Media know all

Levi Strauss- Binary oppositions

media know all- binary oppositions http://www.mediaknowall.com/as_alevel/alevkeyconcepts/alevelkeycon.php?pageID=narrative
Claude Levi-Strauss - constant creation of conflict/opposition propels narrative. Narrative can only end on a resolution of conflict. Opposition can be visual (light/darkness, movement/stillness) or conceptual (love/hate, control/panic), and to do with soundtrack. Binary oppositions.

When unpacking a narrative in order to find its meaning, there are a series of codes and conventions that need to be considered. When we look at a narrative we examine the conventions of

• Genre
• Character
• Form
• Time

and use knowledge of these conventions to help us interpret the text. In particular, Time is something that we understand as a convention - narratives do not take place in real time but may telescope out (the slow motion shot which replays a winning goal) or in (an 80 year life can be condensed into a two hour biopic). Therefore we consider "the time of the thing told and the time of the telling." (Christian Metz Notes Towards A Phenomenology of Narrative).

It is only because we are used to reading narratives from a very early age, and are able to compare texts with others that we understand these conventions. A narrative in its most basic sense is a series of events, but in order to construct meaning from the narrative those events must be linked somehow.