Transmedial Narratology and Transmedia Storytelling

The notion of transmediality, when used in conjunction with narrative, can be understood in two ways. Transmedial narratology is the expansion of the discipline beyond the medium of language-based narrative for which it was originally developed, to narrative media such as film, drama, comics, and video games. Its purpose is the study of the expressive devices of narrativity in different media. Transmedia storytelling refers to the migration of narrative content across various media. This phenomenon is as old as the existence of media of communication, but it has received a boost through the development of digital media. The first part of this entry describes the evolution of narratology from a language-centered to a transmedial field of study, and the second examines the various manifestations of transmedia storytelling, as well as the theoretical implications of the phenomenon.