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Narratives

LeRoux-Rutledge, Emily

Authors

Emily LeRoux-Rutledge



Abstract

While many definitions of narrative exist, at its most basic, a narrative is a temporal sequence of events with a plot connecting those events. When we express our identity -- who we are -- we often do so in narrative form, telling a life story that helps us to understand, and indeed to construct who we are. This involves not only making sense of our past, but also shaping how we want to be seen in the present, and imagining who we could become in the future. Indeed, whenever we think back, selecting events from our past to construct our life stories, we are simultaneously communicating our goals and aspirations for our future possible selves. Such goals and aspirations, however, are always constructed in particular social contexts, and these social contexts provide narrative templates, or public narratives -- such as ``rags to riches'' -- which afford models for our stories. Pubic narratives can be difficult to pin down (they are usually not written down anywhere), but we can think about them as the aggregate of many stories. Importantly, they are normative, and widely known, communicating what constitutes a good life for a person like us, in our culture. Against their backdrop, we negotiate our personal stories. Public narratives are not fixed, however, and they are multiple, even in a given culture. Consequently, there is a debate among narrative scholars about whether we select and use public narratives to construct ourselves, or whether they construct us. Ultimately, most scholars recognize that the interplay is dynamic; for, while it is true that we are in some sense constrained by the public narratives available to us in constructing our life stories, it is equally true that, if enough people reconstitute their life stories, these can reconfigure public narratives themselves -- opening up new possible ways of living and being. Herein lies the possibility for social change.

Citation

LeRoux-Rutledge, E. (2022). Narratives. In The Palgrave Encyclopedia of the Possible (1-7). Palgrave Macmillan (part of Springer Nature). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98390-5_182-1

Acceptance Date Feb 23, 2022
Online Publication Date Jun 1, 2022
Publication Date Jun 1, 2022
Deposit Date Jun 5, 2022
Publicly Available Date Jun 2, 2024
Publisher Palgrave Macmillan (part of Springer Nature)
Pages 1-7
Book Title The Palgrave Encyclopedia of the Possible
ISBN 978-3-319-98390-5
DOI https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98390-5_182-1
Keywords Narrative; Identity; Self; Aspiration
Public URL https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/9611704
Publisher URL https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98390-5_182-1