Your narrative and culture change roundup! 📢
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Seasons greetings everyone,
I apologise for not having sent an In Other Words for a while. I’m afraid Omnicron got me and I haven’t been much good for anything other than sleeping for the past few weeks. On the mend now though, just in time for Christmas, which I am very grateful about! I really hope wherever you are that you’ll be signing off soon for some well-deserved rest and precious time with loved ones.
A heartfelt thank you to all 530 of you who subscribe to this little newsletter. I hope you’ve enjoyed some of the links shared throughout the year and found some inspiration for your own work. It is such a pleasure to compile and I thank you for all your kinds words and encouragement during 2021.
As well as the normal list of links to interesting work from the past few weeks, I am also closing out this chapter by looking back at some of my favourite projects from the past year.
Wishing you all a Christmas break filled with much joy, happiness and love.
See you in 2022,
Ruth x
THE LINKS
Articles, reports & podcasts.
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Artwork by Ifada Nisa
Through the Looking Glass: 2022 Narrative Predictions The wonderful Reframe team reflect on what they feel to be a transitional moment in history, and through extensive research provide us with predictions and insights into the possible narrative trends we can expect in 2022. This is an incredible resource for those working to build narrative power both in the US and elsewhere. You can also check out an Instagram Live recording with the authors here. [This Is Signals]
British Media’s Coverage of Muslims and Islam (2018-2020) The Centre for Media Monitoring has conducted a mammoth analysis into how Muslims and Islam are reported by the British media. I don’t think it will come as a surprise to anyone that it is overwhelmingly negative. I’d also recommend having a read of this article by Zarah Sultana MP discussing how Islamophobia goes beyond language to “racist policies and political decisions”. [CfMM]
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas I wrote a blog for Common Cause on the values that are engaged through advertising, and especially the much-loved Christmas advert, and what this means for social and environmental change. [Common Cause Foundation]
How to hope in dark times In this TEDx talk, Thomas Coombes, founder of hope-based communications, explains his journey from relying on fear and outrage in order to invoke compassion in others, to believing that hope is the emotion required to create mainstream public support for change. A great watch! [TED]
Rescuing words For all the word-lovers out there! I really enjoyed this article by Ashish Kothari on how the meaning of various words has changed over time and what we might be able to learn by reflecting on their origins. [Wall Street International Magazine]
Power beyond supplicant politics: building the “parallel polis” You may remember that in the last edition of In Other Words, I shared links to a twitter-thread conversation taking place between George Monbiot and Alex Evans about the future of climate activism. Brian Stout has also written this insightful Medium article on the same topic that I thought I’d also share. [Medium]
New: Messaging Guide for Progressive Civil Society Facing Smear Campaigns Liberties have produced a new guide for progressive organisations on how to counter smear campaigns and build public support for their causes. [Liberties]
What Covid taught us about racism - and what we need to do now Gary Young offers us a Guardian long-read, examining the institutional racism that underpins the covid experience in Britain, and offers some suggestions for practical steps forward. Incredibly written, as always. [The Guardian]
Storytelling for Systems Change: insights from the field A wonderfully open and generous guide exploring the role of storytelling in systems change work. I love the insight offered that “we need to understand both how to support people to tell better stories and how to increase the likelihood that there is an audience ready and willing to hear and respond to the stories” (pink box on page 21). This balance, for me, gets to the heart of what narrative change is and why it’s so important. [Centre for Public Impact]
UN Human Rights Podcast - #Standup4Migrants The first UN Human Rights podcast series has launched focusing on migration narrative change. The first episode features journalist, filmmaker, activist and founder of Define American, Jose Antonio Vargas. [Soundcloud]
New Messaging Guides! We Make The Future have recently released two brand new messaging guides - one on public education and the other on transgender rights. If you’re not familiar with We Make The Future or the incredible work they’ve done developing the race class narrative, this is a great place to start. [We Make The Future]
Being Seen and Unseen: An Interview with Amitav Ghosh An incredibly eloquent interview which spans many of the different foundational narratives and myths underpinning climate change and other inequalities. Amitav ultimately argues for the need for stories to help give life to all the beings that inhabit our living earth. He praises Richard Powers’ The Overstory as a brilliant example of this, which I would also highly recommend. [Emergence Magazine]
Winning the Narrative Pod for the Cause interviews a number of narrative experts about how activists can craft messaging that leverages the power of narratives. [Apple Podcasts]
New Narratives: A Seat at the Table The International Service for Human Rights has developed a guide for those working within or engaging with the UN system to promote and protect human rights. I love Tom Clarke’s summary: “Don’t march to the beat of their drums, it’s time we got better at dancing to our own music”. Narrative dancing lessons for everyone! [ISHR]
MY 2021 TOP 5
My favourite 5 links from the year.
In 2021, I’ve sent 17 In Other Words newsletters, including a grand total of 400 links to interesting articles, reports, projects, podcasts, events and more. It goes without saying that choosing just 5 links to highlight is pretty much an impossible task, but after much deliberation, here are the 5 pieces of narrative work that have really stuck with me throughout the year.
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1. The Disrupted Mind This 3-part series, produced by the team at MindWorks, offers some incredible insight into how the mind works during a crisis and what progressive actors can learn in order to create change. The first two instalments are ready and waiting for you and the third will launch next year (I’ve had a sneaky peak already and it looks amazing!). Such an impressive bit of narrative work and presented so accessibly - I love it!
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2. The Long Time Academy Ella Saltmarshe, narrative change extraordinaire, is the brilliant host of this 6-episode podcast series helping us to explore how to become better ancestors and change our relationship with time. But this a podcast which is so much more than a podcast, as each episode is accompanied by a short practice to help you think about timefulness in new and exciting ways. I’ve listened to most of the episodes now and have found them such a joy!
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3. Stories for Life A beautiful and brilliantly accessible website, examining the unhealthy and destructive narratives that currently underpin Western culture and our economy, and sowing the seeds for what a new (and simultaneously ancient!) narrative of interconnection could look like. I have found myself coming back to this site many times throughout the year. Bravo to Paddy, Dan and everyone else involved in its making!
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4. To segment or not to segment? In nearly every training or workshop I ever run the question gets asked as to whether audiences should be segmented in terms of their values, and it is a big debate within the world of strat comms. This well thought through and wonderfully written piece by Bec Sanderson for PIRC sums up exactly what I think and feel about segmentation and I shall be sharing it forever!
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5. Mindset Shifts: What Are They? Why Do They Matter? How Do They Happen? This report by the FrameWorks Institute explores different strategies for moving mindsets. I found it super interesting, as it’s about shifting mindsets that are detrimental to numerous social and environmental challenges at once. In our siloed world, this felt really refreshing and constructive to me. And don’t worry - if the idea of reading the full report feels a little too much right now, you can check out these 3 recorded webinars instead where the report recommendations are discussed. Enjoy!
Words to Live By
Clever people saying clever things.
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