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Publication event: Real Fictions: Fictionality, Factuality and Narrative Strategies in Contemporary Storytelling

Location Tampere University Linna building, room 5026-27
19.11.2019 14.15–17.00
Welcome to the publication event of the Narrative Inquiry Special Issue!

Real Fictions: Fictionality, Factuality and Narrative Strategies in Contemporary Storytelling

Special issue of Narrative Inquiry 29:2 (2019)

Editors Sam Browse (Sheffield Hallam University), Alison Gibbons (Sheffield Hallam University), Mari Hatavara (Tampere University)

 

November 19th, 2019, 4 pm. Tampere University Linna building, room 5026-27.

 

The special issue: In today’s so-called “post-truth” age, the boundary between reality and fiction seems increasingly hard to distinguish: politicians spin stories; everyday reality in (social) media is invested in live narratives; historical events are narrativized in literary texts; fantasy as a genre is more popular than ever. This affects the way people live their everyday lives together with and inspired by the stories that surround them. Stories are tools for making sense of human action in situated social realities: they organize what is happening while they exemplify, explain, and predict the intentions of others. Moreover, the spread of new media affects the affordances and constraints available in interaction and interpersonal sense making. Contemporary and new forms of storytelling thus entail formative force when stories serve as vehicles to comment on and challenge social expectations and the limits of the tellable. This special issue comprises nine articles discussing the theoretical and methodological ramifications of post-truth modes of storytelling across a range of cultural contexts and narrative forms. The first article is a comprehensive introduction to the theme and the latest developments in the fields involved, while the other articles each offer a theoretical reflection and methodological application on the subject through the analysis of varied materials. More information on the issue: https://benjamins.com/catalog/ni.29.2

 

The program includes an introduction from one of the editors, three talks by authors of the articles, and a commentary:

 

16.15 Mari Hatavara: introduction

16.25 Kim Schoofs: Adjusting to new “truths.” The relation between the spatio-temporal context and identity work in repeated WWII-testimonies

Matias Nurminen: Narrative warfare. The ‘careless’ reinterpretation of literary canon in 312 online antifeminism

Samuli Björninen: The rhetoric of factuality in narrative. Appeals to authority in Claas Relotius’s feature journalism

17.00 Hanna Rautajoki: Comments on the issue, followed by general discussion

 

17.30 Drinks and small snacks

 

Welcome!

 

Further information

Anna Kuutsa, Coordinator of Narrare (anna.kuutsa@tuni.fi)