About Us

Summer Institute

Image by Guy Billout

The Project Narrative Summer Institute (PNSI) is a two-week workshop on the Ohio State University campus that offers scholars who have earned a Ph.D. (or other terminal degree) in any discipline the opportunity for an intensive study of core concepts and issues in narrative theory. James Phelan and Robyn Warhol-Down will direct the 2010 institute, which will accept twenty participants and will run from Monday, June 28th to Friday, July 9th.

Seminar Participants
We invite applications from scholars in literary studies, philosophy, history, communication, psychology, medicine—indeed, in any discipline—interested in concentrated work on the methodologies of narrative studies. The institute is not open to graduate students.

Application Process and Deadline
The deadline for applications is Monday, March 1, 2010. A complete application consists of three items: (1) a current curriculum vitae (with up-to-date contact information); (2) a personal statement of no more than 1200 words explaining how your participation in PNSI will enhance your teaching and/or research; and (3) one letter of recommendation. These materials should be sent via e-mail to Professors Phelan phelan.1@osu.edu and Warhol-Down Warhol-down.1@osu.edu. They will inform all applicants about their admissions decisions by March 15, 2010.

Fees
The cost of the 2010 Project Narrative Summer Institute is $1,000. Of this amount, $200 must be paid within ten days after your acceptance in order to hold your place and the other $800 must be paid by May 14, 2010. This fee does not include housing.

Rationale
"Narrative understanding"; "narrative explanation"; "narrative as a way of thinking"; "narrative as self-construction" : these phrases are now common currency in the conversations of literary critics, historians, philosophers, social scientists, therapists, legal scholars, and even some scientists and medical professionals, as their disciplines reflect on the ubiquity and power of storytelling. This Narrative Turn, with its cross-disciplinary consensus about the importance of narrative, invites investigation into narrative's form and effects, into its production and consumption. What is it about character, plot, ways of telling, and other elements of narrative that make it such a widely-deployed way of organizing and explaining experience and knowledge? More simply, how does narrative work in itself, how does it try to work on audiences, and how do audiences work with and against it?
The Project Narrative Summer Institute will explore these questions in conjunction with a group of diverse literary narratives--diverse both in their media and in their cultural origins—and, in so doing, provide insight into essential elements of narrative and narrative theory. Even as the institute explores such theoretical issues as the dynamics of narrative transmission, the architecture of narrative worlds, and the distinction between fictional and nonfictional narrative, it will emphasize the value of establishing two-way traffic between narrative and narrative theory, that is, of recognizing that just as theory informs our understanding of individual narratives, so too do narratives lead us to revise, extend, and on occasion overturn existing theory.

Narrative Texts
We will put a range of work in narrative theory (structuralist, feminist, cognitive, rhetorical, and more) in dialogue with the following set of diverse narratives: five short stories by mainstream and multicultural authors--Edith Wharton's "Roman Fever," Ernest Hemingway's "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place"; Toni Morrison's "Recitatif," Sandra Cisneros's "Barbie-Q," and John Edgar Wideman's "Doc's Story"; one novel, Jane Austen's Persuasion; one graphic narrative (that is, a comics-style text using a sequence of panels with text and image to tell its story), Alison Bechdel's Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic; and one film, Danny Boyle and Loveleen Tandan's Slumdog Millionaire. Participants should read Persuasion and Fun Home in advance of the institute.

Theoretical Texts
Among others, the readings in narrative theory will include foundational work in narratology by Gérard Genette, Gerald Prince, Dorrit Cohn, Mikhail Bakhtin, and Uri Margolin; ethnically centered, queer, and feminist essays by Frederic Luis Aldama, Susan S. Lanser, Susan Stanford Friedman, and Robyn Warhol; work in cognitive narratology by David Herman and Alan Palmer; in neo-marxist theory by Alex Woloch; in rhetorical narrative theory by James Phelan; and in narrative approaches to post-modernism by Brian McHale and Brian Richardson.

Participants' Responsibilities
In addition to active engagement with the readings, the other participants, and the directors in seminar meetings and informal activities, each participant will help set the agenda for one of our discussions by formulating 2 questions about the reading that will be distributed the day before the session. Each participant will bring to the seminar a project to develop over the course of the two weeks, e.g., the development of a lesson plan or course syllabus; a draft of a research proposal; an outline of a journal article.

Housing and Transportation
The Institute will reserve a block of reasonably priced rooms in nearby places. Costs range from $100 to $119 per night. Details to follow, including information for those interested in sharing rooms. There are many housing options available in Columbus, and the organizers can provide some assistance to those who would like to explore house-sitting or other options. Columbus enjoys a functional public transit system, especially within certain locations, and again the organizers can give advice about better and worse locations for linking with the transit system.

Location
Ohio State University's beautiful campus is an ideal place for two weeks of intellectual and cultural stimulation in mid-summer. OSU is in session for summer quarter, so all offices, amenities, and facilities on campus are up and running. Institute participants will have ID cards that grant them OSU faculty privileges, including complimentary membership at the Faculty Club and access to the state-of-the-art recreational center. Participants can use an English department computer laboratory equipped with twenty networked computers, document scanners and other technological needs.

The Ohio State library, one of the largest research libraries in the U.S., will be available for use by the Institute's participants. After a spectacular renovation it opened in 2009 as one of the most striking and convenient places in the country for doing academic work. It has the leading journals in narrative studies and excellent holdings in the novel and in narrative theory.

Columbus has many of the advantages of a large multicultural urban area while being more convenient than many more heavily populated cities. Near the campus is the celebrated Short North district, full of restaurants, galleries, boutiques, and cafés. July 4 brings elaborate public celebrations in several areas of the city. Summer in Columbus also means Shakespeare and poetry in the park, and music of all kinds (classical, popular, jazz) in the open air and in concert halls. The Columbus Museum of Art frequently brings in special exhibits to supplement its already fine collection, and the University's own Wexner Center for the Arts has a very active exhibit series. In addition to the university's comprehensive recreational and athletic facilities, those interested in sports can take advantage of the city's many bike and running trails and its extensive park system.

Detailed Schedule of Topics, Readings, and Discussions

Unit I: Monday and Tuesday, June 28-29 (sessions run from 9:30 to 12:30)
The Narrative Transaction: Authors, Narrators, Narration, Audiences

Readings for Monday: Edith Wharton, "Roman Fever"; Sandra Cisneros, "Barbie-Q"; Ernest Hemingway, "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place"

Readings for Tuesday: Robyn Warhol, section from Gendered Interventions; Gerald Prince, "On Narratology: Criteria, Corpus, Context"; Susan S. Lanser, "Sexing the Narrative: Propriety, Desire, and the Engendering of Narratology"; Frederick Aldama, "Ethnicity" (chapter from Teaching Narrative Theory); John Edgar Wideman, "Doc's Story"; Toni Morrison, "Recitatif"

Interlude I: Wednesday, June 30 No session in morning. Afternoon: Screening of Slumdog Millionaire

Unit II: Thursday and Friday, July 1-2 Narrative Worlds: Space, Setting, Perspective

Readings for Thursday (in addition to Slumdog): Brian McHale, section from Postmodernist Fiction on postmodern worlds; David Herman, "Spatialization," from Story Logic; Susan Friedman, "Spatial Poetics and Arhundati Roy's The God of Small Things"

Readings for Friday (in addition to all narratives considered this week): Gérard Genette, excerpts from Narrative Discourse on "Perspective and Focalization; Dorrit Cohn, "Introduction" to Transparent Minds; Alan Palmer, "Cognitive Approaches" from Social Minds in the Novel

Unit III: Monday and Tuesday, July 5-6: Time, Plot, Progression

Readings for Monday: Jane Austen, Persuasion; Genette, "Order" from Narrative Discourse; Mikhail Bakhtin, excerpt from "Forms of Time and the Chronotope in the Novel"

Readings for Tuesday: Brian Richardson, "A Theory of Narrative Beginnings and the Beginnings of 'The Dead' and Molloy; James Phelan, Introduction to Experiencing Fiction

Interlude II: Wednesday, July 7: No class session; work on projects

Unit IV: Thursday-Friday July 8-9: Character, Medium, and the Fiction/Nonfiction Distinction

Readings for Thursday: Alison Bechdel, Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic; Alex Woloch, excerpt from the Introduction to The One and the Many; Uri Margolin, "Introducing and Sustaining Characters in Literary Narrative"

No new readings for Friday, but the Same Subjects Continued for half the final session

Friday, July 9: Our Chapter Ends but the Story Continues