Naratologie

Naratologie, or narratology, is the interdisciplinary study of narrative and the ways in which stories are constructed, transmitted, and interpreted. It analyzes the formal devices and choices through which narrators convey information, shape meaning, and influence audience perception. While rooted in literary analysis, narratology is also applied to film, theater, comics, and digital media.

Core concepts in naratology include the distinction between story (fabula) and discourse (sujet), the role of the narrator, and the relationship between narrative voice and the reader or viewer. Other central ideas involve narrative time (the arrangement and presentation of events, including order, duration, and frequency), focalization (who perceives the events and how they are filtered through perspective), and the distinction between plot and plot presentation. Terms such as diegesis versus mise-en-scène and analysis of metafiction are also commonly used.

The field traces its modern development to early 20th-century formalist and structuralist theories, with influential contributions from scholars such as Vladimir Propp, Gérard Genette, Roland Barthes, and Tzvetan Todorov. It has since expanded to encompass cinema, television, video games, and digital storytelling, often crossing into cultural, cognitive, and linguistic approaches. Narratology offers tools for analyzing how narratives organize time, space, and perception, how expectations are built and manipulated, and how meaning arises from the interaction between text, author intent, and audience interpretation.

Critiques of narratology point to an overemphasis on form at the expense of content, context, and ideology. Nonetheless, it remains a foundational framework for systematic analysis of narrative across media.