// Category: Commentary
Ecosystem for a New American Narrative
The field of documentary impact has officially entered its maturation phase. For over two decades, the documentary film sector has developed tools and methodologies – even professional strategists – in an effort to maximize the impact of powerful nonfiction work. Though relegated to a corner of the broader field of cultural strategy, the practice of…
Rural Pre-conference at 22nd Century Initiative in Minneapolis
In organizing, many progressives fall into traps that cast rural Americans as antagonists to progress writ large. This erases both rural people who are working towards racial, gender, economic, and migrant justice and the particular concerns, realities, and assets of rural communities. At our best, our many movements have shown that we can coalesce around…
On Mourning as a Motive Force: Grief and Black-Palestinian Solidarity
There is so much on my mind. My thoughts, like my feelings and even the sensations in my body are tangled, the emotion I have felt most recently is terrified. What a season of extreme loss, and this – a moment of heightened visible brutality. What the Palestinian people have been experiencing as a matter…
“Money is Medicine”
Back in June, I moderated a panel at Alight, Align, Arise, the inaugural conference on reparations hosted by Decolonizing Wealth. The panel focused on the narrative history of reparations, a history that began well before the end of the Civil War as keynote speaker and author Ta-Nehisi Coates discussed during his opening night fireside chat…
From Rural America with Love
Three weeks ago, the usually remote Narrative Initiative team convened in Minneapolis for the inaugural 22nd Century Conference: Forging a People-Powered Democracy. This would mark the first time I would meet my teammates in person, the first time I would attend a conference, and my first time in Minneapolis. As I reflect back on the…
Weaving the opposite of fascism: Narrative organizing to build narrative power
I have myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME) from Long Covid, formerly called chronic fatigue syndrome. I first shared these thoughts while standing on a stage at Frank 2023. I ask for care on that stage as I figure out my new brain and body. A statistic I’ve thought about a lot in the past year is: 75%…
Art is at the Heart of Disability Justice
An estimated 7.5% of the adult population in the United States is now living with long COVID, the long-term or chronic effects of a COVID infection, or reinfection, in children and adults. Artist, teacher, and HIV organizer Pato Hebert is one of them. In January, Hebert spoke with Abdul-Aliy Muhammad, who lives with both HIV…
Storytelling Can Move Mountains
In 2011, Tania Mattos started working with filmmaker Christina Antonakos-Wallace when she was a leader in the fight for the New York Dream Act. Mattos expected filming to take a day or two. It took eight years and followed her through a pivotal time in her personal life and the immigrant rights movement as a…
Changing the Conversation Around Reproductive Justice
“Reproductive justice” was first coined in 1994 by the Women of African Descent for Reproductive Justice and defined in 1997 by Sister Song (a formal outgrowth of that group) as “the human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, not have children and parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities.” To…
How storytelling preserves traditions of reciprocity, resilience, and hope
When was the last time you asked someone their story? Stories preserve memory, pass on tradition, convey wisdom, and offer a glimpse of hope. In this way, asking someone about their story is not unlike asking them about what values they use to navigate their daily lives. Recently, Narrative Initiative partnered with the Decolonizing Wealth…