For every narrative, there's a counter-narrative
Matt Sheehan on Medium explores how the days of overarching "Master Narratives" may be waning. Modern communication technology allows for the propagation of new, popular narratives that challenge the blinkered worldviews that marginalize alternative perspectives. Sheehan warns that counter narratives run the risk of becoming master narratives themselves.
Like the types of plots within narratives, many narratives can be placed into groups as well. Researchers call recurring narrative arcs “master narratives” and they play a large role in how we perceive the world around us.
Scholar Michael Dahlstrom writes: “Cultivation theory describes this influence of [narratives in entertainment] on public perceptions about the world. For example, although less than one percent of Americans are victims of violent crime, ∼70 percent of broadcast network television shows characters engaged as either a victim or perpetrator of such violence.” As a result, audiences may believe the world is more violent than it actually is.
Popular stories and narratives play a large role in how we see the world. Using the example above, it’s easy to recognize why many Americans may be concerned about violent crime despite the fact that the data shows the threats to themselves personally may not be as grave as they perceive.
Narratives that don’t conform to these master narratives are called counter narratives and are an emerging tool to increase the power of our storytelling. Social movement activists and organizations often work to create and amplify counternarratives about a particular issue or population to challenge cultural stereotypes and create new ways of seeing the world.
Recently, scholars have begun to turn their attention to the development of counternarratives that work to counteract harmful narratives. They do this by tapping into the same attitudes and beliefs that make harmful narratives persuasive for some groups of people, such as those being recruited for terrorism. They then supplant the harmful narrative with new narratives featuring beneficial outcomes.
To build support for women’s right to vote, suffragists often played into dominant conceptions of womanhood in order to resonate with and not threaten societal norms, while at the same time told stories that pushed society to see new possibilities for women as political actors. For example, suffragists often held parades in public settings. During these parades, they would act out Joan of Arc narratives to show that women could embody political strength while adhering to feminine ideals.
These parades were designed to articulate their goals, demonstrate their capacity to participate in civic life, attract the attention of the press, and build support among the public and government officials. While they played into a master narrative on women’s role in society, they leveraged it to introduce a new narrative that helped others imagine women as political actors.
It’s important to recognize that master narratives are fluid, and that by trying to break one, we can create a new one that may also be harmful.
Read the whole thing here.
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