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Vernacular Meaning Making. Examples of narrative impact in fiction film questioning the 'banal' notion in mediatization theory.

The outcome of an audience study and conducted in-depth interviews with film viewers in Sweden 2012 discussing favorite films, will support theories about stories as a primary mean by which we make sense of our experience through time (Nussbaum 1983, Lynch 2007, Axelson 2011). Empirical examples of narrative impact is presented when specific fiction film scenes (Avatar, Amelie de Montmartre, Gladiator) condensate spectators’ emotional lives, identities, and beliefs. It calls for a development of theories which in more detail explores spectator’s narrative competence when being absorbed by fiction (Johnston 2007, Plantinga 2009, Oliver & Hartmann 2010).

A conclusion is that narrative impact is partly related to fiction emotions but most importantly when spectators are testing the emotional realism of the narrative (Ang 1985) for a larger significance beyond the media, connecting diegetical fiction experiences with spectator’s extra-diegetical world through ‘thick viewing’ (Johnston 2007) or ‘high cognition’ (Avila 2007).

In relation to individualized meaning making processes in secularized society, I argue that the notion ‘banal’ in mediatization theory (Hjarvard 2008; 2012, Petersen 2012), is unsatisfactory on a micro level. As a semantically charged concept it is problematic when analyzing empirical examples of spectators’ use of fiction narratives in a more profound way, trying to grasp the interplay between spectators’ fiction emotions and moral assessments of real life significance.