One thing that makes the TNT Lab approach different from many other approaches to narrative is what we call the “ternary structure of narrative.”
By Solon Simmons
Ternary is just a word complimentary to binary, implying that there are three essential pieces to the whole instead of only two. This three part structure destabilizes the binary, casting it in a kind of perpetual motion.
The binary in question here can be thought of in terms of logic and emotion, explanation and evaluation, reason and rhetoric, or instrumental and value rational action. In our narrative approach, we break down this binary by including a third term that unites the two, what has been described since Hegel as a “dialectic.”
This third term does not erase the polarizing binary between these concepts, but it does bind them in a way that changes them in a fundamental sense. Our argument is that narrative is one of those concepts that transcends or engages the binary in a way that forces us to see the parts in terms of a larger complex.
The easiest way to see what we mean is to look at the figure below.
In this figure we have several moving parts. Let’s consider this cluster of elements first:
This first part of any given political story is what we can associate with the logic / explanation / reason / instrumental side of the animating binary contrast. This is what most people think of as rationality. if you want to get something done, you should take an action for which you have some theory (implicit or explicit) that connects that action to some desired outcome. If you take an action and don’t believe it will produce the outcome—controlling for third variables, feedback, and contextual effects—then it does not make sense to take that action.
The second part of any given political story is what we can associate with the emotion / evaluation / rhetoric / value side of the binary.
This pole of the binary is the second phase of a rational action. After all, if you are trying to produce a set of outcomes but don’t know how you feel about it when you have achieved them, then your action is not particularly rational; it’s more habitual than anything else.
We can think of this second part of the binary as the ends-based decision, involving the way a person attaches abstract values to particular states of the world. It complements the means-based decision that links the action with the outcome itself.
In this model, “theory” is what links actions with outcomes and “values” are what link outcomes with our moral feelings about them, bridging the gap between what the sociologist Max Weber called instrumental and value rational action. If either of these two processes are missing in a given decision, the action taken is only partially rational. To quote Herbert Marcuse, it is “one-dimensional.”
We might further associate each of these aspects of rational action with our received characterizations of the parts of the brain. The instrumental side of the binary is “left brain” thinking. The evaluative side of the binary is “right brain” thinking. The left side of the diagram emphasizes rational calculation and logic. The right side emphasizes creativity, imagination, and emotion, and we speak of feelings and not emotions here to emphasize a steadier state instead of a fleeting moment of affective arousal. We can come to know in a rational way how we would feel if a kitten were mistreated in a given situation, even though we might have many contrasting feelings based on the context.
These two sides of the binary keep us located in the neocortex of our brains. We can think about this stuff. We never really see our theories or our values, but we can come to know them and hold them as objects of our conscious attention. We can write them down and present them in models and words that others can understand. These things are part of our mammalian heritage.
But we have an older and deeper part of brain as well, what used to be called the “reptilian” brain. Here, we think fast, using the amygdala and limbic system to infuse powerful unconscious emotions into our conscious thoughts. This deep brain is in many respects more powerful than our consciousness and is the source of the third or ternary part of our model.
This third part is produced in the synthesis of ratiocination and emotion. It’s what happens when we hear or see a good story. The concrete events and actions are things we can think about and be conscious of, but in the context of the story, they carry us along through paths of empathy and emotion. They invoke our foundational brain, attaching our snap judgments to symbolic representations in the story.
Adolph Hitler becomes a trope activating the whole story complex—a signifier schema. This trope and many others like it can be attached to a story by insinuation or outright association. It can be spoken or suggested. A simple gesture toward a distinguishing mustache can do the trick. Projecting a swastika onto an image can arouse anger, fear and disgust.
And yet the whole complex remains available. A person can slow the judgment process down and examine the parts and reflect on explanations, value judgments, and juxtapositions. Nevertheless, the story comes together in this process of ternary linkage. When neocortex meets limbic system, the person “gets it.” The story comes together. It all makes sense. Sense-making is a ternary process.
This complex of elements helps to explain why some people like to focus on “policy” or “technical accounts” while others rely more on their gut and values. When the political consultant Ben Wattenberg argued that in politics Values Matter Most, he was really arguing that we have to learn to pay attention to narrative.
Values matter when they fit the story. The story needs a technical account to make it plausible. Without a story, you have no meaning; and with no meaning, you have no reason to care about what happens one way or another.
So if you care about what you are doing, you need a narrative theory. and if you have a narrative theory, you are working with a ternary concept, one that transcends the Cartesian split between mind and body, faith and reason.
To cite this article
Simmons, Solon. “The Ternary Structure of Narrative.” The Narrative Transformation Lab. https://tntlab.carterschool.gmu.edu/learn/narrative-transformation-guides/the-ternary-structure-of-narrative/.