ABSTRACT
This Introduction present an overview of key concept discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. Interdisciplinary narrative studies are inspired by the broader scientific and philosophical trend of regarding minds and worlds to be thoroughly interconnected. A mind in action is a mind emerging in dialogue with a world. However, both 'mind' and 'world' are such large-scale notions that specific narrative-related questions involving them must be formulated in order to establish their descriptive and methodological potential. The interest in minds and worlds comes together in the development of cognitive-theoretically informed narratology, which has taken great strides toward understanding the processes of immersion and readerly orientation within the storyworld and the perceptual positioning on the levels of storyworld, narration, and the actual reading process. The theoretical and methodological exchange between the different fields of narrative studies has often remained superficial, largely neglecting the empirical basis and semiotic sensitivity fundamental to inter- and transdisciplinary research.
