NI Blog

Here you will find case studies, interviews, insights, and reflections from staff.
3 min read

What is the “Sandwich Generation”?

Caring for our families and communities is one of the most universal human experiences. That’s why our Care and Health Equity Working Group chose to focus on the “Sandwich Generation” caregiving crisis as an opportunity for narrative disruption. Pew Research Center defines the “Sandwich Generation” as middle-aged adults caring for...

5 min read

Is Your Writing Focused on Solutions?

We think it should be. Here’s why....
5 min read

The Fair Chance Framework and the Power of Person-First Language

How we talk about formerly incarcerated people matters....
6 min read

Introducing the Spring 2026 Changemaker Authors Cohort

For 2026, the Changemaker Authors Program, a joint venture between Narrative Initiative and Unicorn Authors Club, shifted focus to supporting social justice leaders produce short to medium-length non-fiction, rather than a book-length project or proposal. Our first invite-only cohort met for the 10-week spring 2026 session, producing a submittable piece...

5 min read

The Changemakers Authors Cohort Shifts Focus from Books to Long-form Articles

Over the last six weeks two of Narrative Initiative’s marquee projects have joined forces: Word Force and The Changemaker Authors Cohort. The combined program expands the definition of author to include movement workers who perhaps may have a book in them, but have not yet established themselves as seasoned writers...
5 min read

Moved to Act: Why People Really Join Movements

A few years ago, I was playing around with book ideas, when I fixated on Eat, Pray, Love. The title was the best part of that book, and I wondered what the “eat, pray, love” of organizing would be. I settled on “think, feel, act.” I started writing about how...

4 min read

Narrative Work Feels Hard Right Now. This New Tool on Narrating Racial Justice Can Help

A new decision-making tool from Berkeley Media Studies Group and Narrative Initiative can help you and your partners navigate that uncertainty and overcome decision paralysis....
3 min read

Thinking Long-Term: What 2025 Taught Us About Narrative Power

We want to end the year with this reading list, featuring some of the best thinking in the field on power building, narrative infrastructure, and resource organizing for narrative change....
7 min read

Fire and ICE: A Close Look at the Narratives that Emerge When Immigration Enforcement and Disaster Relief Collide

ICE's detention of firefighters responding to the Bear Gulch Fire – the largest wild fire recorded in the Olympic Peninsula – ignites a powerful conversation on immigration enforcement and its cost to all of us....
6 min read

Teaching to Regress: On the Compact for Academic Excellence for Universities

A collection of lessons for organizers working in higher education...
5 min read

“Flooding the zone”: On Narrative Power during Climate Catastrophes

A close look at the harmful and helpful narratives that emerged during the Texas Floods of July 2025–and what they can tell us about the narrative power needed for a true, pluralistic democracy....
2 min read

Narrative Initiative Welcomes Noor Mir as New Chief of Staff

Narrative Initiative is excited to announce Noor Mir as our new Chief of Staff. She will lead efforts to align our programmatic work with our vision and lead internal management of our organization. Narrative Initiative is a strategy hub that collaborates with movements to transform deeply held values and beliefs...

5 min read

Connecting with Our Narrative Power: The LGBT Movement

It is no secret we are in the midst of the most intense and sustained rollback of basic rights, protections, and access to care. Some of us are already burnt out and on the verge of despair, and others are joining the fight for the first time. The strategies of...

3 min read

Narrative Power is Movement Power: Reflections from the Narrative Power Summit

Listening to the Second Line parade serenade a room full of dancing people in the French Quarter of New Orleans, I felt the energy of radical change. Last month, I had the pleasure of attending the Narrative Power Summit (NPS) hosted by the Radical Communications Network and ReFrame in New...

4 min read

Narrating Toward a Bigger “We”: How We Build a Model Majority

But the flip side: the Model Minority Myth is a myth. We know Asian American communities are far from a monolith and Asian American histories are deeply interwoven in the histories of Black Americans, immigrants, people living with disabilities, rural people, and working people. So why haven’t we been able...
6 min read

Meeting Crisis with Community

When COVID-19 vaccines first became available, Southern California Pacific Islander Community Response team (SoCal PICRT) launched a campaign that filled critical gaps left by mainstream public health messaging. Rather than relying on press releases or canned messaging, they grounded their approach in cultural care, community trust and self-determination. Their strategy...

3 min read

Harmful versus Helpful Narratives

How do you know if a narrative is harmful or helpful? It depends on who gets to decide. At Narrative Initiative, our approach is simple: a helpful narrative is one that advances your vision, mission, and goals. A harmful narrative is one that undermines them. That’s it. Using the terms...

8 min read

Fighting for Birthing People in an Uncertain Future

We are living in a time when “a broad anti-sexual and reproductive rights agenda” is being implemented at the direction of a new administration. As daily damage unfolds, doulas and other advocates do what they can to support birthing people as a matrix of legislation threatens their well-being, and the rights...

8 min read

Where Somebody Says Doula, We Say “Auntie”

It’s nearly impossible to discuss solutions for the maternal health crisis— one that leaves Black and Native women 3 – 4 times more likely to die in childbirth— without hearing the word “doula,” a birth worker who nurtures birthing people as they navigate pregnancy and postpartum. Advocates like Ericka Dorsey, a health...

8 min read

Today’s Doulas Support Birthing Parents, But Aren’t the Solution to a Broken System

Looking at doulas from a global health perspective In 2022, 817 women* died of maternal causes in the United States. Admittedly, that’s a decrease from the 1,205 maternal deaths in 2021. But despite a gradual decrease in annual maternal deaths nationally, a few things remain unchanged. First, the majority of these deaths...