ARISTOTLE'S OIKONOMIA, THE MODES OF EMPLOTMENT, AND A FOUNDATION FOR NORMATIVE CONVERSATIONS ON STORYTELLING

• Main Author: August III, John William
• Format: Others
• Published: OpenSIUC 2011
• Subjects: Economic Narrative; Emplotment; Narrative; Puritanism
• Online Access: https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/theses/719; https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1726&context=theses

The following text is devoted specifically to an extrapolation of the literary narrative modes of emplotment as advanced by Hayden White. Utilizing these modes of emplotment as a critical tool for analysis of cultural narrative, a case study is constructed that takes Aristotle`s philosophy of oikonomia as narrative, in both the comedic and the tragic modes, and shows how the normative narrative as offered by Aristotle has, through history, been transformed into the tragic, at least in the United States. This is followed by a brief analysis of how the romantic and comedic modes of emplotment interact with each other, which points to the dangers that might arise. This is primarily a work that begins a much larger project involved in the narrative modes of emplotment and their ethical implications in our lived experiences.