STRUCTURES DU FRANÇAIS CONTEMPORAIN
PRAGMATIQUE: FONCTIONS ET ROLES*
[*ce titre est un
exemple de cas où la règle logique de la séquence progressive n'a pas été
dominée par la loi de la cadence majeure]
I. Fonctions (investissement pragmatique sur l'objet [object oriented])
Russian Vladimir Propp (1895-1970) analyzed many of his country's folk tales and identified common themes within them. He broke down the stories into morphemes (analyzable chunks) and identified 31 narratemes (narrative units) that comprised the structure of many of the stories.
Folk stories around the world form a web of connections and the same or similar stories can be found in many places. These old stories also have formed the basis of many more stories since and hence Propp's morphology is useful not only in understanding Russian folk tales but pretty much any other stories.
Propp has been both lauded for his structural approach and criticized for his lack of sensitivity to subtle story elements such as mood and deeper context. Nevertheless, his analysis provides a useful tool in understanding stories ancient and modern and, after early influence on such luminaries as Claude Lévi-Strauss and Roland Barthes, has become a classic of structuralist analysis of roles and pragmatic functions
He identified that “Five categories of elements define not only the construction of a tale, but the tale as a whole.”:
1. Functions of dramatis personae (see below)
2. Conjuctive elements (ex
machina, announcement of misfortune, chance disclosure – mother calls hero
loudly, etc.)
3. Motivations (reasons and aims of personages)
4. Forms of
appearance of dramatis personae (the flying arrival of dragon, chance meeting
with donor)
5. Attributive elements or accessories (witch’s hut or her clay
leg)
Whilst not all stories will contain all of Propp's narratemes, it is surprising to find stories that contain none, and many modern books and movies fit nicely into his categories.
Here are the 31 elements of stories that Propp identified, plus their symbol, interpretations and discussion. Note that some of these functions generally occur in pairs, such as departure and return. They may also be repeated.
Few stories contain all elements, but where they do contain elements, they will very largely occur in the sequence given here.
Steps 1 to 7 introduces the situation and most of the main characters, setting the scene for subsequent adventure.
The main story starts here and extends to the departure of the hero on the main quest.
In the third sphere, the hero goes in search of a method by which the solution may be reached, gaining the magical agent from the Donor. Note that this in itself may be a complete story.
In the final (and often optional) phase of the storyline, the hero returns home, hopefully uneventfully and to a hero's welcome, although this may not always be the case.
Propp, V. (1927). Morphology of the Folktale. Trans., Laurence Scott. 2nd ed. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1968
Le schéma actantiel d' A. J. Greimas.
Tout énoncé possède un "objet" pragmatique que l'on peut identifier ("Quel est l'objet de votre visite?")
Tout événement ou état peut se définir par rapport à une relation "Sujet-Objet" caractérisée par des modalités secondaires:
II. Rôles(investissement pragmatique sur le procès de l'action [process oriented])
La pragmatique des rôles trouve son origine dans les théories anglo-saxonnes de la communication des années 60.
Dans sa conceptualisation elle se rapproche considérablement du schéma de la communication verbale trouvée chez R. Jakobson.
Il s'agit d'étudier les rapports qui lient les différents éléments impliqués dans un "échange"; une grande place est laissée aux
aspects aléatoires contingents (temps et/ou espace) ce qui permet la création d'un discours d'escorte chargé de prendre en compte
la contextualisation (et donc également la "réception" in situ) de l'événement dénoté.
Dans le discours les éléments privilégiés par ce type d'étude sont les prépositions, et les éléments du système verbal (personnes, temps, modes, etc.).
