph.
1:08:50Where we achieve what we call the
1:08:53discourse proper, which is the
1:08:56interaction between the narrator and new
1:09:00reader who has read that paragraph, has
1:09:02applied the toolkit of
1:09:05poetic toolkit for the stylistic
1:09:08analysis of the linguistic manipulation
1:09:11of language, and articulated that
1:09:14finding with the stylistic toolkit of
1:09:17segmentation,
1:09:19uh syntax and salience
1:09:22in the dis- hierarchical distribution of
1:09:25sentences applying the
1:09:29a model of prop of grammar, if you want,
1:09:32in trying to understand how the what
1:09:35happens is narratively configured.
1:09:39And finally, these two articulations
1:09:43crave or in a way craft, sorry,
1:09:47the literary discourse, which is
1:09:51the product of your interpretation.
1:09:54First comes analysis. Then
1:09:58after your analysis comes the
1:10:00description
1:10:02of the tools
1:10:04of that analysis and your findings.
1:10:07Third comes the narrative analysis of
1:10:11the configuration
1:10:13of the syntactic units, that is to say,
1:10:16the syntagmatic units of prose
1:10:19narrative, which are the sentences,
1:10:21through hierarchy, through topicality,
1:10:24through segmentation, through syntax,
1:10:27and through salience, right? So, this is
1:10:31textualist, 100%, right?
1:10:35Good. Now we go
1:10:37to um the
1:10:40Of course, in this analysis of
1:10:42narrative,
1:10:43which is the second part of the
1:10:45articulation with the stylistic aspect
1:10:49of the surface of the linguistic
1:10:51richness of the
1:10:53lexical, semantic,
1:10:57rhythmical, phonological,
1:11:00lexical I said sorry
1:11:02and the repetition of the surface area
1:11:06of the linguistic manipulation by
1:11:07stylistics you add the narrative model
1:11:11whether it's grammar whether it's prop
1:11:14and you contribute to what we call
1:11:18the analysis of who's a narrator what
1:11:22type of narrator we have what type of
1:11:24vocalization what type of speech or
1:11:26discourse if free indirect speech into
1:11:29your monologue direct speech direct into
1:11:32your monologue
1:11:35whether we have direct speech or
1:11:37dialogue
1:11:38etc. All these are parts of the second
1:11:43axis of analysis which is
1:11:46of course the
1:11:48sorry the
1:11:50axis of narrative configuration
1:11:53okay
1:11:55um
1:11:57what have I left out
1:12:00um
1:12:02contextualism here we can't I'm I'm
1:12:04finishing now I'm sorry it's extended a
1:12:07little bit contextualism is of course
1:12:09what the what the word is already
1:12:12implying that we
1:12:14not only need to look at the text but we
1:12:17need to lead to to look at the context
1:12:22what do I mean the context
1:12:25everything the social [snorts] cultural
1:12:28political forces ideological
1:12:32and cultural components that influence
1:12:36not only the writer in the choice of a
1:12:39certain style
1:12:42I would say stylistic linguistic
1:12:44stylistic or literary linguistic but
1:12:46also the narrative style that the author
1:12:50has
1:12:51um
1:12:52selected all the typical in input
1:12:56stylistic input of the author in the
1:12:58narrative configuration. [snorts] How
1:13:01does How he manages temporality? Is
1:13:04there a fragmentation of temporal
1:13:06dimension? How does he manage
1:13:09narrativity? What type of narrators?
1:13:12What type of characters? How are they
1:13:14presented internally? Tell her that
1:13:17choice those tools for narrative
1:13:20configuration make what we call
1:13:23part also influenced by the textual the
1:13:26contextual sorry the contextual element
1:13:29of social culture and political forces
1:13:32and factors that make certain authors
1:13:36choose to write in a certain way in
1:13:38order to say something in a certain way.
1:13:42And so contextualism is a broad church.
1:13:47There are many schools of contextualism.
1:13:49I am going to mention a few now.
1:13:53Um
1:13:54it is of course um
1:13:56I would say an assortment of methods and
1:13:58and models that can be applied together
1:14:01with a textualist analysis. That is to
1:14:03say, there is no
1:14:06one analysis of narrative prose fiction
1:14:09but it should be articulated by a
1:14:12textualist
1:14:14analysis as well as a contextualist
1:14:17informed analysis or model that
1:14:20contributes to make meaning
1:14:22of the literary discourse.
1:14:25Um
1:14:27So, uh these collections of of of models
1:14:31or methods are of course unifying the
1:14:34text and the context.
1:14:36And what is a foremost and most
1:14:40important core object here is the
1:14:43literary discourse interpretation.
1:14:47That is the final conclusion
1:14:50that you're going to write in your paper
1:14:53and that you're going to ready be
1:14:54writing at the end of your
1:14:58I would say three structured of a
1:15:00monograph and each I would say unit of
1:15:04analysis or argumentation
1:15:07that you configure your monograph for
1:15:10your paper, there is a kind of
1:15:13development of your argument in terms of
1:15:16interpretation. So, interpretation of
1:15:20section 1, 2, and 3
1:15:23makes up for the final conclusive
1:15:26unit of your
1:15:28monograph or your thesis whereby all
1:15:32those um
1:15:34interpretative frameworks are going to
1:15:37be unified or are going to be
1:15:40articulated to give a final
1:15:42pronouncement that merges
1:15:45uh different perspective, different
1:15:47ideas um in order to
1:15:51frame what is a literary discourse and
1:15:55what have you made in terms of
1:15:57interpretation of that particular text.
1:16:00So, we go
1:16:02to the
1:16:03I would say the ways in in which text
1:16:07and context are articulated
1:16:11and these are literary ways in which
1:16:15text and context are related. The first
1:16:18and utmost most important involved
1:16:21a reader.
1:16:22And not
1:16:24all readers read alike. Readers are
1:16:26differentiated by their literary
1:16:28competence and their disposition, their
1:16:31attitude towards a text. So, certain
1:16:34texts are you're more disposed to read
1:16:37certain texts than others. The second
1:16:40is the I would say, the prevailing uh
1:16:45social cultural and, of course,
1:16:49forces that shape
1:16:52that we read in a certain way. That is
1:16:55to say, we come to the reading with a
1:16:58say
1:16:59typical sociological
1:17:02and cultural and ideological framework
1:17:06that shapes our interpretation of a
1:17:08text, independent of the text has
1:17:11certain core elements that are salient,
1:17:13that are foregrounded, that are
1:17:16different to other texts. Nevertheless,
1:17:19our construction of meaning is highly
1:17:23determined by these social cultural
1:17:25logical cultural forces that dominate
1:17:29all linguistic discourses, including
1:17:32literature. So, we are going to identify
1:17:36those social cultural logical forces
1:17:40that are typical in the structuring of
1:17:44that narrative configuration and in the
1:17:47employment of certain rhetorical
1:17:49figures, right?
1:17:52And the third way of bridging the
1:17:56contextualist and the textualist
1:17:58approach to the text is taking into
1:18:01consideration
1:18:03the systems
1:18:05of signification. And this is a very
1:18:08important concept that I would like you
1:18:10to employ
1:18:12in terms
1:18:13of understanding which processes,
1:18:17yes, we are
1:18:20in practices, what that is to say, which
1:18:23processes are implemented or are put
1:18:26into practice to interpret all phenomena
1:18:31which are linguistic, literary or
1:18:34non-linguistic or literary. Which are
1:18:38those systems of signification
1:18:41that
1:18:42that is to say, how do we make meaning
1:18:45of all phenomena, of all events,
1:18:47literary, linguistic, and non-literary
1:18:51or linguistic that take place in the
1:18:53world around us? How do we make meaning
1:18:57through those processes of signification
1:19:00or six the [snorts] systems of
1:19:02signification? For this, we have the
1:19:05most important contextualist
1:19:07author
1:19:09that you know, that is
1:19:11Barthes.
1:19:13And Barthes, therefore, talks about the
1:19:16structure of narrative in terms of
1:19:21associating
1:19:24the structure of a text
1:19:27or of making an analogy
1:19:30of the structure of a text
1:19:33with the items of clothing that we wear.
1:19:36That is to say,
1:19:37the distant
1:19:39items of clothing
1:19:42which are the systems of signification
1:19:45are strictly relating to the units that
1:19:49are part of our anatomy. What we wear in
1:19:53our head, what we wear for our eyes,
1:19:57what we wear on our chest, on our legs,
1:19:59on our shoes. Whether we wear trainers
1:20:03or boots or high-heeled shoes, whether
1:20:07we wear caps or hats or nothing, whether
1:20:10we wear lenses or not, whether we wear
1:20:14sweatshirt or a blouse these are the
1:20:17systems of signification
1:20:20that make meaning of the units of our
1:20:25body. That is to say, the systems of
1:20:28signification
1:20:30are of course the production of style.
1:20:33That is to say, I like her style. And
1:20:35what do you mean? The way she dresses.
1:20:38And the way she dresses is, of course, a
1:20:42system, a selection out of those
1:20:46selection of garments out there for my
1:20:48head, my chest, my my eyes, my my feet,
1:20:52and my my legs, trousers or skirts,
1:20:55whatever.
1:20:56And [snorts]
1:20:57those assortments out there in the world
1:21:02are equal to the assortments that we
1:21:04find in language in terms of nouns,
1:21:09adjectives, adverbs, right? Um for
1:21:14nouns, let's say, we can say um
1:21:18your your eyes um your mouth is crimson
1:21:23crimson red, and we are already using a
1:21:26literal um
1:21:28form of language that the reader
1:21:31understands as being red, right? But
1:21:34if the instead of employing the literal,
1:21:37your lips are red, I employ your your
1:21:41your lips are crimson blood, I am
1:21:44already choosing from a system of
1:21:49signification, in this case a metaphor,
1:21:52for assigning
1:21:54a different
1:21:56uh I would say dimension, which is
1:21:58dimension of blood, and the dimension of
1:22:02color of a palette, crimson blood, to
1:22:06give meaning to something which is a
1:22:09unit, which is anatomical, which is the
1:22:12mouth, which is the literal. You
1:22:14understand by this? So, um associated
1:22:19with the distinctive elements of the
1:22:21human
1:22:22body, as I said, head, toes, etc., uh
1:22:27there these units head, body, toes,
1:22:32legs, whatever are, of course, part of
1:22:38the syntagmatic unit
1:22:40which are
1:22:43articulated
1:22:45through the assortment of meanings we
1:22:49have outside the systems of
1:22:51signification
1:22:53of the fashion elements that are going
1:22:55to give it, of course, uh, meaning to
1:22:59that mouth, head, toes, etc.
1:23:04Now,
1:23:05breaking that, and I'm going now to the
1:23:08most important, apart from
1:23:10structuralism,
1:23:11is the fact
1:23:14um
1:23:16Wait a minute till I get my focus and we
1:23:19finish now here.
1:23:21The second structuralist, which is
1:23:23important, a contextualist,
1:23:26which I said is a broad church,
1:23:29and has to do with
1:23:32this stylistics of narrative
1:23:35in that
1:23:37the, um, sorry, the selection here
1:23:43is, um
1:23:46Sorry, I I made a mess of my notes, so
1:23:49just give me a second and I'll be here
1:23:52with you. Just a minute.
1:23:55Um
1:23:59This is, of course, the structuralist
1:24:04here. Okay.
1:24:05Um
1:24:09Okay.
1:24:12Let's go now
1:24:16to
1:24:22I see, I'm I'm lost, eh? Take a minute
1:24:25and I'll be with you.
1:24:27Uh no, I want to give you first because
1:24:29I want to finish this as soon as
1:24:32possible as to give more meaning to it.
1:24:36Um
1:24:39So, we have here
1:24:42>> [snorts]
1:24:46>> um
1:24:51I would say that those who have studied
1:24:53Barthes have studied the part of uh
1:24:55structuralism, which has to do with
1:24:59identifying in narrative search and
1:25:01structures which he names codes, codes
1:25:04of meaning, and he names fives in his
1:25:07famous study of
1:25:09um
1:25:10narrative in Sarrasine,
1:25:12uh where we have the proairetic code,
1:25:15where we have the enigma code, several
1:25:18codes or functions in narrative to
1:25:22understand the configuration of
1:25:24narrative plot, right? Now, that will be
1:25:28the phase where Barthes becomes a
1:25:32textualist. Now, what we're doing here
1:25:35is
1:25:36understanding the post-structuralist
1:25:38phase of Barthes, whereby he
1:25:40incorporates a
1:25:42contextualist approach to this study of
1:25:45narrative. Right. Um
1:25:49>> [snorts]
1:25:50>> So, we talk about the systems of
1:25:53signification again as the amount of
1:25:56choices we have out there, a selection
1:25:59of choices that makes, that constructs
1:26:03meaning out of units such as the units
1:26:06of our body. So, the way we dress, our
1:26:09style is basically informed first of all
1:26:13by the units as syntagmatic units. That
1:26:15would be the sentence in terms of the
1:26:17body parts and the way that the author
1:26:20addresses it through a narrative
1:26:23configuration of certain style or the
1:26:26certain stylistic input would be a of
1:26:30course the type of narrative speech
1:26:33discourse, the type of narrator, and
1:26:36also gives narrative style.
1:26:38Uh this is um meaning, right?
1:26:42Good.
1:26:43Um
1:26:46The second category is the act of
1:26:49writing. This category of contextual
1:26:52list with
1:26:54um
1:26:56the negotiation of the text with a
1:26:59reader. And the negotiation of the text
1:27:01with a reader implements the reader as a
1:27:05fundamental role in the meaning making
1:27:07of narrative. And this is the typical
1:27:11reception theory by Stanley Fish coined
1:27:15as of course the authority of the
1:27:18interpretative communities
1:27:21in which he claims that
1:27:24uh the authority or
1:27:26that derives
1:27:29that um sorry, the meaning that we
1:27:32achieve of a text, that is to say its
1:27:35interpretation, is the confluence or the
1:27:38overlapping between the text and its
1:27:42inherent qualities or properties,
1:27:44rhetorical, poetic, and narrative, plus
1:27:48the contribution
1:27:50that the authority of the text lends to
1:27:54its meaning in terms of many aspects
1:27:57that have to do with interpretative
1:28:00communities. And what makes an
1:28:02interpretative communities communities
1:28:05are therefore
1:28:06randomly described as being configured
1:28:10by literary competence, by social
1:28:12groups, by ideological about also about
1:28:17geographical sites that make different
1:28:19interpretive communities.
1:28:21And the education system, the standards
1:28:25conventions of naming part of literary
1:28:28text act
1:28:29consequently fish
1:28:32the perception of a stylistic aspects of
1:28:35narrative is much acquired between a
1:28:39grammar of communication that the text
1:28:42informs
1:28:43but articulated through them the
1:28:46features that the communities bring to
1:28:49the act of interpretation.
1:28:51So style is historically indeterminate.
1:28:55Yes, it is developed through time
1:28:58through these variables
1:29:01that shape the text that influence
1:29:05that is to say the social cultural
1:29:07frameworks that shape linguistic
1:29:11discourse but the social cultural
1:29:13frameworks that shape linguistic
1:29:16communities or interpretative
1:29:19communities as authorities of meaning.
1:29:24Right, the social linguistic aspect is
1:29:27the second part we're going to analyze
1:29:30as a contextualist approach and this is
1:29:32very important in terms of
1:29:37the theory of Jacobson. I would say he
1:29:40is fundamentally establishing that not
1:29:42only the formal properties of a text are
1:29:45important here. Yes, as we studied now
1:29:49in narrative prose, the formal
1:29:50properties would be the employment of
1:29:53the aesthetics of language plus the
1:29:56narrative configuration of uh syntactic
1:30:00units through syntax segmentation
1:30:03topicality and uh salience
1:30:07syntax segmentation topicality and and
1:30:10salience are three S's and topicality,
1:30:13but he says
1:30:15that this formal structure is determined
1:30:18and not only, but the but the material
1:30:21of language, the
1:30:23the semantics of language, the lexical
1:30:26pattern, phonological rhythm, of rhyme
1:30:29patterns, etc., but the way in which we
1:30:33the decisions that the author has taken
1:30:37to treat that language in a poetical
1:30:39way.
1:30:40Yes.
1:30:41Uh
1:30:42linguistic conventions are habits of the
1:30:45world. Yes, the way we speak, um the
1:30:48tools in our formal communication
1:30:51are of course um implemented by habits
1:30:55of speaking,
1:30:57uh which are proper of communities,
1:30:59proper of our social, etc. Now, the way
1:31:04we shape that linguistic forms has to do
1:31:08with the selections
1:31:10in an array of possibilities we have in
1:31:14nouns and adjectives, in adverbs, in
1:31:17structuring of sentences, in system. The
1:31:20array of possibilities we have makes us
1:31:24select uh between one noun or the other
1:31:28or one adjective or the other, and that
1:31:31selection is what's going to make the
1:31:34difference
1:31:36uh in terms of projecting the axis of
1:31:41selection
1:31:42through the axis of combination into
1:31:46narrative.
1:31:47Um
1:31:49that is to say,
1:31:52when uh I use um John grabbed a Coke and
1:31:59sat down to watch TV, I'm using literal
1:32:03language, right? Now, if I decide to
1:32:07change that verb, instead of grab, and
1:32:10grab has already a connotation, right?
1:32:13It has already a connotation. It marks a
1:32:16stylistic input, a stylistic selection.
1:32:20And that that stylistic selection, if it
1:32:23is already
1:32:25projected or transformed by the axis of
1:32:29com- bination of changing the order of
1:32:33the sentence of the syntactic order is
1:32:37going to change the interpretation of
1:32:40discourse, right?
1:32:43If I say,
1:32:44"In front of the TV
1:32:47grabbed
1:32:49was a Coke
1:32:51by Jack." Right? All those changes
1:32:55implemented are stylistic changes in the
1:32:59way of formal, lexical, linguistic,
1:33:03syntactic choices, but also narrative
1:33:07order and segmentation of salience that
1:33:10crave a specific analysis of that
1:33:15narrative configuration, and ergo a
1:33:17specific interpretative meaning.
1:33:22Right. Um then we are going to see
1:33:26that the incorporation, apart from Jack
1:33:30Jacobson uh post-structuralism,
1:33:33that includes a system of signification
1:33:37into the text projection, the axis of
1:33:41selection
1:33:43into the axis of um
1:33:47Sorry, the axis of um combination into
1:33:52the axis of selection
1:33:54onto the text that is the product that
1:33:57Jacobson talks as the stylistics of
1:34:00narrative. Already a text has a
1:34:02linguistic or formal configuration. When
1:34:07we come to narrative, that formal
1:34:09configuration is going to be altered by
1:34:12a stylistic selection that the author is
1:34:15going to make in terms of how that
1:34:18choices of noun, adjectives, and adverbs
1:34:21are going to be distorted
1:34:24or he chose to grab a Coke instead of
1:34:28saying a fish drink. Those are
1:34:31selections and are selections of verbs
1:34:33and noun. And you can select a number of
1:34:37verbs and nouns instead to replace grab
1:34:41or to replace Coke. That's selection is
1:34:45going to be heavily influenced by the
1:34:48access of
1:34:50combination
1:34:52of the syntactic units onto the formal
1:34:56units, right?
1:34:58So,
1:34:59within this and I finish now because
1:35:02it's too long for you, but you can the
1:35:05benefits of having this face-to-face
1:35:07interaction through the video is the
1:35:10fact that you are going to perform
1:35:14a study taking notes of what I have
1:35:17rendered to you in this class
1:35:19through
1:35:21the different moments of this um
1:35:26this this uh elocution of this
1:35:29presentation because you can stop
1:35:31whenever you like and resume. My advice
1:35:34is always to take notes and therefore
1:35:37not to watch the video again, but to uh
1:35:40sequence this in notes. So, to bridge
1:35:43this lot perch of contextualist Besides
1:35:46the textualist approach, we have the
1:35:49contextualist approach. Where are we
1:35:51going to find all these models? You're
1:35:54going to find them in the bibliography
1:35:57of unit three, which you have to read.
1:36:00And how do we apply them? I'm going to
1:36:04explain how to apply
1:36:07the articulation of a text release model
1:36:09of approach and you have different
1:36:11models in Simpson and Leech and Short,
1:36:15you're going to find and and Stockwell
1:36:18also and Carter. In all these core texts
1:36:22that I'm giving you as bibliography,
1:36:24you're going to breach contextualist as
1:36:28well as textualist model for the
1:36:30analysis of narrative prose fiction. And
1:36:34all the differences between these
1:36:39approaches, why do we have so many
1:36:41models?
1:36:42Because in fact, what the critics and
1:36:45the author of of these models have found
1:36:48is that um in terms of the perspective
1:36:52the author brings to the analysis of the
1:36:55text. Whether they are going to function
1:36:58whether they are going to perform a
1:36:59functionist analysis of all the elements
1:37:03of language, of verbs, of nouns, of of
1:37:07passives, of of active sentences, of
1:37:10discourses, whether they are
1:37:13concentrate on narrative uh plot
1:37:16integration. Uh how to articulate both
1:37:20the text release and the contextualist
1:37:23approach, that is going to be laid bare
1:37:26in our second video with an example of
1:37:30narrative prose fiction for you to look
1:37:34at. And if you have any queries, just
1:37:37you put your query
1:37:39uh upload it onto the platform. Thank
1:37:42you very much.

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