PCA/ACA 2013: More Fairy Tale Prep

Now that I've gotten a bunch of big deadlines/projects out of the way, I can now focus back on my paper for PCA/ACA conference at the end of March.

The original title was:

Let Me Tell You a Story: The Function of  Digital Narratives as Oral Narratives in

Once Upon a Time and Grimm

The original argument was that technology, and digital narratives, have allowed the collective US to approximate closely the original environment of how fairy tales were told. Given that there are currently two fairy tale based television shows on, this gave me a lot to work with.

But here's what always seems to happen to me during research- one idea leads to another, which leads to another, which leads me down a seemingly neverending path into the dark forest, never to be heard of again.

One of the ideas that became the dark path in the forest was this:

 

Revolving Narratives: How the Matrix of Fan Fiction Narratives Influences the Narratives of Fairy Tale Television Shows

In researching WHAT exactly oral narratives were defined as, and WHO the audience was, in order my original query, I started thinking about how audience influenced the teller, and how technology these days mimics that original response. But the rabbit hole of fan fiction is a deep one, and I just can't go down it. Plus, I'm really more interested in the "other" stuff that's not really fan fiction- the discussion board posts, the comments on articles, that sort of thing, and how that influences the story of the show.

Now that I'm diving back into all this though, I can't get this image out of my head:

Maybe it's because stories started around fires. Maybe because they're primitive. Maybe I just have a Joss Whedon obsessed brain.
But I'm pretty sure I'm going to have kick the first slayer out of my head before the real work can happen.