(Narrative) Structural Design

The following narrative structures have been taken from the book Art in Motion: Animation Aesthetics by Maureen Furniss. Although they imply storytelling forms, they will play a role by informing the evaluation of other works when establishing the role of sound and sonicity. 

Linear Narrative Structures

1. Beginning, Middle and End - Enjoyable because they conform to the ideology of work ethic: moving forward, achieving goals and making progress.

2. Interactive Narrative - (Such as animated games) - Rather than one linear narrative, the participant is offered many.

Non-Linear Narrative Structures

"An artist can utilise an alternate structure for the purposes of disturbing a viewers sense of equilibrium"

3. Cyclical - ...does not reach a conclusion but rather comes back to it's beginning. Such as myths, natural occurrences, life and death and the changing of the season.

4. Episodic - The most common place...is in weekly television series...[they] involve recurring characters and settings, with out without the addition of an on going narrative. 

5. Thematic - ...Creates an experience that can be quite different than that of a linear or cyclical production. Rather than moving forward, or even in a repeated pattern, thematic works tend towards stasis. In that respect, they can be described as meditative or poetic in nature, exploring an experience, emotion or other abstract concept in depth.