Throughout the Norse Tales how do characters' actions/traits influence the reader's perception of them in their stories?
In Norse Tales, typically the main character is classified as a hero because they always help others and perform stoic actions, which we classify as positive traits. In terms of our data, we counted these actions as positive traits. We can distinguish who the hero of our tale is based on our graphs because those characters have a large amount of positive traits. Typically, the hero character is also perceived in a positive manner. Our villainous characters are typically distinguished by negative traits both in their actions and how they are perceived. This is illustrated by our graphs, as typically the villains will have the most number of negative qualities. Intermediate characters vary, in the sense that they can be both positive and negative, although not to the same scale as the main characters.
How do different species' actions/traits differ from each other?
For this question we did not collect enough substantial data to come to a conclusion for all species mentioned in the tales corpus. However, we can conclude with confidence that some species in the works show solid patterns of positivity or negativity. For example, Trolls and Giants are portrayed as the enemies of humans in practically all tales. This is illustrated in our graphs indicated by the negative corresponding data. Similar to real life, humans are categorized as overwhelmingly positive or negative, depending on the character.
How does transformation influence a character throughout their tale? Is the reader's perception of them altered post transformation?
In our chosen tales, there were only a small amount of transformations. However, in East O’ the Sun and West O’ the Moon, the Prince is able to transform into the White Bear. Based off of our data, the White Bear is not looked at as positively as his alternate form, the Prince. In The Master Thief, the thief changes his form into a goose, and then an angel. In both of these cases, his transformation is for mischievous purposes, which we correlate with a negative character perception. Transformations are not the deciding factor when determining character perceptions in our tales. Instead, perceptions are more based on the characters’ actions in a given form.
Does the positivity/negativity of a character's actions/traits correlate directly to the character's overall positivity/negativity
While mainly applicable to the main heroes and villains of a given tale, the actions of a character do have a large implication on their overall perception of positivity/negativity. This is made clear, as in our data, correlations found in our action graphs are also present in our descriptor graphs. For example, in East O’ the Sun and West O’ the Moon, the Prince’s actions are all viewed positively. In the descriptor graph, the narrator describes the Prince in an overwhelmingly positive manner. This same trend can be found throughout many of the tales, but not all (like in Tatterhood where she performs positive actions. However, she is perceived negatively in the descriptor graph due to being viewed as “ugly”), when examining the main characters.
How are character interactions represented in terms of positivity and negativity in their descriptions?
Although there is some variance in characters’ different perceptions of each other in our “Relationships in Character Descriptors” graph, typically, a majority of speakers view the same subject in the same light. For example, in The Giant Who Had No Heart In His Body, both the wolf and princess view the Giant negatively. However, the narrator does speak of the Giant positively in one instance. Despite this, it is clear that generally, the Giant is described negatively. This pattern can be found in a majority of the tales.