The Universal Structure of Storytelling
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The Universal Structure of Storytelling
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Re: The Universal Structure of Storytelling
#2[deleted]
Re: The Universal Structure of Storytelling
#3[deleted]
Re: The Universal Structure of Storytelling
#4I wouldn't say that this article is about the universal structure of stories, it's really about the universal purpose (or reason) common to stories in most (all?) cultures.
IMO, the universal structural aspect is about how to tell good stories (hero's journey and such), however this article is actually about how storytelling in all cultures brings us together as a group and the actual universal about stories described in the article is moralism (good vs bad).
Re: The Universal Structure of Storytelling
#5Wow, thanks for the unrequested spoilers. You’d think an article about storytelling might be a little more careful.
Re: The Universal Structure of Storytelling
#6> From one point of view, it’s obvious that, despite exceptions, most stories portray “goody-baddy” dynamics—from nursery rhymes to juicy gossip, from ancient folktales to Holy Scripture, from lowbrow reality shows to award-winning documentaries. The question is, why?
Because they are all, actually, from the same culture, as becomes obvious when reading the article. The author is a little quick to call this universal. It may be a little more "universal" than the World Series, but not much.
There are many stories where there are no baddies, and others where there are no goodies (such as Greek Mythology for instance).
Re: The Universal Structure of Storytelling
#7> The golden rule of hunter-gather life is pretty simple:
Oh please. There are at least as many "hunter-gather lives" as there are tribes, and probably more, and it's very likely the author knows about none of them. This is rubbish of the highest order.
Re: The Universal Structure of Storytelling
#8A bit unrelated to the article -
An (initial) portion of my academic experience was researching Interactive Storytelling systems[1]. I was particularly interested in the methods for ensuring certain qualities of the plots, and modeled some constraint solving problems -
but I did had the absolutely outstanding opportunity to interact with researchers in this area, and to read the seminal works on plot structure, Aarne-Thompson's index, Propp and other very, very, very cool stuff
With no false modesty I can say that I had a 'knack' for writing from a young age, but after studying narratives in-depth, what they share, how they 'move', fabula and syuhzet, I became a much better writer - even a technical writer.
Turns out explaining a formal method shares a lot in common with telling a story. One of this days I'll try to pinpoint that overlap and write about it.
[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_storytelling
P.S.: this is a good resource: http://tecfalabs.unige.ch/mediawiki-narrative/index.php/Narr...
Re: The Universal Structure of Storytelling
#9> From one point of view, it’s obvious that, despite exceptions, most stories portray “goody-baddy” dynamics—from nursery rhymes to juicy gossip, from ancient folktales to Holy Scripture, from lowbrow reality shows to award-winning documentaries. The question is, why? Because they are all, actually, from the same culture, as becomes obvious when reading the article. The author is a little quick to call this universal…
This is a huge problem when you see discussions on music theory as well; claims that things like Pythagorean 12 tone scales are "universal" because of the simplicity of the ratios.
My favorite is the claims of the universality of divisive rhythm; where larger units (measures, phrases, the like) are subdivided into equal portions and those subdivisions are the building blocks of all rhythm ever. I think music education has gotten to the point where plenty of people (who are used to euro-centric western music, that is) are able to comprehend that some cultures use smaller than half-step increments or other scales, but the way our rhythm works is so ingrained that trying to explain additive rhythm is almost painfully mind-expanding, even those it's very very common outside of sub-saharan africa and western europe.
This also applies to people who try to make statements about A432 or whatnot, which relies on having a very narrow view of music theory as a whole
Re: The Universal Structure of Storytelling
#10Wow, thanks for the unrequested spoilers. You’d think an article about storytelling might be a little more careful.
The reason those examples are used is because they're widely consumed stories. This is an article on literary analysis, not a fan discussion board for TV shows.
Norms for spoiler tagging would be awful in articles like this.