Decision-making in the Prose Novel of the 15th and 16th century

决策被认为是现代性的一个特征。在一个人的一生中作出决定的自由，甚至被描述为对现代社会的强加，社会学家因此将其称为“决策社会”(Schimank)。任何决策过程都与个人的社会决定的自我概念紧密相连，因为决策过程反映了个人的自决和疏远的范围。必须作出决定，因此必须应对决策的偶然性和隐含风险，这构成了一种特殊和危险的社会做法。然而，就其本身而言，决策并不完全与现代性有关，而是在前现代就已经发生了。特别是，前现代时代的文学反思和谈判决策的情况。该项目旨在系统地重建和评估早期现代散文小说体裁内的决策。因此，它将重新评估指数，研究声称标志着16世纪初(约1500年)的根本历史转折。将决策作为一种突出的社会行动形式进行分析，为重建个人与社会关系、自决和异化(无论是由上帝还是命运挑起的)开辟了一个创新的视角。在文本材料中，决策经验与传记转折点以及冒险经历的十字路口有关。在这里，关键的问题是：决策是由角色做出的，还是由超验的力量决定的？哪些主题被认为是人类决策的主题？在该项目中，将从三个角度分析决策：在分项目A中，宗教知识与决策的相关性将与前现代散文小说的身份概念相关联。子项目B旨在探索从中世纪到近代早期描述决策的叙事模式。该项目将探索描述决策情况的变化是否与在这段时间内解释世界和自我的一般转变有关。在询问决策叙事在多大程度上被用来反思伦理或宗教规范时，分项目C转向叙事决策的教学潜力。从方法上讲，该项目将基于叙事学范式和话语历史理论。虽然三个分项目侧重于一般项目范围内的不同主题，但所有调查都将基于一个共同的启发式方法。在每个项目中，将根据内部化、集体谈判和外部化的类别区分决策模式。总而言之，该项目开辟了早期现代散文小说学术研究的创新领域。

Decision-Making is said to be a characteristic trait of modernity. The freedom of making decisions over one’s life, was even described as an imposition of modern society which sociologists thus identified as "society of decision-making" (Schimank). Any process of decision-making is tightly linked to the socially determined self-concept of the individual, since processes of decision-making reflect the scope of self-determination and -alienation of the individual. Having to decide and therefore having to cope with the contingency and implicit risk of decision-making constitutes an exceptional and risky social practice. As such, however, decision-making is not exclusively linked to modernity, but occurs already in premodern times. In particular, literature of the premodern era reflects upon and negotiates situations of decision-making.The project is aimed at systematically reconstructing and evaluating decision-making within the genre of the early modern prose novel. Thus, it will be re-evaluating the indices, research has claimed to mark the fundamental historical turn at the beginning of the 16th century (around 1500). Analyzing decision-making as a prominent form of social action opens up an innovative perspective of reconstructing the relationship between individual and society, self-determination and -alienation (be it provoked by God or by fate). Within the text material, experiences of decision-making are linked to biographical turning points as well as to crossroads of adventurous experiences. Here, pivotal questions are: Is decision-making expected of the characters, or are decisions regulated by transcendental forces? What topics are claimed to be the subject of human decision-making?Within the project, decision-making will be analyzed from three perspectives: In sub-project A, the relevance of religious knowledge on decision-making will be analyzed with regard to identity concepts of the premodern prose novel. Sub-project B aims at exploring narrative modes of depicting decision-making from the Middle Ages to Early Modern Times. The project shall be exploring whether the changes in depicting situations of decision-making are related to general transformations of interpreting the world and the self within this period of time. Sub-project C turns to the didactic potential of narrated decision-making when asking in how far narratives of decision-making are used to reflect upon ethical or religious norms.Methodologically, the project will be based on narratological paradigms as well as on theories of discourse history. Although the three sub-projects focus on separate topics within the scope of the general project, all investigations will be based on a common heuristic. In each project modes of decision-making will be differentiated with regard to the categories of internalization, collective negotiation, and externalization. All in all, the project opens up an innovative field of scholarly investigations into the early modern prose novel.