NARRATIVE INQUIRY, 14(1), 69–85Copyright 2004, John Benjamins B.V., AmsterdamA MODEL OF NARRATIVECIRCULATIONVilma H¨anninenUniversity of Tampere, FinlandThis article suggests that narrative meaning structures have different modes of ex-istence: the “told”, the “inner” and the “lived” modes. Their definitions and mutualrelationships are presented in the form of a schematic model. The inner narrativerepresents the experiental mode of narrative form. It is an individual’s interpreta-tion of his/her life, in which the past events, present situation and future projectsare understood using cultural narrative models as resources. It is (partly) madeexternal by told narratives, and validated/revised in that process. The lived narra-tive, again, refers to the real-life drama, which is shaped in the interplay betweensituational constraints and the inner narrative that guides one’s actions in chang-ing life situations. The article reviews narrative research focusing on the studiesand discussions related to the relations between the different modes of narrativity.(Narrative Theory, Narrative Methodology, Inner Narrative, Lived Narrative)Recent decades have witnessed a rapid increase of interest in narrative invarious branches of human science. This phenomenon has been called the“narrative boom”, “narrative turn” or sometimes even “narrative explosion”.The fascination with the concept of narrative seems to stem from its abilityto bring together various disciplines, as well as to bridge the gap betweenscience and art. Narrative research is like a huge buffet to which differentdisciplines bring their own methods and views for others to share. Ideas,concepts and methods are mutually borrowed and a happy family atmosphereis created. Sometimes, however, this abundance may be difficult to digest,and some of the family members may feel they do not know each otherafter all.Requests for further information should be directed to Vilma H¨anninen, Department ofSociology and Social Psychology, 33014 University of Tampere, Finland.E-mail: [email protected] VILMA H¨ANNINENLess metaphorically speaking, the concept of narrative has the potentialto integrate the knowledge and understanding provided by separate researchfields of human sciences. I want to argue that this potential can be fullyrealised by conceptually organising this multiplicity and by recognising thatthe term narrative or story can be used to mean different things in differ-ent contexts.In recent years, several authors have presented ways of organising the fieldof narrative research, especially that of narrative research on illness (Bury,2001; Hyd´en, 1997; Mishler, 1995; Murray, 2000). This paper is yet anothersuch attempt with the general aim of defining, organising, and discussingsome of the main concepts used in narrative research.To achieve this end I will propose a schematic model of different modesof narrativity in human life and use it as a scheme by which narrative studiescan be classified and located in relation to each other. The scheme also makesit possible to identify the main theoretical and methodological questions andcontroversies related to narrative research. The model should be seen as aheuristic device for organising narrative research.MODES OF EXISTENCE OF THE NARRATIVE FORMThe basis of the model is the concept of narrative form. It can be defined sim-ply as a structure of meanings related to human events, by which the eventsare seen as parts of a plot, related to “human predicaments and attemptedresolutions” (Sarbin, 1986). Thus defined, the concept of narrative form isnot bound to a specific mode of existence, for example, a verbal account.The narrative form can be seen to exist in three modes. The first of these isthe most familiar and evident, namely the told narrative. The told narrative iswhat we encounter as an empirical phenomenon: the symbolic representation,most often verbal, of a chain of human events. In narrative research, the toldstories of interest are most often autobiographical stories that people tellabout their lives.The concept of inner narrative, on the other hand, refers to the narra-tive organisation of experience, the story we tell to ourselves. The innernarrative is the focus of interest of narrative psychology. The idea that hu-man experience is to a large extent organised through narrative form hasbeen presented by several classic writers of narrative research. For example,MODEL OF NARRATIVE CIRCULATION 71Theodore Sarbin has formulated the well-known “narratory principle” ac-cording to which “human beings think, perceive, imagine, interact and makemoral choices according to narrative structures” (Sarbin, 1986, p. 9), andDavid Carr (1986, p. 65) has argued that narrative is a “primary way oforganising and giving coherence to our experience”.The concept of lived narrative is based on the idea that there is a narra-tive quality inherent in human life itself. As Alasdair MacIntyre (1981) hasargued, human actions are to be understood as enacted narratives. Humanlife consists of interlocking narrative-like episodes which have their relativebeginnings, middles, and ends. The narrative organisation of lived life canbe seen as the basis of narrative organisation of experience, as David Carr(1986), for instance, has argued.The fascination with the concept of narrative seems to lie precisely in itsability to refer to all these aspects at the same time, in the idea of a basicaffinity between narrative expression, experience and life itself. However, inmy view it is important also to see the differences between the modes ofexistence of narrative form. Making this distinction allows us to explore thedynamics of their relationships.In narrative research, the empirical data typically consists of told narra-tives. The studies differ, however, in regard to their ultimate focus of interest.In some studies, the interest lies in the told narratives themselves. Forinstance, the narratological study of literature or folklore focuses on thestructures or tropes of narratives, and these are not studied as reflections ofanything beyond themselves (e.g. Prince, 1982). In anthropological or socialscientific studies on storytelling in various cultural groups or organisations,the told stories are analysed as expressions of the culture in question (e.g.Boyce, 1995; Steffen, 1997). Then again, sociolinguistic or microsociologicalstudies analyse the structures of