I title this post "Stories On Storytelling" because I will be telling three short story snippets in response to the readings about storytelling (one story snippet per book). Somehow, this makes me feel as if this post is less A.D.D. by considering it a compilation of three short stories as opposed to a long convoluted story with three miniature, unrelated stories therein. So without further ado, three miniature, unrelated story snippets for your reading enjoyment:
A lot of the story snippets I will share with you all were brought to my mind via Made To Stick. True to its name, the things Heath & Heath discuss in this book really did stick. My first story snippet came from reading about mental simulation (Chapter 6: Stories). If anyone had told that this was an effective way to communicate before starting undergrad, I would have scoffed and told them they were full of themselves. What changed was my Italian language professor from Columbia College in 2004. My friends and I had just started our sophomore year in college and were still "bright-eyed and bushy-tailed" and generally excited about being in college. Our Italian professor that year was Professor Pauluzi (he insisted on a 20 minute lesson on the pronunciation of his name: Pow-loot-see), and he moved to America with his family as a small child, so English is his second language and he did not learn it until he got here. While helping us prepare for an oral examination in which we would have to hold a conversation with one another, he noticed some of us had problems thinking of things to say. He told us that, as a child, he would often walk to the gas station down the road to buy candy. Along the way he would hold entire conversations with himself so he would know what to say to the cashier. He did this everyday. He told us all to start doing that. Every day as we were studying we were to mentally simulate any and all possible conversations so we would not have to stammer during an exam to think of things to say. And it worked! We all aced our next exam because of this technique. This long convoluted story within a story is to show that mental simulation is a form of mental stimulation that can help you move past your stress (210-212) or even learn to converse in a new language. The possibilities are endless!
My next story came about while reading "Whyse's Story" (Chapter four) in Squirrel Inc. This story snippet is about my first job/internship at Clemson during undergrad. I worked for a lovely woman who has been in many different industries; from designing lingerie to making a Clemson brand (many of you from Clemson's past I'm sure will remember the bouncing Tiger Paw advertisements from 2004) she's been there and done that. Most of her work is about branding. When I came to work with her during the summer of 2005, she was in the process of trying to generate new ideas for the Clemson brand for the coming football season. She asked me to come up with ideas for 30 second commercials that would say all there is to know about Clemson. 30 seconds! That was it! So I set about my task. I tried to think of all that Clemson was and all that it could be in the future. I thought about what the students are looking for, what the parents are looking for, what donors are looking for, and what prospective employers want their prospective employees to get from their college experience. Its hard to combine all that you are and all that you want to be in a 30 second spot. So we made four 30 second spots. Each of the spots were tailored to a specific aspect of Clemson we wanted to highlight. With each of these 30 second spots, we were telling mini-story snippets. We were getting people interested in who we are (and by "we" I mean Clemson). Those spots were less about a "brand" and more about what Clemson is about. Branding is important and it is a part of who someone is, but that year it was more important to let people know about Clemson through four different commercials highlighting four different, yet equally important aspects of Clemson as opposed to most "branding" campaigns that focus only on the most well-known aspect of a business, school, person, etc. (which for Clemson would have been football, of course.)
My last story is of course inspired by what I read in Neuro Web Design. The Once Upon A Time Let Me Tell You A Story concept. I never realized how important this is to the human existence until we started these blogs. True, this is the first "real" blog post I've made to this blog, but so many of my friends have asked for my blog address to keep up with my story. My musings. My whatever. When we created these blogs last week, I posted to facebook that I was making a blog. So many of my "friends" "liked" that I was making a blog and many even asked me what I was writing about and if they could have the address. It amazed me how these people, some I haven't talked to in years, are now interested in what story I am telling. It amazes me how, if I were to stand on the library bridge and recite this for all to hear during class breaks, I'm sure a good percentage of the students would go out of their way to not have to cross the library bridge and hear me "prattle" on about whatever it is I'm trying to sell them. I know I've done that. When I see people handing out papers or selling things or standing on boxes talking to no one in general and trying to get their story out, I will walk a mile out of the way if I have to just to avoid the "harassment" of my personal "me" time in between classes. However, if those same people put their story up on the web so that I could access it on my own time and it was not thrown in my face unwarranted, I would probably sit down and read and see what it was about. Even if it was the same story. The fact that someone can tell a story and people around the world will listen as long as they have an internet connection baffles me. But I am pleasantly surprised as well because now we can all share stories and experiences and learn from one another the way we did as children: through storytelling. Which, of course, was the entire purpose of this week's readings...as well as making sure we are all now acutely aware of the fact that we do tell stories on a daily basis.
It's cool that your friends are wanting to follow you on your blog, but what I've learned over the years with blog sites is that audiences won't go out of their way on the Internet to listen to "prattle" either. I've found that the most successful blogs either have a storyline that people want to follow, or they're a type of journalism.
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ReplyDeleteJessica, your last story got me thinking. I, much like you, avoid the people on the street who seem to be shouting out their stories (i.e. evangelists, singers, etc.). But then again, if it's on the Internet, I'm much more apt to read what it has to say. Why is that? One reason for me, at least, is that if I am reading it on my own time, the author doesn't see my reaction. If I think what they wrote is stupid or appalling, I still have time to plan my reaction without them seeing my intial emotions. But if I am looking the author or storyteller directly in the eye when he or she is telling me a story, I am in danger of giving a reaction that may be upsetting to the teller. Therefore, when listening to a story that comes directly from the storyteller, the audience has quite a bit of pressure to deliver the "correct" reaction.
ReplyDeleteI, as a listener of a story, really consider my reaction to a storyteller. It seems safe to say that my more true reaction comes from reading a story second-hand and not listening to it straight from the storyteller. This being the case, should storytellers who want a more "true" reaction send the stories out to be viewed in the audience's own time? This seems to go against what Denning says in Squirrel Inc. about the importance of performing a story (26). Obviously, when the teller does not tell the story directly to the listener, he loses a bit of control over the listener's actions.
Therefore, I think the end results of telling versus writing a story are two-fold. If someone tells a story directly, he or she risks receiving a genuine reaction. However, if the teller instead writes down the story, he or she loses control of the outcome.