<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

<p>The outcome of an audience study supports theories stating that stories are a primary means by which we make sense of our experiences over time. Empirical examples of narrative impact are presented in which specific fiction film scenes condense spectators’ lives, identities, and beliefs. One conclusion is that spectators test the emotional realism of the narrative for greater significance, connecting diegetic fiction experiences with their extra-diegetic world in their quest for meaning, self and identity. The ‘banal’ notion of the mediatization of religion theory is questioned as unsatisfactory in the theoretical context of individualized meaning-making processes. As a semantically negatively charged concept, it is problematic when analyzing empirical examples of spectators’ use of fictional narratives, especially when trying to characterize the idiosyncratic and complex interplay between spectators’ fiction emotions and their testing of mediated narratives in an exercise to find moral significance in extra-filmic life. Instead, <italic>vernacular meaning-making</italic> is proposed.</p>
</abstract>

The outcome of an audience study supports theories stating that stories are a primary means by which we make sense of our experiences over time. Empirical examples of narrative impact are presented in which specific fiction film scenes condense spectators’ lives, identities, and beliefs. One conclusion is that spectators test the emotional realism of the narrative for greater significance, connecting diegetic fiction experiences with their extra-diegetic world in their quest for meaning, self and identity. The ‘banal’ notion of the mediatization of religion theory is questioned as unsatisfactory in the theoretical context of individualized meaning-making processes. As a semantically negatively charged concept, it is problematic when analyzing empirical examples of spectators’ use of fictional narratives, especially when trying to characterize the idiosyncratic and complex interplay between spectators’ fiction emotions and their testing of mediated narratives in an exercise to find moral significance in extra-filmic life. Instead, vernacular meaning-making is proposed.

Vernacular Meaning Making

Nordicom Review

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

The outcome of an audience study supports theories stating that stories are a primary means by which we make sense of our experiences over time. Empirical...

Vernacular Meaning Making

Publié en ligne: 29 oct. 2015

Pages: 143 - 156

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/nor-2015-0022

Mots clés
mediatization of religion, film, spectator, meaning-making, banal, vernacular

© 2015 Tomas Axelson, published by De Gruyter Open

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Vernacular Meaning Making

Publié en ligne: 29 oct. 2015

Pages: 143 - 156

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/nor-2015-0022

Mots clésmediatization of religion, film, spectator, meaning-making, banal, vernacular

© 2015 Tomas Axelson, published by De Gruyter Open

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Mots clés
mediatization of religion, film, spectator, meaning-making, banal, vernacular