The papers in this book were originally published in Narrative Inquiry in 2006 and represent work on narrative in a variety of disciplines discussed in Michael Bamberg's introductory chapter (chap. 1). Bamberg also develops one of the major themes of the book in chap. 17: a turn from “big stories” to “small stories,” involving more attention to the roles and purposes of narrative in everyday interaction. This theme is developed in contributions by Liz Stokoe & Derek Edwards (chap. 8), Alexandra Georgakopoulou (chap. 15), Amy Shuman (chap. 18), Paul Atkinson & Sara Delamont (chap. 20), and Eric E. Peterson & Kristin M. Langellier (chap. 21), who all focus on narrative as discourse and social action. Two chapters, in particular, point to the spirit of debate in the collection: Mark Freeman's (chap. 16), which offers a defense of “big stories,” and Crispin Sartwell's (chap. 19), which disputes the centrality of narrative to the organization of experience.
The collection includes several overview chapters, including those by Ruthellen Josselson (chap. 2), outlining seven grounds for comparing narrative studies; James Phelan (chap. 11), reviewing five current issues in narratology; and Mary M. Gergen & Kenneth J. Gergen (chap. 14), reviewing work in three areas of narrative practice. Among the disciplines, psychology is the most strongly represented. Dan McAdams (chap. 3) proposes a three-tier conceptual framework using life stories to understand personality, and Brian Schiff points out the potentials and limitations of narrative psychology (chap. 4). Wolfram Fischer & Martina Goblirsch (chap. 5) focus on biographical memory, and Stephanie Taylor (chap. 12) and Wolfgang Kraus (chap. 13) on narrative and identity work. Literary perspectives are represented by Patrick Colm Hogan, who reviews Aristotle's Poetics to revisit the analytical development in narrative theory (chap. 9), and by David Herman, who analyzes scenes of talk in Virginia Woolf's To the lighthouse (chap. 10). Linguistics is also represented in contributions from William Labov (chap. 6), discussing the pre-construction of narratives of personal experience; Barbara Johnstone (chap. 7), discussing narratives of dialect variation in Pittsburgh; and Jan Blommaert (chap. 22), who uses ethnopoetics as a means of analyzing asylum-seeking stories.
While the majority of papers are concerned with analysis of narratives and their roles in discourse, the last four chapters cover applications in professional settings: Rita Charon (chap. 23) in health care, James McLeod (chap. 24) and Nairán Ramírez-Esparza & James W. Pennebaker (chap. 25) in psychotherapy, and Roger Schank & Tammy Berman (chap. 26) in education.
Overall, this collection fulfils the promise of its title to provide a “state-of-the-art” look at narrative research. It gives readers a sense of where narrative research has come from and raises the question: Where is it going next? The answer to this question is reflected in the kaleidoscopic nature of this volume.
