Hi folks,
Sending solidarity during these difficult times.
This week, with COP28 on the horizon, we’re focused on the role story and culture are being called to play in tackling the climate and nature crises. Next week, we have an incredible line-up for our COP session curated by Imran Ahmed - details below.
The gathering of Israel/Palestine comms that we shared in the last issue can now be found here.
Shared with care.
Public events
Climate Consensus: Building Resilience and Reclaiming our Digital Spaces
30th Nov | 13:00-14:30 GMT
Tech companies play an outsized role in eroding trust in climate science, climate-focused institutions, experts, and solutions. In a digital environment overwhelmed by mis/disinformation, how do we build consensus to meet the challenge of climate change?
In this session, curator Imran Ahmed (CEO of the Centre for Countering Digital Hate) will be joined by Michael Khoo (co-chair of the Climate Action Against Disinformation coalition, Friends of the Earth, and co-CEO of UpShift Strategies), Kate Cell (Senior Climate Campaign Manager, Union of Concerned Scientists) and Tom Brookes (CEO, Global Strategic Communications Council), to discuss the social, political, and economic forces needed to incentivise digital platforms to detoxify an already toxic information ecosystem.
Narratives for Stewarding a Different Economy into Existence
Recording
Watch Cassie Robinson’s curated session, where her guests questioned whether “narrative can move power-holders” (Anastasia Millin); heard about how “the polycrisis is not a cognitive problem, it is a relational and effective problem” and that “we can only imagine different versions of the same system, unless we work to interrupt our patterns, let go of stories, and make space for something genuinely new but also generative” (Azul Duque) – that “we can imagine all we want, it won’t assist unless we sit with who we are and who we are in relation to the earth” (Ashanti Kunene).
🎬 See here
Shares
Key: ⚙️ Tool | 📋 Report | 📝 Article
Land Back To Right Relations Reframe Toolkit
Culture Hacks Lab
An invitation to join a ‘reframe intervention’ in the 2 weeks leading up to COP28: “Land ownership sits at the heart of the extraction-based global operating system. To address the issue of land ownership is to address the root causes of the polycrisis: the interlinked systems of capitalism and colonialism. To change the system we need to change the narrative. We change the narrative by centering land in our work: decolonisation, climate justice, peace - land gives us a frame to work collectively towards a liveable future.”
#narrativestrategy #deepnarrative
⚙️ See here
Storytelling For System Change
Centre For Public Impact
“What does it take for government and philanthropy to listen to stories meaningfully? To make real change, we need to get better at telling stories. But governments and philanthropy also need to get better at listening to them. The Centre for Public Impact, Dusseldorp Forum, and Hands Up Mallee have been exploring the role of storytelling in systems change. For this report, we turn our attention from storytelling to storylistening.”
#narrativestrategy
How To Reach New Climate Audiences
Narrative Observatory, Harmony Labs, Earth Alliance
“A first-of-its kind, culture-first look at audiences to understand who climate communications are currently reaching, who they may be leaving out, and how to integrate more climate content into media…Existing maps see audiences through the lens of those who care about climate change and those who dismiss it. But these maps don’t reveal what people are interested in when not thinking about climate. To build a media strategy that reaches new audiences, and contributes to a better climate future, we need new maps!” Also see ‘What’s your creator vibe?’.
#insight #tactics #issuenarrative
Spotlight: How People of Colour Experience and Engage with Climate Change in Britain
Charles Ogunbode, Jeremy Kidwell, Nick Anim, Amiera Sawas, Serayna Solanki
“In the UK, people of colour typically have greater vulnerability to environmental risks including potential harm from negative climate change impacts. The voices, knowledge and experiences of UK people of colour are also under-represented in the climate change discourse, the environmental movement and global solutions. UK people of colour have unique and different perspectives on climate change causes and solutions for their local communities. They also have unique perspectives of being connected to international communities affected first and worst by climate change.” Also see Ethnic Minority Communities and the Climate Crisis.
#insight #issuenarrative
Supporting public engagement on Climate Change – a guide for grant-makers
Climate Outreach, Climateworks Foundation
“One of the key ways that philanthropists can leverage their resources to maximise impact is through supporting work focused on engaging the public on climate change. By supporting carefully considered interventions designed to drive major shifts in public sentiment, grant-makers can harness the force of public opinion and action to create powerful demands for change.”
#tactics
Americans’ Thinking about Political Division Offers Clues for Communicating about Systemic Reform
Frameworks US
“We will soon be releasing a full report with the results of a multi-year, qualitative investigation of Americans’ deep, taken-for-granted ways of thinking about our government, the Constitution, and democracy. In this article, we’re taking a closer look at how themes of partisanship have surfaced in our research, and what those conversations reveal about Americans’ thinking about our political systems more broadly.” The three ‘mindsets’ they identify are likely worth considering in other geographies.
#insight #framing
Storytelling For Action Pavillion, COP28
BAFTA albert, Bellona Foundation
“This year at COP28 UNFCCC Climate Conference in Dubai, UAE, the Bellona Foundation is hosting the ‘Storytelling for Action Pavilion’ in the UNFCCC Blue Zone, in partnership with BAFTA albert, Futerra, and Think-Film Impact Production…a series of conversations that have never been had at COP between the entertainment community and the climate science & policy community on the role of storytelling in addressing global climate change. It will feature participation from major entertainment studios, broadcasters, and leading storytellers and creators.” Also see the Climate Heritage Network’s Call To Action.
#issuenarrative #tactics
Liminal Economics: Swimming at the Edge of the Economy
Jessica Prendegrast, Onion Collective
“The end goal cannot be simply to build more third- and fourth-sector businesses within the prevailing economic system, but instead must be system change itself. The ‘sustainability’ and ‘resilience’ of social enterprises will always be undermined by operating in a system designed explicitly to weaken them. Those who think otherwise are kidding themselves. This presents a major dilemma for those of us who work in the current system while seeking a new one.”
#deepnarrative #tactics
The Cracks are Where The Light Gets In
Erin Remblance
“As the cracks I describe below make us more aware of the injustice and unsustainability of our current model, the legitimacy of capital and growth being at the heart of our economy starts to crumble, further weakening the foundations on which this system exists. We begin to decapitalise our minds, if you like, giving opportunities for new systems to emerge.”
#deepnarrative #tactics
Events & jobs
Why words matter: a new way to speak to Brits about climate change
ACT Climate Labs | Nov 28th, 17:30-19:00, London
“Join ACT Climate Labs to uncover learnings from their recent qualitative research project ‘The Language of Climate Change’, to learn new ways of speaking to 'Persuadables' (the 70% of the UK who are neither climate activists nor deniers). The session will be driven by learnings from: in-depth interviews with Persuadables across the UK; expert interviews with professionals, academics and community leaders working with these audiences; semiotics and place immersion; ethnography, and more..”
Narrative Change
AKO Storytelling Institute | Nov 30th, 18:30-20:00, London
“Panel discussion exploring the emerging field of Narrative Change and its potential for creatives and campaigners alike. What are deep narratives? What about framing? Can mindsets really be shifted through stories? And how might this translate into real-world impact?” Chaired by Fran Panetta, Director, AKO Storytelling Institute at University of the Arts London and moderated by Alice Sachrajda, UK Program Officer and UK Head of Cultural Strategy, Unbound Philanthropy. Also joining the panel discussion: Hassan Akkad and Ruth Taylor.”
Production Officer
AKO Storytelling Institute | Deadline: Dec 1st
“The Production Officer for the AKO Storytelling Institute will be responsible for the production and administrative activities of the Institute. In this pivotal role, your aim will be to support the day-to-day operations that are integral to our mission of exploring the links between the art of storytelling and social change.”
Global Director, Policy and Communications
Client Earth | Deadline: Dec 4th
“Join us as Global Director of Communications and Policy and work with some of the world’s leading climate and legal experts, shaping and developing external engagement that maximizes our ability to deliver the change we need for both people and planet.”
Quotes
(This selection of quotes is intended as a resource, in the hope that they may be useful for your own communications.)
“Don’t rush to escape the dissonance. You can bear witness to pain without being consumed by it. Lament is sacred. Grief is an honoring” – Black Liturgies
“The future depends much less on the images we project ahead than on our capacity to repair relations and build relationships differently in the present. We will need to combine engineering and relational sciences and technologies if humanity is to have a future on this planet. Before we can do that, Western disciplines of science and technology will need to lose their ingrained ethnocentrism and universalism, and confront the harms they have caused and/or contributed to. Once that happens, Indigenous sciences and technologies can be integrated with Western sciences and technologies to coordinate efforts towards regeneration and the expansion of social- ecological accountabilities.” – Chief Ninawa Huni Kui, PWIAS International Indigenous Scholar
“Humanity is now faced with a stark choice… If the structures of the human mind remain unchanged, we will always end up re-creating the same world, the same evils, the same dysfunction.” – Ekhart Tolle
“If we surrendered to earth’s intelligence we could rise rooted, like trees.” — Rainer Maria Rilke
“Sit, be still, and listen, for you are drunk, and we are at the edge of the roof.” – Rumi
Thanks for joining us, see you here again in two weeks.
A reminder that if you have something that you’d love to see in these newsletters, or if you have any feedback, please reach out at inter-narratives@greenfunders.org
Very best,
Paddy & Ella