[Note: Numbers in square brackets refer to paragraphs.]

Introduction [1-3]

Types of databases

Databases as they appear in new media^* are "collections of items on which the user can perform various operations: view, navigate, search".

This is what distinguishes the experience of a database in a media object from that of a narrative. Cinematic and literary narrative, the architectural layout, and the database "each present a different model of what a world is like. In this sense the database is "a cultural form of its own".

Thus, the concept of the database may provide a new concept for thinking about ourselves and how our lives are organized.

CD-ROMs and web sites are typical media for database structure. They allow multiple routes through the data (random access). In the case of web sites, they are open to change and, thus, not necessarily complete or self-contained.

Data and Algorithm (The Ontology of the Computer)

Not all new media objects are organized explicitly as databases, e.g. computer games are experienced as narrative.

General Principle of New Media: "the projection of the ontology of a computer onto culture itself… The world is reduced to two kinds of software objects which are complementary to each other: data structures and algorithms."

Data Structure (def.): "data organized in a particular way for efficient search and retrieval".

Database and narrative are in opposition to one another in the sense that a database is inherently unordered; narrative is inherently ordered.

"Data structures and algorithms drive different forms of computer culture. CD-ROM’s, Web sites and other new media objects which are organized as databases correspond to the data structure; while narratives, including computer games, correspond to the algorithms." [14]

In other words, database is to data structure as narrative is to algorithm.

"In general, creating a work in new media can be understood as the construction of an interface to a database."

"Historically, the artist made a unique work within a particular medium. Therefore the interface and the work were the same; in other words, the level of an interface did not exist. With new media, the content of the work and the interface become separate. It is therefore possible to create different interfaces to the same material." [17]

"The new media object consists of one or more interfaces to a database of multimedia material." [17]

To clarify the distinction between database and narrative it's important to state what we mean by "narrative". In order to qualify as a narrative, an object must satisfy the following criteria:

1. It must contain and actor and a narrator.

2. It must include the levels of text, story, and fabula [creator].

3. It must be constituted by "a series of connected events caused or experienced by actors." [19]

The database is a support or foundation for the narrative which is, in turn, the interface to the database. An interface which offers only a single path through the database results in a traditional narrative. When the interface offers multiple paths to the "reader", a hyper-narrative results. [19]

There are two dimensions to keep in mind when thinking about the role of databases and narratives.

Syntagmatic and paradigmatic dimensions:

• syntagm is material, linear, explicit and present to perception

• paradigm is nonmaterial, implicit or relational (by means of sets or categories) and, thus, not present to perception (conceptual). [23-4]

"To use the example of natural language, the speaker produces an utterance by stringing together the elements, one after another, in a linear sequence [e.g., 'There are no chairs in this room.' The words in the sentence are the elements strung together.] This is the syntagmatic dimension… [In the paradigmatic dimension] each new element is chosen from a set of other related elements. For instance, all nouns form a set; all synonyms of a particular word form another set. [So, in the example above, 'chair' and 'room' are chosen from the set of all nouns. Other non-grammatical categories could be identified just as well. So, for example, 'no' and 'in' belong to the set of all words with only two letters.] In the original formulation of Saussure, 'the units which have something in common are associated in theory and thus form groups within which various relationships can be found.' This is the paradigmatic dimension." [23]

How does this relate to new media? In traditional literary and cinematic contexts, "the database of choices from which narrative is constructed (the paradigm) is implicit; while the actual narrative (the syntagm) is explicit." [25]

"New media reverses this relationship. Database (the paradigm) is given material existence, while narrative (the syntagm) is de-materialised. Paradigm is privileged, syntagm is downplayed. Paradigm is real, syntagm is virtual." [26]

"Why does new media insist on this language-like sequencing? My [Manovich's] hypothesis is that it follows the dominant semiological order of the twentieth century — that of cinema… New media continues this mode, giving the user information one screen at a time. " [30]

What determines whether a cultural object takes on a narrative or database form? Manovich rules out the mode of access as a way of explaining cinema's predominantly narrative forms vs. the database-style, random access structure of many CDs, DVDs, hard drives, etc. For example, the book lends itself to random access, but supports both narratives and collections of data.

"Rather than trying to correlate database and narrative forms with modern media and information technologies, or deduce them from these technologies, I prefer to think of them as two competing imaginations, two basic creative impulses, two essential responses to the world. Both have existed long before modern media." [32]

Manovich claims that "we want new media narratives, and we want these narratives to be different from the narratives we saw or read before". How can database and narrative work together to produce these new media objects? [36]

"[N]ew media artists working on the database/narrative problem can learn from cinema 'as it is.' For cinema already exists right in the intersection between database and narrative. We can think of all the material accumulated during shooting forming a database, especially since the shooting schedule usually does not follow the narrative of the film but is determined by production logistics. During editing the editor constructs a film narrative out of this database, creating a unique trajectory through the conceptual space of all possible films which could have been constructed. From this perspective, every filmmaker engages with the database-narrative problem in every film, although only a few have done this self-consciously." [37]

database

narrative

hyper-narrative

algorithm

data structure

interface

montage

syntagm

paradigm

* Manovich identifies "new media" as comprised of "cultural objects which use digital computer technology for distribution and exhibition. Thus, Internet, Web sites, computer multimedia, computer games, CD-ROMs and DVD, Virtual Reality, and computer-generated special effects all fall under new media. Other cultural objects which use computing for production and storage but not for final distribution -- television programs, feature films, magazines, books and other paper-based publications, etc. -- are not new media." ["New Media from Borges to HTML", Lev Manovich.] [return]