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Narrative Analysis
Narrative analysis is a genre of analytic frames whereby researchers interpret stories that are told within the context of research and/or are shared in everyday life. Scholars who conduct this type of analysis make diverse—yet equally substantial and meaningful—interpretations and conclusions by focusing on different elements. These elements include, but are not limited to, how the story is structured, what functions the story serves, what is the substance of the story, and how the story is performed. Communication scholars from a variety of perspectives ranging from quantitative to qualitative as well as traditional to postmodern conduct narrative analyses, which makes it challenging to cover all of its nuances; however, broad strokes are possible. This entry discusses sources of data for narrative analysis and forms of narrative analysis. It also offers a concrete example to explore how to apply narrative analysis in context.
Sources of Data for Narrative Analysis
Researchers analyze narratives from an array of sources. They might intentionally collect stories from participants for the purposes of analysis, such as collecting oral histories or conducting interviews that focus on stories about a certain type of experience or series of experiences (e.g., stories of hope). Scholars conducting narrative analysis also might examine stories documented in “real life” artifacts such as in journals, diaries, social media posts, and transcriptions of talk where stories are told (e.g., interpersonal conversation, public speeches).
Forms of Narrative Analysis
While narrative analysis as a genre of interpretation includes several different frameworks, there are four typical narrative forms of analyses that may be used in concert with one another in a given study: structural, functional, thematic, and dialogic/performance. Structural narrative analyses involve examining particular characteristics of a story, such as plot elements. Functional narrative analyses identify the purposes of a given storytelling moment, asking questions such as “What does this story do as a result of its telling?” and “What is the significance of how/when the story was told for the narrator?” Thematic analyses study the substance of narratives and determine, for example, what motifs are present in the stories, what types of stories are told (e.g., stories of grief, survivor narratives, master narratives, counternarratives) and what is their genre (e.g., comedy, drama). Narrative analysis that focuses on dialogic/performance issues examine, for example, how, where, and to whom the story is told as well as what identities are at stake in the telling of given story and how the story speaks to larger discourses at play in a given community or culture.
Brief Applications of Narrative Analysis
To better understand how narrative analysis is capable of providing insight into a given story, consider the following “coming out” tale from “Sean” who posted his story on the anonymous story-sharing website experienceproject.com.
Better Than I Thought: I came out to my family just before this past Christmas. My boyfriend and I at the time had just come back from a weekend camping trip. I live in Australia and it was the middle of summer. Tristan and I had decided to stop at my place first so i could get a change of clothes before we went to his house to drop of the camping gear.
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- Creating and Conducting Research
- Creation of Research Project
- Authoring: Telling a Research Story
- Body Image and Eating Disorders
- Hypothesis Formulation
- Methodology, Selection of
- Program Assessment
- Research Ideas, Sources of
- Research Project, Planning of
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- Research, Inspiration for
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- Narrative Analysis
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- Post Hoc Tests: Scheffe Test
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- Quasi-Experimental Design
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- Research Proposal
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- Within-Subjects Design
- Linear Approaches to Statistics
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- Correlation, Pearson
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- Errors of Measurement: Range Restriction
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- Frequency Distributions
- Heterogeneity of Variance
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- Understanding the Scope of Communication Research
- Areas of Inquiry
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