Historical narrative and enrichment of the meaningful horizon of cultural worlds

• Published in: Semiotica Vol. 2024; no. 260; pp. 203 - 219
• Main Authors: Gubman, Boris, Anufrieva, Karina
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: De Gruyter 25.09.2024
• Subjects: communication; cultural world; event; narrative; unlimited semiosis
• ISSN: 0037-1998; 1613-3692
• DOI: 10.1515/sem-2024-0142

Built on the results of collective experience expressed in language, cultural worlds are given to each of their inhabitants as integral ensembles constantly developing on the basis of unlimited semiosis via communication. Rooted in the very way of human intersubjectivity, communicative ability, and existence in time, historical narration serves as an important tool for increasing the meaningful potential and diachronic depth of cultural worlds. It should have integrity, thematic and plot certainty, problematic character, a chronotope system chosen by the author, as well as an efficient intrigue and composition focused on the intended reader who is able to decode its content. The historical narrative, unlike the literary one, should be based on truthful and reliable empirical data, despite the fact that the linguistic description in both cases assumes a connection between the past and the present. The historical narratives themselves, from the point of view of their epistemological status, have only greater or lesser reliability, since they depend on the interpretative intentions of their authors. The unpredictability of an event may trigger a confrontation between different kinds of narratives, undermining the power of the existing Encyclopedia that describes a cultural world. This problem can be fruitfully approached today on a cooperative platform of hermeneutics, semiotics, and analytical philosophy.