The Role of Unexpected Events in Stories: J. Bruner’s and C. Feldman’s Florentine Seminar

This book stems primarily from the intention to make public the seminar entitled ＂Narratives and Cultural Psychology＂ held by J. Bruner and C. Feldman in May 2000 in Florence. This seminar represents the point of view of these two authors, at an important moment in their scientific and human careers, on two themes: narratives and interpretative communities.

The central concept on which this book works is the Aristotelian concept of peripeteia which, born in the world of art, is developed by Bruner in the field of cognitive and cultural psychology and by Feldman in the concept of interpretative community.

Thus the first purpose of this book is to analyze the role and usefulness of this concept in the study of the world of stories and culture

The second aim of this book is to explain, clarify and comment on the concept, the theoretical assumptions and the key words used by the two authors, while also exploring the issues addressed. In this way, the author wanted to reflect on what contribution this seminar offers today to the theme of narratives and cultural psychology and what the future prospects might be.

This book is aimed at students and scholars interested in exploring the role that stories play in human culture.

Andrea Smorti has a master degree in Philosophy (University of Florence), a specialization in School Psychology (University of Siena) and in Sport Psychology (University of Rome). He was Dean of the Faculty of Psychology of the University of Florence and he is currently full Honorary Professor in the School of Psychology - University of Florence. Using a Cultural Psychology stance in the last three decades he has been studying the problem of autobiographical narrative in different personal and social contexts, with particular regard to painful and illness experiences.