Interpreting text through context
"Thought of the Week" for
Much of the time when we produce an
interpretation of a text..., we do so by contextualizing it within
the frame of some meta-text or generalization that occupies a
discursive space at a higher level of abstraction than the story.
...[We] are re-presenting the story from a more abstract perspective
of a generalization... Students...may lack the life experience
and/or the discourse experience that would otherwise equip them with
an adequate repertoire of generalizations or theories to draw upon
for a more abstract perspective or frame through which to reexamine
a narrative...
The personal narrative as a contextualizing framework
by Reg Harris
Copyright © 2006 by Reg Harris. Revised October 6, 2007. All rights reserved. Apart from properly cited quotes and short excerpts, no part of this article can be copied or used in any form without written permission from the author. For permission to use, please contact me.
The heroic journey pattern in its generic,
non-mythological sense, could be considered a theory or, in the case
of the journey, a generalization about human experience. In the
hermeneutic process of interpretation, we must begin any
interpretation or analysis from our current understanding. That
current understanding provides a schema or scaffold upon which
students can build meaning. The heroic journey patter provides
students with a starting point for interpretation by giving them a
transformation pattern and a vocabulary to use to express their
understandings of a character's passage through the pattern.
Blau goes on explain that our "theories" are
based on what we learn in school, our own experience, and from
generalizations provided by our community, what Jerome Brunner
called "cultural narratives." In a sense, mythologies carried (and
still carry) these cultural narratives, the generalized assumptions
that guide a people in their relationship with each other and the
world.
But as valuable and ubiquitous as a theory is
to interpretation, it has its dangers. Blau points out that when a
theory works for them, young people will over use it to interpret
not just literature, but their own lives and the lives of others.
This attraction of theory creates what James Moffett called the
illusion of power. While the heroic journey pattern is less likely
to create this illusion of power, it should be considered only one
interpretive theory, albeit an extremely good one. For most
students, simply understanding the concept of transformation, with
its challenges, its crisis, and its revelation, will be enough to
serve them well in school. For others, the journey will serve as a
starting point for deeper understanding.
However it is used, the heroic journey is a
valuable model to teach students as they search for ways to make
meaning of their lives during the dramatic changes of adolescence. .
It seems to explain everything and gives a false sense of
understanding and control, creating a selective blindness that may
exclude more viable models of understanding and interpreting. You
can see this in students who are so indoctrinated in their religious
philosophies that they interpret all experience with their religious
model, even distorting the experience itself so that it fits the
model.
While the heroic journey pattern is less likely
to create this illusion of power, it should be considered only one
interpretive theory, albeit an extremely good one. For most
students, simply understanding the concept of transformation, with
its challenges, its crisis, and its revelation, will be enough to
serve them well in school. For others, the journey will serve as a
starting point for deeper understanding.
However it is used, the heroic journey is a
valuable model to teach students as they search for ways to make
meaning of their lives during the dramatic changes of adolescence.