ERIC Number: ED385890
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 1994-Nov-22
Pages: 25
Abstractor: N/A
ISBN: N/A
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Novels, Scripts, and Natural Discourse: Mediated Models of Language Use and Understanding.
Soukup, Paul A.
This paper explores the question of interpreting complex texts, particularly scripts and multimedia presentations. The paper first reviews the literature on natural discourse, noting that although interpreting spoken natural language seems rather straightforward, many scholars have discussed what is required to make sense of discourse. The paper next discusses the discourse of novels, pointing out that writing and print fix language to a page and, in doing so, change an individual's relationship to language, and that the written text does not engage people in the same ways that natural discourse does. The paper cites the rise of hermeneutics, or textual interpretation, and notes that modern scholarship has subjected hermeneutics itself to a struggle for understanding, with outstanding scholars such as E. D. Hirsch and Hans-Georg Gadamer in opposing theoretical camps. The paper then discusses in detail the discourse of scripts, after defining them as "a set of instructions for actors so that they can recreate a human lifeworld." The paper concludes with a postscript about multimedia presentations, which cross the boundaries separating natural discourse, texts, and scripts. The paper concludes that the situation of multimedia throws all interpretation into relief and suggests the fusion of not just two, but multiple horizons. (Contains 23 references.) (NKA)
Publication Type: Information Analyses; Reports - Evaluative; Speeches/Meeting Papers
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
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Author Affiliations: N/A