Professor Barnhurst

Professor Barnhurst’s lecture is the most interesting lecture to me because the fact that it applies to everyone on an everyday basis no matter whom you are or where you are from. We are always telling stories and I have never really noticed all of these patterns.

Professor Barnhurst led off his lecture with an exercise called speed narrating where you tell a story for one minute about something important that happened recently to a partner taking notes on the story. Then switch and repeat. Two groups then debrief compare notes and look for patterns from the stories. Some patterns found were the stories were not very detailed, about school or family and the notes were short among others.

After the exercise professor Barnhurst informed everyone of the recurring pattern that happens with storytelling. It always starts with an abstract like, “that reminds me,” to let people know that you are going to start telling a story. The abstract leads into the setting to get the other person to understand the who, what, where. The complicating action then tells what you thought about what happened and what mindset you are in. after telling what happened comes the resolution or the response. The more important part of what always happens is the interpretation. This is because the interpretation happens throughout the story. How someone starts the story can trigger a response of “here we go again” and can also change throughout the story.

The storytelling outline can be compared to the basic model of communication and more so the in depth Schramm’s model of communication. With the encoder sending the message to the decoder who interprets what was heard and responds and continues in this cycle.

The interpretation of the story can also be compared to the class topic of perception. The third step in perception, interpretation, attaches meaning to what is being heard and also plays into the cultural differences. This also connects to code switching where you shift to different styles or dialects in order to match the communication style of the other person. For example I will tell my mom a story a different way than I would my friends and even my sister. By code switching the interpretation and also the judgment will change by your wording and how you are telling the story.

I wish I could get more into the judgment and the difference between judgment and interpretation but professor Barnhurst’s lecture cutoff early. It is too bad because I was really getting into what he was saying.