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Chapter 4. Constructing perspectives as positioning resources in stories of the self

Abstract

Perspectivation – verbal practices to represent perspectives – can be used in personal storytelling to negotiate moral claims which are crucial to the teller’s self. The perspectives of different interactants in the story-world can show up in complicated fusions or as contested battlefields, contrasting, backing or commenting each other. Preferably in reported speech and scenic re-stagings of episodes, the narrator as “almighty author” can shape or frame the voices of problematic interactants within the story by means of rhetorical devices, which enables him to gain authentification and persuasive power while refraining from explicit evaluations.

Abstract

Perspectivation – verbal practices to represent perspectives – can be used in personal storytelling to negotiate moral claims which are crucial to the teller’s self. The perspectives of different interactants in the story-world can show up in complicated fusions or as contested battlefields, contrasting, backing or commenting each other. Preferably in reported speech and scenic re-stagings of episodes, the narrator as “almighty author” can shape or frame the voices of problematic interactants within the story by means of rhetorical devices, which enables him to gain authentification and persuasive power while refraining from explicit evaluations.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction. Rethinking narrative identity 1
  4. Chapter 1. Identity and empathy 33
  5. Chapter 2. Axes of identity 49
  6. Chapter 3. The quest for a third space 69
  7. Chapter 4. Constructing perspectives as positioning resources in stories of the self 85
  8. Chapter 5. Referential frameworks and focalization in a craft artist’s life story 103
  9. Chapter 6. Strange perspectives = strange (narrative?) identities? 117
  10. Chapter 7. “Indefinite, sketchy, but not entirely obliterated” 129
  11. Chapter 8. Creative confession 147
  12. Chapter 9. The queer self and the snares of heteronormativity 171
  13. Chapter 10. Confessional poetry 187
  14. Contributors 203
  15. Index 207
Rethinking Narrative Identity
This chapter is in the book Rethinking Narrative Identity
https://doi.org/10.1075/sin.17.05luc

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction. Rethinking narrative identity 1
  4. Chapter 1. Identity and empathy 33
  5. Chapter 2. Axes of identity 49
  6. Chapter 3. The quest for a third space 69
  7. Chapter 4. Constructing perspectives as positioning resources in stories of the self 85
  8. Chapter 5. Referential frameworks and focalization in a craft artist’s life story 103
  9. Chapter 6. Strange perspectives = strange (narrative?) identities? 117
  10. Chapter 7. “Indefinite, sketchy, but not entirely obliterated” 129
  11. Chapter 8. Creative confession 147
  12. Chapter 9. The queer self and the snares of heteronormativity 171
  13. Chapter 10. Confessional poetry 187
  14. Contributors 203
  15. Index 207
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