Narrative (the activity of narrating) occupies a central role in the social life of individuals, while also taking on the function of actualising the past to construct a perspective of the future and reshape the present social world. The real issue, however, for social science scholars is not the distinction between the telling of true stories and false ones (this seems to be a practical rather than a theoretical problem) but the value of narrativity as a way of making sense of reality—both the factual reality of real events and the moral and symbolic reality of fictions. “Narrative”, in this process, translates into the narrativity that enables individuals to know, understand and make sense of the social world, and it is through narratives and narrativity that narrative identities are constituted (integration between the two major classes of historical narratives and fictions). Narrative identity, therefore, is closely linked to memory and also shares its form. Therefore, this contribution will clarify, starting from the difference between narratives and storytelling, how narratives re-actualise the past in a future perspective since they preserve the memory of actions over time allowing them to become models to be imitated and/or surpassed.

The Reasons Why the Narrative of Memory and not Storytelling: Reconstructing the Past, Present, and Future

Emiliana, Mangone
2023-01-01

Abstract

Narrative (the activity of narrating) occupies a central role in the social life of individuals, while also taking on the function of actualising the past to construct a perspective of the future and reshape the present social world. The real issue, however, for social science scholars is not the distinction between the telling of true stories and false ones (this seems to be a practical rather than a theoretical problem) but the value of narrativity as a way of making sense of reality—both the factual reality of real events and the moral and symbolic reality of fictions. “Narrative”, in this process, translates into the narrativity that enables individuals to know, understand and make sense of the social world, and it is through narratives and narrativity that narrative identities are constituted (integration between the two major classes of historical narratives and fictions). Narrative identity, therefore, is closely linked to memory and also shares its form. Therefore, this contribution will clarify, starting from the difference between narratives and storytelling, how narratives re-actualise the past in a future perspective since they preserve the memory of actions over time allowing them to become models to be imitated and/or surpassed.
2023
978-3-031-41920-1
978-3-031-41921-8
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11386/4851472
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