Narrative Analysis of Power for Environmental Storytelling
“There are no new ideas. There are only new ways of making them felt.”
“As the poet Audre Lorde reminds us, “There are no new ideas. There are only new ways of making them felt.” Indeed, what could be less new than the power of story? Storytelling is a foundation of human culture and has always been central to successful social change campaigns and movements.”
– Patrick Reinsborough and Doyle Canning, in Re:Imagining Change
Last year I read the second edition of Re:Imagining Change: How to Use Story-Based Strategy to Win Campaigns, Build Movements, and Change the World by Patrick Reinsborough and Doyle Canning (2017). The book comes out of The Center for Story-Based Strategy, a great resource for you environmental communicators out there! They also have a neat collection of ‘tools and resources’ on their website too.
The book covers a lot of territory on key communication strategies for social movements, non-profits and advocacy groups, including elements of storytelling, frames and framing, narrative analysis, and a fascinating chapter on selecting a ‘point of intervention’ for changing a story. As the authors Patrick Reinsborough and Doyle Canning write:
“The story-based strategy approach…
