The 6th International Conference of the European Narratology Network, will take place in Riga (Latvia) on September 15-16, 2020 at the RISEBA University of Business, Arts and Technology in Riga. Preconference Doctoral Seminar, September 14, 2020.
‘Gaslight’ Narratives in Virtual Landscapes: Narratological Implications of Technologically Mediated and Immersive Media
The ENN6 conference addresses the fusion of new technologies with unreliable, paradoxical, or disturbing narratives, which draw readers and viewers into a story, geospatially and cognitively, by means of blurring the boundaries between real and virtual spaces or alternative ones. At the vortex of the discourse are ‘Gaslight’ structures that undermine or destroy impartiality in narrative perception, since the very ‘modus operandi’ of progressive virtual technologies, under the guise of various ‘immersive’ scenarios, significantly alters all storytelling devices. It is not only within Cinematic Virtual Reality (VR), Extended Reality (XR) or Mixed Reality (MR) but also within any narrative format blending traditional and new mediums that Gaslight Narratives occur as a set of narrative strategies that seek to destabilize the critical faculties of its audience or readers through misdirection, contradiction, and cognitive manipulation both in content and form.
ENN6 will discuss the narrative and technological devices and strategies that undermine logic and reason with the effects of surprise, confusion, self-doubt or disappointment emerging subconsciously out of such transmedial and perturbatory narratives. ENN6 will aim at a set of suggestions for future exploration in the emerging vectors of narratology warning against the unchecked dominance of ‘gaslight’ narratives in all forms of media shaping the global political and social climate so as to corrupt the world as we know it, with or without the aid of a virtual apparatus.
The ultimate aim of the conference is to extend the boundaries of narratological discourse, both in its classical and post-classical conceptions, within the framework of the technological diversification of Virtual Reality. The topics listed below are meant as a guideline for possible contributions. Contributions are to be strictly limited to 20 minutes (ca. 2,500 words).