ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the notion of public sphere presupposes the existence of a public in the form of what B. Anderson calls an ‘imagined community’. It introduces the concept of narrative, analyses the narrative structure of public discourse, and explores the mechanism of symbolic mediation of political relationships - power, authority, status, solidarity and differences - in terms of the notion of narrative genre. The chapter explains how in the public sphere, the changing narrative construction of events hinges on the interplay among three factors: the value themes or codes prevailing in the community, the modes of narration used in public discourse, and the mobilizational strategies of the political actors. It presents a theory of narrative progression in more dynamic terms, theorizing a particular instance in which an event starts off as a heroic romance and then develops into an irony. The narrative development of an event is seldom straightforward and without incoherence.
