The Linguistics Of Narrating Personal Experience
Sociolinguist William Labov on the 6 key linguistic elements for analyzing people’s everyday stories of life
The sociolinguist William Labov is probably most well known for his research on “oral narratives of personal experience.” In other words, the many kinds of stories we tell in everyday conversation with friends, co-workers, and family.
Labov defines an oral narrative of personal experience as “a report of a sequence of events that have entered into the biography of the speaker by a sequence of clauses that correspond to the order of the original events.”
Here’s a simple example that Labov gives of how a ‘sequence of clauses’ in everyday conversation builds up into narrative.
- Well, this man had a little too much to drink
- and he attacked me
- and a friend came in
- and she stopped it.
The compelling power of narrative
In a classic 1967 paper, co-authored with linguist Joshua Waletzky called “Narrative analysis: Oral versions of personal experience,” Labov and Waletzky proposed a theory of ‘personal experience storytelling.’
