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ANNALS, AAPSS, 560, November 1998
By JEROMEBRUNER
17
18 THE ANNALSOF THE AMERICANACADEMY
irrelevant facts; they are immaterial. what about facts in a narrative fic-
Besides, irrelevant facts have an ex- tion? Nora's marital plight (married
ceedingly short half-life, if any at to a stiffly conventional husband) in
all-not just in the law but even in Ibsen's A Doll's House seems like
memory and perception. They some sort of prototypicalfact, or a set
scarcely make it to the Lost and of conjoinedfacts that make a plight.
Found. Notice, though, that her plight is a
Does all this add up to the charge fact not only in that remarkable play
that storytelling and theory construc- but also in daily life, where it serves
tion bring the very ontology of raw us as a way of making sense of things
facts into question? Perhaps not, but we encounter.Whois the copycat,life
it certainly makes one wonder what or art? RememberHerman Melville's
might be meant by eo ipse facts, Captain Veretrying Billy Budd at the
standing free and independent in a drumhead court where he condemns
place deceptively known as the real him to hang for striking Claggart
world. But even so, in spite of such dead? Was Melville trying to make
doubts, any sensible person knows sense of his father-in-law, Judge
that facts are, in some sense, just like Lemuel Shaw, the ardent abolitionist
hard rocks: they are there, even if who nonetheless condemned escaped
they are also products of our efforts slaves from the bench to be returned
to make sense of the world. Indeed, to their owners in the South, perhaps
they are there, like the very rock that to die? By the Queen'slaw on mutiny,
Dr. Johnson asked Boswell to kick. Billy must hang; Captain Vere says:
That much is plain enough even if we "Anangel must die."Wasthis Lemuel
believe that naked facts do not make Shaw, administering the much hated
sense until they are nested in our Fugitive Slave Law of 1793? Perhaps
conception of how the world really when fictions become a culture'swin-
is-nested in a theory or story that dows on the world, facts come to re-
places them. semble what is expected of them. In
To thicken the argument, let us classic Athens, when there were no
call all such conceptions about the plays by Sophocles, Aristophanes, or
real world fictions, whether scientific Euripides at the theater, citizens
or narrative fictions. A fiction is would often repair to the law courts
something made up, the Latin root of for their drama.
the word is fingo, fingere, finxi, fic-
tum, which means to shape, fashion, MAKINGFACTS
form, mold; also to arrange, to put in
order; also to represent, imagine, Let me begin our serious pursuits
conceive; and also, finally, to feign, with some fanciful philosophy.Socra-
fabricate, devise. A neutrino, then, is tes, let us say, has been returned to
a fact in certain branches of high- earth to reestablish his famed acad-
energy physics, one inferred to make emy. In preparation for opening day
theoretical sense of a set of tracks in and to becomebetter acquaintedwith
a cloud chamber in light of a theory the culture, he is holding a dialogue
about the composition of atoms. But with three distinguished baseball
20 THE ANNALSOF THE AMERICANACADEMY
umpires. "Howdo you call them from back roads. The resources of an an-
behind the plate?"he asks them. The nale are used after some questions
first says, "I call them like they are." are developed, for questions seem to
"Andyou?"he asks the second. "Icall make facts as well as being answered
them like I see them." The third re- by them.
plies, after a pause: "Theyain't noth- Plots and hypotheses lurk in those
ing until I call them."The classic, the chroniques and histoires, prescribing
modern, and the postmodern fact in what makes a fact a Fact or, at least,
a nutshell! What each of our umpires what makes it relevant to the matter
tells Socrates is true, of course, how- at hand. They are guides not only for
ever incommensurate their accounts putting facts together but for deter-
may be. But we should know that, mining what facts are worth their
when contradicting truths are also salt. Histoires simply coverlonger pe-
true, as Niels Bohr once remarked, riods than chroniques, a dynasty's
they must be Great Truths, for only rule rather than a king's, for exam-
the opposites of small truths are ple. Both provide the connective tis-
false. When one encounters such sue in the story of factually what
anomalies, Bohr warned, one is al- happened.
most certainly caught in the dilemma What is found in the archives may
of complementarity, irreconcilable sometimes lead to a new interpreta-
ways of conceiving of the world-like tion, just as the implicit interpreta-
specifying the velocity and the posi- tion in a growingchroniquemay have
tion of a particle at the same time. Let led to that annale in the first place.
us explore some matters more mun- That bumpy two-way street between
dane than particles or balls and interpretation and fact is, of course,
strikes to see what we can learn the high road into the infamous her-
about factuality. meneutic circle:we justify our choice
Consider historical facts first. The of bitty facts by appealing to how well
French Annales school of historians they fit into the whole, while support-
distinguishes between annales, ing our interpretation of the whole by
chroniques, and histoires. Annales celebrating how well it encompasses
are drawn up from what house-proud the parts. While not fatal, the herme-
historians like to call archival neutic circle should at least promote
sources-court records, property a certain modesty about the issue of
deeds, birth registers, tax rolls, old factuality-relevant factuality.
newspapers, and other hard-edged But facts are facts, one might say
stuff. That is where facts are found. (like the umpire who calls them like
But when is a birth register turned to they are). I would reply, Stop con-
for facts? Say, when a person has a founding relevance and factuality. I
hypothesis that provinces bordering wonder whether one can, so I want to
great through roads had more than try out a little case study that might
their share of Black Death. He or she help us judge. Here goes. The year is
starts examining registers along the 1997, the 50th anniversary of India's
Via Emilgia and Via Appia and com- independence. A small industry has
pares them with ones from towns on already developed exploring what it
WHATIS A NARRATIVEFACT? 21
leged but still dependent figure left though he did send his agent to Lon-
on his own may, for example, be a don looking for someone in the India
young prince left alone in the family Office or the Royal Household who
castle; or it may be a young mathe- might help out. Perhaps his donor,
matical genius whose mentor has inadvertently, was the mindless
gone off on indefinite holiday; or it Minie who designed the ill-fated rifle
may even be poor deserted Nana Sa- requiring the tainted cartridges!
hib, whose adoptive right to the Note that Propp's morphology re-
throne has been annulled by Lord quires an "arrow of time," a rather
Dalhousie (with the complicity of the fixed sequence unrolling over time. If
old peshwa who got an ?80,000 an- the sequence is broken, the tale is
nual pension in return). All of these destroyed-though functions can be
can serve as tokens of the general deleted with impunity. There need
type of the deserted young man of not be an actual donor of the gift, for
privilege driven off to a quest. example, so long as the gift comes to
the hero's hand at the prescribed
The fit of facts point in the story.Propp'sexploration
of the Helsinki archive variorum
Now take the next step. Consider texts revealed, by the way, that some
the young man's quest. It will be deletion is almost always the rule. A
somewhat (but not entirely) deter- student of mine, Walter Zaharodny,
mined by what sort of hero we started even found that people forget folk-
with in the first slot. A deserted royal tales they have heard by leaving out,
prince might go in search of a maiden deleting, but hardly ever by mixing
who might one day be a fit queen of up the order of things.
the realm, but the young mathemati- My purpose here is not to discuss
cal genius might better be searching folktales for their own sake. In fact,
for a solution to the twin primes con- Vladimir Propphas a very great deal
jecture or the three-color mapping to teach us about facts. But he is not
problem. Nana Sahib's quest is al- concerned with the verifiability or
ready given. truth about facts but with their
Now to the magic gift of the helper factlikeness, truthlikeness, or verisi-
or donor.What shall it be-a tireless militude. What makes something
horse, an endless golden thread, a seem like a fact when one encounters
Cray computerwith infinite memory, it? That is no trivial question. Verisi-
what? What fits the evolving tale will militude does for narrative what
depend on what has gone before, verification and verifiability do
which means, in reverse, that the for science and logic. Something's
further one gets into a narrative, the verisimilitude is the mark of whether
fewer the options left open. For exam- the illusion of reality is working.
ple, our deserted mathematical gen- Now, few topics in the history of phi-
ius might perhaps do better with a losophy have been flogged into more
Cray computer than an endless gold- abject correctness than verification
en thread. Poor Nana Sahib, by the and verifiability, and some philoso-
way, failed to find a magic donor, phers, like Richard Rorty (1979),
24 THE ANNALSOF THE AMERICANACADEMY
have even urged a moratorium on it. puters with unlimited memory are
I will spare you the details of the impossible, but they are a fitting fact
verifiability conditions for estab- for our story.
lishing the meaning of "an endless In a word, facts seem to shape
golden thread." But there has been themselves, even at times to be de-
precious little written on what makes rived from a body of canonical lore (I
anything truthlike.1Perhaps it defies called them "fictions" earlier) that
our analytic, formal efforts at eluci- human beings entertain about how
dation because verisimilitude is so reality really is. What is even more
utterly local and so context depen- striking is that the very same shap-
dent, not the elegant stuff of syllo- ing of facts by a common canonical
gisms, universals, and rules of infer- lore seems to be shared by large
ence. Yet, when we say of Ibsen's A masses of people, as in a particular
Doll's House, "That'sabsolutely true culture but even for humankind in
to life, Nora walking out on that bas- general. If, for example, something of
tard," it does seem to imply some- social import happens to us, our first
thing universal, and so we celebrate and almost irresistible impulse is to
the playwright for understanding the believe that it must have resulted
human plight. from an act performed by some hu-
Which brings us back to Vladimir man agent or agents with some pur-
Propp, for there is something pose in mind. This conviction or pre-
astonishingly systematic about the sumption seems to have the power to
way in which a lifelike story unfolds guide our attention and to shape our
its realness. It "fits the pieces to- experience. It cuts the world up into
gether" in the very way we expect categories appropriate to it. We look
truth to do. I want to borrow a term for and often find particulars that fit
that DerdreGentnerandA. Markman the requirements of such presump-
(1997) use in describing how analogy tions to a T. Often we are right; often
fits a target to its vehicle: they call it we are not. Survival depends on be-
the "aligning of systematicity." In ing more the former than the latter,
what way does Nora's plight match and in the main, as we will see in a
the ideally constructed plight of a moment, the presumptions that we
sensitive woman with an ambitious, acquire or that we are heir to serve
unfeeling husband? The local condi- us fairly well. Note in passing that
tion of Nora needs to fit an inherent these "shaping presumptions," if I
general condition that we take to be may call them that, have a great deal
canonical in the world. "Canonical"is in common with the narrative folk-
a difficult idea. It bespeaks some le- lore patterns that Vladimir Propp
gitimate expectancy. We seem to brought to our attention. Again, as
learn as much about such legitimate with Propp, they are types that can
expectancies from the play of narra- be instantiated by lots of different
tive imagination as we do from life tokens-that is to say, they reproduce
itself, like the magic donorgiving the well locally. Navajos, for example,
Cray computer to the abandoned who entertain strong beliefs about
young mathematical genius. Com- witchcraft, are readier to see injuri-
WHATIS A NARRATIVEFACT? 25
ous acts as being initiated by witch be-these are matters that are still
agents with malevolent purposes, subject to often bitter debate, though
and they have developed highly so- the debate gets less bitter as new
phisticated procedures for confirm- findings take us beyond the neo-
ing their beliefs (Kluckhohn 1962). social Darwinism that early flat-out
ContemporaryAmericans prefer bu- sociobiologists seem to have been
reaucrats to witches and are equally peddling.
adept in confirming their view of the We can settle for the while for two
world. fairly self-evident claims, both of
All of this suggests that we as hu- them neutral where the raging evolu-
man beings share certain suscepti- tionary issue is concerned. The first
bilities for seeing the world of reality is that while representations of the
in certain ways-sometimes locally world-what can be taken presump-
shared in a culture, sometimes virtu- tively as factual-may vary system-
ally universal. There is now a fierce atically from culture to culture, they
debate in progress among anthro- do not vary like crazy:the variations
pologists, biologists, psychologists, themselves seem to reflect certain
and, of course, philosophers about natural ways of using mind. As Dan
what to make of all this. Though the Sperber (1996) notes, even so pre-
debate is too rowdy to sum up, all sumably fancy-free a domain as how
sides seem to agree on certain things. we represent the supernatural shows
The first is negative. Nobodybelieves amazing commonalities across
any longer that "the mind [is] a cultures-perhaps more variability
universal learning device, equally than classifications of, say, the ani-
welcoming to any kind of cultural mal kingdom but not astonishingly
content"(Sperber 1996, 14). The cog- more so. The second claim is that
nitive revolution surely blew that odd particular cultural systems for repre-
notion out of the water; we cannot use senting reality, if they come easily
our heads just any old which way. and naturally, facilitate communica-
Plainly, there are certain ways of per- tion and joint activity within a cul-
ceiving, attending, thinking that ture and, in virtue of doing so, become
come more naturally and easily to memorable and passed on from gen-
human beings than do others. It is eration to generation-in some form
also now widely believed that these or other.That is enough on the evolu-
easy and natural ways reflect some- tionary side!
thing deep in the human being's I would want to add only one point
unique, species-specific cultural ad- to the immediately preceding
aptation to the world. For example, thoughts. It relates to what I called
we are the only species that operates internal fit or systematicity-the
on the belief that others have human way the constituents of a realized
minds equipped with intentions, be- version of some folktale hang to-
liefs, expectations (Tomasello, gether to make it seem realer than
Kruger, and Ratner 1993). How hu- life or truer than true. What is it that
man culture evolved to get that way, grips us about the appropriateness of
what its evolutionary history might Iseult lowering her flowing locks
26 THE ANNALSOF THE AMERICANACADEMY
from her window so that Tristan can tualizing story leaves one dizzied.
climb up to her? It is not the same as There is a Supreme Court holding of
recognizing the intuitive power of only a few years ago, in Freeman v.
Kepler'spre-Newtonian insights into Pitts (118 L. Ed.2d 108 [1992]). It is a
planetary motion-perhaps equally ruling on the status of a lower court's
beautiful but compelledby logical ne- earlier desegregation order to the
cessity. It is not logic but narrative Board of Education of DeKalb
cohesion that makes Iseult's intimate County,Georgia. That desegregation
act of bringing Tristan to her arms so order had failed, in its several years
compellinglyright-and so beautiful. of enforcement, to remedy racial im-
The factuality of that gesture cannot balance in the county's schools and
be isolated from the narrative out of had, incidentally, led to so-called
which it arises. white flight from the northern part of
Now my final point, and of course the county. The majority of the
it relates to journalists, perhaps to all Supreme Court ruled that the lower
intellectuals. If what I have been dis- court's desegregation order should
cussing is so, it would be absurd to now be terminated on the ground
think of journalism as just an art of that it was a "demographicchange"
fact gathering. If facts are sought af- that had now occurred in DeKalb
ter and shaped by the narrative con- County, despite the board's best
texts in which they have their life, effort, and the Court had no power to
then the goodjournalist in the grip of remedy "demographic changes." To
his or her function must be a master consider what happened in DeKalb
of narrative. It is his or her function County as a naked demographic
not simply to cherish the facts that do fact would be to ignore where facts
not yet make sense in anybody'sstory live. They live in context; what holds
but also to generate candidate narra- most human contexts together is a
tives that both handle those aberrant narrative.
facts and generate new ones. Andre
Gide once said that the novelist's Note
function is to disturb, and that is
1. The brief entry on verisimilitude in Si-
surely the sometime duty of the jour- mon Blackburn's Oxford Dictionary of Philoso-
nalist. On the other side, the journal- phy (1994) is given over to the verisimilitude
ist should be a master at recognizing of theories and relates to "atheory T ... [that]
the same old story in new dress, like implies more truths and fewer falsities than
some other theory"(393). In fact, if we take
Propphimself. So I find myself in the verisimilitude to be the same as believability,
rather anomalous, rather old- its study more properlybelongs either in lit-
fashioned position of urging more erature (for example, Riffaterre, 1990) or in
systematic literary studies for the rhetoricthan in philosophyproper.
journalist-though I certainly do not
want to talk down politics, econom-
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where naked fact without its contex- versity Press.
WHATIS A NARRATIVE
FACT? 27
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