1. Sitzung Flashcards
(20 cards)
What is the difference between the first and second generation of Cognitive Literary theory?
What is cognition?
The processes, states, and capacities of the human mind (not just the brain), including:
- Perception and Attention
- Memory
- Learning
- Thinking
- Production and Reception of language
- Emotions and moods
- Opinions, attitudes, beliefs and wishes
- Social cognition
Which disciplines does the multi-disciplinary (and evolving) field of cognitive sciences cover?
- Philosophy
- Linguistics
- Psychology
- Computer science
- Neuroscience
- Anthropology
What are cognitive approaches to literature that cover all genres?
- Cognitive poetics
- Cognitive stylistics
What is cognitive narratology?
“Approaches to narrative study that fall under the heading of
cognitive narratology share a focus on the mental states, capacities,
and dispositions that provide grounds for – or, conversely, are
grounded in – narrative experiences. This definition highlights two
broad questions as centrally relevant for research on the nexus of
narrative and mind:
(1) How do stories across media interlock with interpreters‘ mental
states and processes, thus giving rise to narrative experiences?
(2) How (to what extent, in what specific ways) does narrative
scaffold efforts to make sense of experience itself?”
Why is the human mind of central significance?
Turner points out that “the literary mind is not a seperate kind of mind; rather, “it is our mind”. (We use the same mind to read literature that we use for all other cognitve processes/ No mind-body dualism)
Also, Herman argues that we can only make sense of fictional texts on the basis of our cognitive architecture and pre-existing frames and scripts. (Thus, real world knowledge applies to reading and vice versa: stories are tools for thinking).
What is a schema?
It is general term for structures that organize bits of information/knowledge into meaningful, coherent units and are stored in long-term memory; schemata have slots that can be triggered individually to activate the whole schema. It is a top-down and bottom-up processing in constant interaction.
What is the difference between frames and scripts?
Both are cognitive parameters, but the frames are more static and scripts are more dynamic.
“Frames basically deal with situations such as seeing a room or making a promise while scripts cover standard action sequences such as playing a game of football, going to a birthday party, or eating in a restaurant.”
What are frames and scripts comprised of?
Frames and scripts are comprised of “specific knowledge to interpret and participate in events we have been through many times”, and can be used as a point of reference to help us master new situations.
How do frames and scripts adapt?
- Both must be able to change as a result of new experiences.
- When one encounters a new situation (or makes a substantial change in one’s view of a problem), one selects from memory a structure called a frame. This is a remembered framework to be adapted by changing details as necessary.”
What is the idea of the Theory of Mind?
- Consciousness allows us to adapt intelligently to our environment.
- We continously engage in processes of mind-reading and try “to explain people’s behavior in terms of their thoughts, beliefs and desires.”
- It has been argued, that the way in which we try to make sense of other people is similar to the way in which we attempt to make sense of fictional narratives.
- Palmer, for instance, argues that “the constructions of the minds of fictional characters by narrators and readers are central to our understanding of how novels work because, in essence, narrative is the description of fictional mental functioning.
How are the individual and social mind differentiated by Palmer?
“An internalist perspective […] stresses those aspects that are inner, introspective, private, solitary, individual, psychological, mysterious, and detached. An externalist perspective […] stresses those aspects that are outer, active, public, social, behavioral, evident, embodied, and engaged.
What is the principle of minimal departure?
- It was formulated by Marie-Laure Ryan.
- It predicts, that we project upon [fictional] worlds everything we know about reality, and […] make only the adjustments dictated by the text.
- Ryan argues that readers only alter their realist expectations if a narrative explicitly text tells them to do so.
What is the idea of the enactivist theory of experience?
- “Experience, far from being the computational process whereby we construct an internal model of the environment, is an embodied, evaluative exploration of the world.” (Embodiment!)
- Readers can enact narrative space by simulating a hypothetical perceptual experience, even in the absence of fictional characters to which they could attribute that experience.
What is the definition of empirical literary studies?
“How readers process narrative is essentially an empirical question that can only be answered by systematic observation of actual readers reading actual texts; it cannot be answered solely on the basis of intuition, anecdotal evidence, or even sophisticated models of human experience.”
Thus, “each reader’s constructions must be viewed as valid and appropriate given that reader’s knowledge
What were the take-home points on Empirical literary studies?
- We share the same cognitive “architecture” and many schemata, frames and scripts with other human beings.
Which question are Cognitive Literary Studies trying to investigate?
How do the individual experiential background, the culturally shared schemata and the universal cognitive architecture interact?
What are important concepts in Empirical Literary Studies?
- Statistical reader (as opposed to implied reader)
- Research hypothesis (testable and falsifiable; as opposed to interpretation)
- Operationalization (relying on process models of cognitive operations)
- Independent vs. dependent variable
- Text corpus or stimulus material
- Textual features vs. reader constructions.
- Test subjects
- Control group
What are examples of research hypotheses in Cognitive Literary studies?
- It will be easier for readers to identify with a narrator who uses internal (as opposed to external) focalization.
- It will be easier for readers to identify with a first-person narrator.
- Textual triggers of emotion will lead to longer fixation times in regarding the respective word/phrase/sentence.
Which exercise questions were given at the end of the lecture to practice?
- How do you use frames and scripts in your daily life?
- What are main differences between first- and second generation cognitive approaches?
- Develop a research question of your own and explain how you would study it.
