PIRC goes to a conference in Bogota: and learns a lot!
Published on our website on 21.12.2023
Written by Sara Cowan
On a Wednesday afternoon, just before logging off, I received an email: “Save the date for a global convening on narrative change that IRIS, Puentes and Global Narrative Hive are co-organising this October in Bogotá.” A work trip to Colombia? Yes please! The opportunity to learn about narrative change outside of the UK and to learn from global narrative change practitioners felt too good to be true!
The first day of the conference arrived, and I felt the awkwardness and excitement of a first date. I was not sure who to approach, where to sit, or what to do with my hands. Then the facilitators welcomed us to the space and I began to relax. Matthew Armstead led us in the diversity welcome. I felt welcome as they named aspects of my identity: bisexual, survivor, in my 20s, feeling nervous, religious background.
The conference took me to many different, yet interconnected places. I talked about my ecosystem, my conservative background with evangelical missionary parents, the paradox of violence and beauty growing up in Ecuador, the alcoholism and rain of industrial Glasgow. I listened to the stories of activism in the Amazon rainforest of Brazil, of story-telling culture in Sierra Leone, of radical activism in the United States. Through the stories I heard, I could visualise how many individuals and their stories create fluid and interdependent ecosystems.
We engaged in profound dialogue about our hopes for our narrative work in our respective ecosystems. We shared stories about our work imagining, listening and experimenting; of our research and practice; our training, campaigning and collective action. We spoke about the tension between unity and power: the desire to build our power with one collective voice while still working and valuing our diversity. The need to decolonise and indigenise narrative change was a pivotal theme, echoing Audre Lorde’s wisdom:
The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.
We talked about breaking out of our silos and enabling practitioners and activists to create their own theory and conclusions from their lived experience. Enabling narrative change work that is embedded in and driven by movements.
I have been working at PIRC for a year, and to be honest, I don’t think I really understood our work until I had these conversations. The themes we discussed gave me a new-found depth of understanding of PIRC’s strategy — I had read it countless times, but now I truly understand it. I understand what we mean when we say current strategic communications approaches are leaving civil society in the shallows, trapped in siloes. I understand what we mean when we say that leadership from those most affected is necessary for narrative work to be truly embedded within the energy, activism and wisdom of movements for change.
I had so many special, wide-eyed moments thinking: ‘Aha! I understand how all of this is connected!’ However, as with most things, the more I listened and the more I learned, the vaster the concepts became. Then came moments where I was flooded with all too familiar thoughts: ‘This feels too big, too impossible to change.’
Amidst these conversations, a prominent theme emerged: hope. Hope and action are inextricably linked; our work is pointless if we don’t believe that things can change.
To paraphrase Oscar Wilde: Utopia is always at the horizon, it may never be reached but that hope of utopia serves as a motivation to keep walking.
We acknowledged the courage it takes to search for hope; to keep hope alive once it’s been found. Our discussions highlighted the transformative potential of hope: when one person hopes, others find hope too. We envisioned a world where both hope and those who dare to hope are highly valued. Where the language and narratives we use come from a place of hope instead of fear; making others believe that the change we seek is possible and desirable. Where we speak about the things we are for, not just what we are against.
In a magnificent conclusion to our conversation, someone recited Aurora Levins Morales’ poem, V’ahavta, a beautiful illustration of hope:
Say these words when you lie down and when you rise up,
when you go out and when you return. In times of mourning
and in times of joy. Inscribe them on your doorposts,
embroider them on your garments, tattoo them on your shoulders,
teach them to your children, your neighbors, your enemies,
recite them in your sleep, here in the cruel shadow of empire:
Another world is possible.
My last day in Bogota, with all this fresh in my mind, I went to see an exhibition called Sembrar la Duda (Sowing Doubt: Cues About Indigenous Representation in Colombia) in the MAMU museum. The exhibition sought to generate a dialogue with the thoughts of past and current indigenous peoples of the country. I was not prepared to be so moved by the joyful, colourful, vibrant, beautiful, resilient power of the exhibition. I have boundless respect and admiration for the artists and curators.
The exhibition demonstrated a lot of what we had been speaking about during the four days of the conference. I saw the manifestation of what I imagine when I think of collective voice, of decolonised, indigenous power. I saw the determination to fight injustice but not to be defined by the past. Rather, claiming their place in that museum with joy and pride and hope. The exhibition and the conference made me believe, more than I have ever believed, that justice is possible.
I returned home, bringing back with me a few paragraphs of scribbled notes, a whole lot of dirty laundry, and a tote bag from Puentes with the printed quote “Creo en un mundo mejor” (I believe in a better world).
At first I wished I had taken more pictures, or written more notes. I felt there was so much content I could already feel slipping out of my mind. In the end though, I think I got exactly what I needed. The message on the tote bag is enough: ‘I believe in a better world.’ It’s a reminder I carry on my shoulder, and I am doing my best to also carry it in my mind.
