Semiotic Analysis of a Folk Tale: a Topic Map by Irene Soave

Vladimir Propp’s Morphology of the Folk Tale Russian Formalist approache extended to the study of narrative structures. In the Formalist approach, sentence structures in narrative had been broken down into analysable elements (“morphemes”). Propp used this method by analogy to analyse folk tales. Ignoring narrative tone or mood, or extraneous decorative detail, and just analysing types of characters and kind of action in a hundred Russian folk tales, and breaking them into their smallest narrative units, which he called functions… …Propp arrived at a typology of narrative structures. He arrived at the conclusion that there were just thirty-one generic functions and eight roles in the traditional Russian folk tale.

Roles and Functions 8 Roles: Hero, Anti- or False- Hero, Villain, Donor, Helper, Dispatcher, Sought-for Person, Father of the Sought-for Person 31 functions (“mythemes”): Initial Situation, Absentation, Interdiction, Violation, Reconnaissance, Delivery, Complicity, Villainy/Lack, Mediation, Counteraction, Departure, 1st function of donor, Hero's Reaction, Receipt of Magic Agent, Spatial Transference, Struggle, Branding, Victory, Liquidation, Return, Pursuit, Rescue, Unrecognized ArrivaL, Unfounded claims, Difficult task, Solution, Recognition, Exposure, Transfiguration, Punishment, Wedding.

Characters & Roles in Cinderella Hero Cinderella False – hero The Step - sisters Villain The Step - Mother Donor Cinderella’s Mother Helper The Birds Dispatcher The Dispatcher Sought – for person The Prince Father of The King

A Topic Map for the Semiotic Analysis of Cinderella Our Topic Map will take into consideration a particular aspect in the semiotic analysis: it will map the relationships between roles, between characters, and between the two levels of content. The content we want to map is, in a certain sense, already “marked-up”: we have a base “content level”, which is the narrative level, and an upper one, the semiotic, which is basically comprised of statements about the first. Consequently, it is important for us that the difference between the two levels remains visible.

…it does, for example, if we avoid establishing a “Class/Instance”- relationship between roles and characters. In our topic map this relationship is expressed in the form of a “performs” association. In so doing, we keep the two levels distinct, yet highlighting the association between them. We also keep clear that this association is precisely valid in this tale (= that in other tales, like, for example, “Snow-white”, the topic Cinderella is no instance of the topic Hero, which nevertheless is there still valid)

… Functions Characters Roles Hero Villain Donor Prince Helper King Narrative Topics Semiotic Topics Functions Characters Roles Villainy Cinderella Step-sisters Hero Villain Testing Mother Step-mother False-hero Donor Wedding Birds Prince Helper Sought-for Person … King Father

<topic id="cinderella"> <baseName> <baseNameString> Cinderella </baseNameString> </baseName> <occurrence> <resourceData> stupid goose </resourceData> </occurrence> <resourceData> proud princess </resourceData> <resourceData> little stunted kitchen-wench </resourceData> <resourceData> true bride </resourceData> <resourceData> maiden </resourceData> </topic>

<topic id="hero"> <subjectIdentity> <subjectIndicatorRef xlink:href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Propp#hero"/> </subjectidentity> <instanceOf> <topicRef xlink:href="#role"> </instanceOf> <baseName> <scope> <topicRef xlink:href="#propp"> </scope> <baseNameString> Hero </baseNameString> </baseName> </topic>

… … Roles Hero Helper(s) Characters Cinderella Birds False-Hero Blue line = class/instance Relation Red line = “performs” Relation  association. This is no class/instance relation as we want to highlight the difference between narrative topics and semiotic topics (this text is an analysis, so this difference counts) Cinderella Step-sisters Birds …

<association id="Cinderella_Hero_association"> <instanceOf> <topicRef xlink:href="#performs"/> </instanceOf> <member> <roleSpec> <topicRef xlink:href="#character"> </roleSpec> <topicRef xlink:href="#cinderella"/> </member> <topicRef xlink:href="#role"/> <topicRef xlink:href="#hero"/> </association>

…The Class/Instance – relationship is, however, established on the level of associations between characters. The associations highlighted between the characters are “instances” of those between the roles – and actually, the performing of a role itself is tied to what relationships a character has with the others.

<association id="hero_Falsehero_assoc"> <instanceOf> <topicRef xlink:href="#opponentOf"/> </instanceOf> <topicRef xlink:href="#peerOf"/> <member> <roleSpec> <topicRef xlink:href="#goodie"/> </roleSpec> <topicRef xlink:href="#hero"> </member> <topicRef xlink:href="#baddie"/> <topicRef xlink:href="#falseHero"> </association>  

<association id="Cinderella_Stepsisters_assoc"> <instanceOf> <associationRef xlink:href="#hero_Falsehero_assoc"/> </instanceOf> <member> <roleSpec> <topicRef xlink:href="#goodie"/> </roleSpec> <topicRef xlink:href="#cinderella"> </member> <topicRef xlink:href="#baddie"/> <topicRef xlink:href="#stepsisters"> </association>

Conclusions: what can such a topic map be useful for? - It would make it possible, for example, to search in a database of tales, stories which have a role- (or function-) pattern similar to Cinderella’s; - Applied to a webpage, it would allow a search-engine user to find the page not only searching “Cinderella”, but also with semiotic searching keywords. That would be useful, for example, in case of searches for texts which contain examples of semiotic analysis (see Google)