DATABASE NARRATIVE

"As a cultural form, database represents the world as a list of items and it refuses to order this list. In contrast, a narrative creates a cause-and-effect trajectory of seemingly unordered items (events). Therefore, database and narrative are natural enemies. Competing for the same territory of human culture, each claims an exclusive right to make meaning out of the world." - Lev Manovich

Vertov's "Man with a Movie Camera" never arrives at anything like a well-defined language. Rather, it proposes an untamed, and apparently endless unwinding of cinematic techniques, or, to use contemporary language, 'effects', as cinema's new way of speaking."

How Effective is this form of engagement, really, in terms of its ability to reorient our thinking?

How does this effectiveness compare with more traditional narrative and argumentative forms?

• Narrative: Develops Thematically, formally, or otherwise
• Database: "collections of individual items, where each item has the same significance as any other.