A multi-genre text combines conventions from different literary genres, making it unpredictable and requiring background study. Approaching it with an open mind and identifying the conventions used can reveal whether it was deliberately crafted to contain multiple genres or disguised as such. Genre theory is important in understanding multi-genre texts, but the imposition of gender on texts has led to separation between literary and genre fiction. Certain conventions are not limited to one genre, such as fantasy in magical realism and romance in gothic horror.
A multi-genre text contains conventions of different literary genres. A genre is a collection of stories, art, music, or film that adheres to a fluid set of conventions. For example, science fiction (science fiction) stories tend to contain a futuristic setting and ideas that focus on the future of science; fantasy tends to ignore science and create a world where the laws of physics can be broken to allow for things like magic. A multi-genre text will contain ideas and styles familiar to at least two genres.
Genre theory is important in approaching a multi-genre text. The fundamental question of the idea, faced with a text full of conventions of different genres, is whether genres exist or not. The idea of gender is more prominent in Anglo-American or English literature than in that of other languages and cultures. The imposition of gender on texts has led to gender tyranny and the separation of literary and genre fiction. The student or academic, therefore, who approaches such a diverse text should consider whether it has multiple genres or no genres at all.
Such texts create problems for the student because they lack a regular genre context to deal with. When a text is easily viewed as science fiction, horror, or romance, there are sets of conventions to compare that text to. This makes multi-genre text more unpredictable and requires more background study of conventions.
There is an easy way to approach a multi-genre text and that is to keep an open mind. This means removing expectations from textual studies. This turns it into plain text, so it can be approached just for its information without relying on a whole range of contexts. This, for example, is like studying a new Eric Brown novel without using HG Wells, Ray Bradbury, and Arthur C. Clarke for context.
Instead of creating a checklist of conventions and then comparing the text to that checklist, individuals can read the text and write a list of conventions that the text appears to use. From this data, it can be determined whether the text was deliberately crafted to contain a certain number of genres or whether it used a single genre as a basis and then added conventions of other genres to disguise it. Such studies and texts lead to ideas such as subgenres, blending of genres, and evolution of genre.
It is also possible, reading such a text, to realize that certain conventions are not limited to just one genre. For example, magical realism contains an inherent dosage of fantasy. The same can be said for gothic horror and romance.
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