Narrative Theories

Barthes - Gives the audience an enigma code, e.g a close up on a knife, which gives the audience a hint of danger to come.

Levi-Strauss - Binary oposition- Good vs evil, e.g Heather vs Ben.

Todorov- The sense of a beginning middle and end.

Vladimir Propp- He thought that characters had key functions. For example we would have a protagonist and antagonist a long with many different characters to show off different personalities.

Open Narrative- an open narrative is when a story carries on between episodes and doesn't show a sign of ending.

Example: Heathers murder in Eastenders, the first episode is when Heather is murdered by Ben Mitchell, this is an open narrative because it opens the door for the storyline to continue. Instantly you begin to ask yourself is he going to get caught? As a result you continue to watch because you are intent on finding out what happens in the end.

Close Narrative- This is the opposite to an open narrative, it addresses less issues and therefore when resolved the storyline finishes.

Example: Michael walks into the shop and buys some nappies. This is a close storyline because it doesnt open up the opportunity for this story to be continued into future episodes.
Multi-Stranded Narrative- This is when a number of storylines are linked together in an episode, this is a key convention as it is used effectively in multiple soaps.