Cloud Discourse, Clock Logic: Research On Network News In The Perspective Of Narratology

Though narratology was first applied to the study of literature, with its longdevelopment it has demonstrated powerful theoretical tension. Some researcherscommitted to construct generalized narratology trying to present the most essential sideof narratology; more researchers worked to construct the subdisciplines relating todifferent narrative genres trying to show the most lively side of narratology. Regardlessof narratology how to develop, it must be associated with the certain social context, then,the problems we currently facing with are: in the digital age, what have happened to“news” as a typical narrative genre? what demands will the narratology give birth to?To answer above questions, I observed network news texts from the perspective ofnarratology and carefully explored them from four aspects:“narrator”,“narrativestructure”,“narrative discourse” and “narrative acception”. The results showed that incyberspace due to the intervention of digital technology the relationship among text,narration and media was more close and complex, then the traditional narratologicalconcepts were reconstructed, and narrative texts faced with many aspects of thetransition, and the narrative art was not declining in the new eco-environment butushered a nirvana-like “renaissance”.Specifically referring to “news narrative”, in the context of internet, the nature ofthe news narrative has been transformed from mainly the original writting of newsevents into the creative management of news information; narrative style from linearand single-dimension narrative into dynamic, continuous and interactive collectivenarrative which editors, reporters and netizens jointly participated; narrative textsfrom single and authoritative works form into open texts collection which could jumpdirectly among them; the news narrator and narratee overall presented a state of chaos,and then became a new “wreader” identity. In short, it is undeniable that what digital technology brought was indeed a new world, even though maybe it was not so beautiful.The new world was full of “cloud discourse”, but hidden “clock logic”: on the onehand, the network media was not as pure as traditional one, and network news textswere not as single and stable as traditional ones either, in addition, due to the narratees’direct intervention they became uncertain and contingent like clouds, which made themshow the state of “cloud discourse”; On the other hand, since both the network newsnarrative and traditional one belonged to news narrative, they must obey the laws of thenature of news narrative that “the narrative objects were facts, the narrative purpose wasseeking truth and the narrative style was based on facts”, which was the premise andfundamental of all of the news narrative. So network news texts strictly obeyed someinherent laws and had some certainties which could be grasped. It seems that “all cloudsare clocks”, and “clock logic” as narrative conventions based on the factual propertyand cognitive logic is hidden under the surface of “cloud discourse”.The specific characterizations of “clock logic” were: referring to “narrator”, thoughits subjectivity has been sown and differanced and the explicit and integral “author” nolonger existed, we could still find a definitive “fundamental narrator” responsible for thenarrative about main facts; referring to “narrative structure”, although the structure ofthe hypertext seemingly was complicated and messy, its contents and the layout werestill be arranged according to a certain logic, and the divergent texts could be retrievedin the field of meaning; referring to “narrative discourse”, first, due to the interventionof human-computer interaction and human interaction the signifier of texts had floated,which endowing the texts with larger uncertainty, however, there were an initial visible“master copy” in the personalized texts formed by interaction; Secondly, although in theprocess of the text constantly being written and rewritten its significant had beenextended, expanded, converted or even replaced, we could still capture ameaning-spirochete, namely, under the synthesized observation we could still see theprocess of self-evolution about the significance; finally, although most of the network news texts belonged to the multi-media narrative texts, there must be a main media easyto the narratees’ comprehensive interpretation. Referring to “narrative acception”, in thespecific cognitive process, faced with the dynamic and instable narrative form as“cloud”, the narratees could still re-organization of the narrative process and restore thetruth in their brains according to the related narrative conventions and cognitiveframework.In a word, the purpose of the study could be seen as an attempt to re-examinenarratology relying on network news texts in the context of media convergence, and itwas just an attempt. However, we studied narrative not only in order to construct ideas,but also to lead the action. I believe that with the internet having showed greatadvantage and been expected to become the “meta-media”, the study on network newsnarrative and the practice of journalism will be able to take it as an opportunity tonourish each other and reach positive interaction. After all, we have no reason to suspectthat a crack would gradually turn into a door in a era abundantly filled with information.