Brexit as Cultural Performance: Towards a Narratology of Social Drama
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Roy Sommer
Abstract
Brexit is not only the most important, but also the most confusing challenge to European integration. While political scientists, historians, and economists are struggling to come to terms with current events, literary and cultural theory has remained so far conspicuously silent, although one might argue that Brexit is first and foremost a cultural phenomenon, a contest of stories and worldviews that transcends rational argument. Redefining Victor Turner’s anthropological notion of social drama as narratives in conflict and engaging with Ansgar Nünning’s work on events, turning points and narratives of crises, this essay shows how retrospective and prospective worldmaking interact and how leading playwrights explore anger, frustration, and envy in an attempt to understand, and maybe heal, the current divisions in British society. It makes the case for a narratological approach to current events, opening up the horizons of cultural narratology both as a critique of politics and as a dialogue with political science.
Abstract
Brexit is not only the most important, but also the most confusing challenge to European integration. While political scientists, historians, and economists are struggling to come to terms with current events, literary and cultural theory has remained so far conspicuously silent, although one might argue that Brexit is first and foremost a cultural phenomenon, a contest of stories and worldviews that transcends rational argument. Redefining Victor Turner’s anthropological notion of social drama as narratives in conflict and engaging with Ansgar Nünning’s work on events, turning points and narratives of crises, this essay shows how retrospective and prospective worldmaking interact and how leading playwrights explore anger, frustration, and envy in an attempt to understand, and maybe heal, the current divisions in British society. It makes the case for a narratological approach to current events, opening up the horizons of cultural narratology both as a critique of politics and as a dialogue with political science.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter i
- Contents v
- A Tale of Two Concepts: Ansgar Nünning at Sixty 1
- Stories of Dangerous Life in the Post- Trauma Age: Toward a Cultural Narratology of Resilience 15
- Mind the Narratives: Towards a Cultural Narratology of Attention 37
- The End of the World (as We Know It)? – Cultural Ways of Worldmaking in Contemporary Post-Apocalyptic Narratives 57
- Plumbing Distant Spatiotemporal Scales: Towards an Econarratology of Planetary Memory in Narratives of the Global South 75
- Narrative Forms in the Age of the Anthropocene: Negotiating Human-Nonhuman Relations in Global South Novels 91
- Fact, Fiction, and Everything in-between: Strategies of Reader Activation in Postcolonial Graphic Narratives 109
- ‘It’s Not Our Opinion, It’s the Opinion of Our Roles’ – Fremdverstehen Revisited or: Where Foreign Language Education and Narratology Can Meet 129
- Narrative and Visual Resources of Culture in Contemporary Indigenous Children’s Books from Australia 149
- Troubling Justice: Narratives of Revenge 165
- Erin Burnett in Mali: Bardic Television and the Genealogy of Cultural Narratology 185
- New Media Narratives: Olivia Sudjic’s Sympathy and Identity in the Digital Age 199
- The ‘Death’ of the Unreliable Narrator: Toward a Functional History of Narrative Unreliability 215
- Odyssean Travels: The Migration of Narrative Form (Homer – Lamb – Joyce) 241
- A European Storyteller? Collective Narration in John Berger’s Into Their Labours 269
- Brexit as Cultural Performance: Towards a Narratology of Social Drama 293
- Contributors 321
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter i
- Contents v
- A Tale of Two Concepts: Ansgar Nünning at Sixty 1
- Stories of Dangerous Life in the Post- Trauma Age: Toward a Cultural Narratology of Resilience 15
- Mind the Narratives: Towards a Cultural Narratology of Attention 37
- The End of the World (as We Know It)? – Cultural Ways of Worldmaking in Contemporary Post-Apocalyptic Narratives 57
- Plumbing Distant Spatiotemporal Scales: Towards an Econarratology of Planetary Memory in Narratives of the Global South 75
- Narrative Forms in the Age of the Anthropocene: Negotiating Human-Nonhuman Relations in Global South Novels 91
- Fact, Fiction, and Everything in-between: Strategies of Reader Activation in Postcolonial Graphic Narratives 109
- ‘It’s Not Our Opinion, It’s the Opinion of Our Roles’ – Fremdverstehen Revisited or: Where Foreign Language Education and Narratology Can Meet 129
- Narrative and Visual Resources of Culture in Contemporary Indigenous Children’s Books from Australia 149
- Troubling Justice: Narratives of Revenge 165
- Erin Burnett in Mali: Bardic Television and the Genealogy of Cultural Narratology 185
- New Media Narratives: Olivia Sudjic’s Sympathy and Identity in the Digital Age 199
- The ‘Death’ of the Unreliable Narrator: Toward a Functional History of Narrative Unreliability 215
- Odyssean Travels: The Migration of Narrative Form (Homer – Lamb – Joyce) 241
- A European Storyteller? Collective Narration in John Berger’s Into Their Labours 269
- Brexit as Cultural Performance: Towards a Narratology of Social Drama 293
- Contributors 321
