Richard Schechner has made a careful and scholarly analysis of time patterns in the theater which also applies to the dramaturgy of real-life scripts.  The two most important types he calls 'set time' and 'event time.'  Set time runs by a clock or calendar.  The action begins and ends at a certain moment, or a certain time is given for its performance, as with a football game.  For script analysis, we can call this clock time (CT).  In event time, the activity is to be completed, like a baseball game, no matter how long or short a time it takes by the clock.  We will call this goal time (GT).  There are also combinations of these.  A boxing match can terminate either when all the rounds are completed, which takes a set time or clock time, or when there is a knockout, which is event time or goal time.\r\n \r\nSchechner's ideas are useful to the script analyst, particularly in dealing with 'Can' and 'Can't' scripts.  A child doing homework can be given five different instructions.  \r\n \r\n*Clock Time Can* \r\n* 'You need plenty of sleep, so you can stop at nine o'clock.'  \r\n\r\n*Clock Time Can't* \r\n* 'You need plenty of sleep, so you can't work after nine o'clock.'  \r\n \r\n*Goal Time Can\r\n 'Your homework is important, so you can stay up and finish it.'  \r\n \r\n*Goal Time Can't\r\n Your homework is important, so you can't go to bed until you finish it.'  \r\n \r\nThe two Cans may relieve him, and the two Cant's may irritate him, but none of them box him in.  \r\n \r\n 'You have to finish your homework by nine o'clock so you can get to sleep.'  \r\n \r\nHere Clock Time and Goal Time are combined, which is called a 'Hurryup.'  It is evident that each of these instructions can have a different effect on his homework and on his sleep, and when he grows up, on his working habits and his sleeping habits.

• early childhood development
• permission
• schechner
• time
• transactional analysis
• life
• work
• will
• sleep
• ideas
• activity
• scripts
• analysis
• patterns
• matter