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This chapter provides a general introduction to the treatise. After a brief background sketch, some basic terminology concerning the field of transmedial narration is covered. This is followed by an overview of existing research in the area and declarations of the central research questions, aims, and goals of the investigation. Finally, an overview of the treatise is presented.

This chapter puts narration into the area of communication at large. Narration does not exist independently of minds but is a result of people communicating with each other. Therefore, some general concepts for modeling communication and the work of communicating minds are provided, partly influenced by Charles Sanders Peirce’s semiotics. The importance of background knowledge for the realization of narration is emphasized and the issue of transmedial narration is related to some influential psychological and cognitive concepts.

This chapter concisely demarcates narration within the broad field of communication. The story, which should be understood as the scaffolding core of a narrative, is circumscribed as . This definition is precise enough to be operable, yet general enough to work transmedially. After specifying a number of vital implications of the definition, these implications are elaborated in the context of some concepts in semiotics and cognitive science.

This chapter explores the fundamental similarities and differences among media types to explain why different media types may narrate to different degrees. Based on a general conceptual framework for analyzing communication and a specific definition of narration, certain basic traits of media products that are significant for both communication at large and narration in particular are pinpointed. These basic traits are described in terms of the material, spatiotemporal, sensorial, and semiotic modalities of media. This conceptual framework makes it possible to distinguish between different ways of categorizing media; the differentiation between basic and qualified media types makes it possible to explain the differing narrative capacities of media types in a more refined way.

This chapter affords a broad conceptualization of communicating minds, which is essential for framing transmedial narration. It also suggests a methodical way of analyzing narrators and narratees that are external and internal to narratives. Distinctions are made between actual narrators/narratees and overarching and embedded virtual (represented) narrators/narratees in order to be able to discern both transmedial and media-specific narrative features. Whereas all narratives by definition require actual narrators and narratees, it is sometimes helpful to construe overarching virtual narrators or narratees that are internal to narratives and help in making sense of them. Narratives can also hold embedded virtual narrators and narratees creating stories within stories. Narrators additionally act as focalizers, delimiting the scope of narration in various ways.

This chapter scrutinizes the essential notion of represented events as a transmedial cornerstone of narration. Events should be understood as sudden or slow changes of conditions. Because events can be both concrete and abstract and generally very diverse, they can be represented by a broad range of media types far beyond the borders of verbal media. The distinction between actions and occurrences further helps to discern among different kinds of narratives: actions are events that result from acts of volition and occurrences are events that do not result from acts of volition. Finally, it is emphasized that some represented events are normally perceived to be more salient than others, which leads to hierarchization.

This chapter investigates temporal interrelations of represented events with an emphasis on dissimilarities among temporal interrelations. Two distinctions that are vital for grasping media differences are highlighted: possible temporal differences between (static or temporal) representing media products and (temporal) narratives, and potential temporal differences within narratives, more precisely between overall narratives and core stories. Particular attention is given to the convention of sequential decoding, which is important for inducing temporality in some forms of static media products. These explorations make it possible to understand both the transmedial possibilities and the media-specific restraints for narration.

This chapter offers a semiotically colored model for interrogating meaningfully interrelated events in narratives. Based on our minds’ inclination to perceive gestalts (i.e., intraconnected wholes), it is suggested that meaningful temporal interrelations among represented events be understood in terms of internal coherence. It is also put forward that the internal connections in narratives can be analyzed in terms of various sorts of contiguity, forming the basis for indices that bind together the numerous parts of narratives. Several theoretical perspectives and concepts, such as narrativization, are discussed. Finally, the results are demonstrated to be valid for the phenomenon of multimodal narration, which is central for understanding transmedial narration.

This chapter proposes some analytical tools for understanding how communication in general and narration in particular can be truthful to what one perceives to be the actual world; how it can achieve external truthfulness. These external connections are scrutinized in terms of various sorts of contiguity, forming the basis for indices that connect narratives to the perceived actual world. The proposed analytical tools are intended to make it possible to understand the many ways in which the represented events in narratives can be connected to phenomena outside the narratives. The standard concept for theorizing this issue within narratology—fictionality—is critiqued and replaced with a multifaceted concept of (lacking) external truthfulness.

This chapter illuminates and roughly summarizes some vital concepts and ideas of the whole treatise. Narration in four diverse qualified media types is explored: painting, instrumental music, mathematical equations, and guided tours. These qualified media types are grounded on partly very dissimilar basic media types, which also makes it possible to highlight the fundamental importance of media modalities for narration. The four investigations also illustrate how historically and socially qualified media types establish conventions that facilitate narration. Overall, the four investigations elucidate the usefulness of the theoretical framework developed in the treatise and highlight the media similarities and differences that make narration a profoundly transmedial but media-dependent phenomenon.