Elizabeth Ellis will be interviewed by Eric Wolf on the relationship between Storytelling and the Development of Ethical Behavior on the Art of Storytelling with Children on Wednesday, Dec. 3 at 8pm EST.
Elizabeth Ellis Writes…
If I had a nickel for every time someone (attorney, state trooper, loan officer, IRS agent) has made fun of me because I told ‘em I am a storyteller, I could take us all out to dinner. At a nice place. With tablecloths. Because often the public perception of storytelling is that it is fluff and foolishness.
Well, we storytellers know better, and we have survived an entire movement of Back to the Basics and Almighty State Testing. What the left brain-ers don’t realize is there is another entire level of education far more basic to being human than the 3 R’s will ever be.
The most basic things about being human come from the right side of the brain, not the left. Chief among them is the ability to make ethical decisions. I am not talking about following the rules. Remember that the Nazis were great rule followers. Ethical decision-making requires the ability to imagine the effect of my behavior on your life. Without an active imagination, a child is an ethical cripple. The new study about the state of ethics of America’s youth just out from the Josephson Institute (http://josephsoninstitute.org/ for the full details of the survey) has many people in our culture asking themselves, “How did we get on this handcar? And where are we headed?
Hearing stories told leads to the development of empathy. And empathy is essential for all ethical decision making. I have been talking about this for more than thirty years. Recently other folks have begun to say the same thing. I am pleased by that, ’cause I’m not gonna live forever. Check out P.J. Manney’s article “Empathy in the Time of Technology” in the September, 2008 Journal of Evolution and Technology. (http://jetpress.org/v19/manney.htm if you want to read the entire article, especially the interesting part about the development of ‘mirror neurons’.)
Please join me for a discussion of how storytelling contributes to the development of ethical behavior on this Pod-cast, but also in your guilds and story circles and list serves. In a time of national financial hardship, it behooves us as tellers to be able to challenge people’s thinking about the importance of story and it’s role in right brain development. Storytelling is neither fluff nor foolishness. It is how we change the world “one listener at a time.”
Oh, and by the way, if you happen to be a attorney, state trooper, loan officer or IRS agent or some other form of left brain-er, it is the key to learning to “think outside the box”, which is imperative if America is to remain an economic power… (Daniel Pink, A Whole New Mind: How Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future. Riverhead Books, 2006.)…but, that’s another story.
A Short Biography
Designated an American Masterpiece Touring Artist by the NEA, Elizabeth Ellis grew up in the Appalachian Mountains. A children’s librarian at Dallas Public Library before becoming a professional storyteller, the “Divine Miss E” is a versatile, riveting teller of Appalachian and Texas tales and stories of heroic American women, though her personal stories are arguably her best. Invariably hilarious and poignant, she is a repeated favorite at the National Storytelling Festival. Selected a Listener’s Choice at the 30th Anniversary of the National Storytelling Festival, she is a recipient of the John Henry Faulk Award from the Texas Storytelling Association and the Circle of Excellence Award from the National Storytelling Network. She has mesmerized nearly a million children in her thirty-year career as a professional storyteller.
Elizabeth is also well known for her workshops, which offer training for beginning and seasoned storytellers. Inviting the Wolf In: Thinking About Difficult Stories, which she co-authored with Loren Niemi has been described by NAPRA ReView as a “great leap forward in the literature of how to put stories together with art and truth”. It received a Storytelling World Award.
Jay O’Callahan says, “Elizabeth Ellis’ voice sounds like chocolate tastes.” Her stories are just as addictive as chocolate. A mother and grandmother, she makes her home in Dallas. www.elizabethellis.com
Play to hear this interview that was recorded as a conference call on October 19th at 8 PM ET - 2008. SWC #068 Dylan Pritchett - What Makes a Great Storyteller?
Very few storytellers currently make it easy for potential clients to listen to their material. Many storytellers choose to hide the treasure of their professional work behind a wall of profit and self-interest. Unluckily for them profit and self-interest can be better served by bringing down the wall. How do you expect potential clients to be sold on your ability to be an amazing storyteller if they have never heard you tell a story? How many potential presenters or school administrators are not hiring storytellers just because they had one bad experience and need more evidence to overcome their prejudice? How do you expect people to buy your online CD’s without being able to test the waters?
As a movement we are offering what the world wants to hear. Currently America is filled with cynical, disconnected and apathetic people who are dying for authentic relationships. What is good storytelling? - authentic, real and emotional. We as storytellers can do a better job of making our material available to the average American audience. We could do a better job of selling the value of our movement to the average American and we can do a better job of helping Americans to find themselves. In a culture that is filled with pop icons we have authentic tellers with ability and quality that matches any of the Hollywood studios.
Every storyteller in the country could have a list of audio files of their stories available for easy download. A list of files is called an rss feed; if they are all audio or video files they are called an rss feed for a podcast. You might be asking what is a podcast. Podcasting is a way to receive audio files over the Internet via what is called an RSS feed. Many content providers offer podcast feeds at no cost. These feeds deliver audio broadcasts to your desktop. You can listen to these files on your computer or load them on your MP3 player and take them with you. The term podcast, like broadcast, can refer either to the series content itself or to the method by which it is syndicated; the latter is also called podcasting. The host or author of a podcast is often called a podcaster. We live in an on demand society where people want what they want when they want it - NOW, not at the next storytelling festival, conference or workshop. You have a responsibility to the storytelling movement to record as much of your material as possible and to make that material available to as wide an audience as possible.
If you are a presenter or an organizer of storytelling events - after the show is over hand them an audio CD of the event for tellers to take home. They have a personal computer they can use to copy that disk and sell at their next venue or just trade with other tellers. You can use your website or a blog to drive listeners to your very own storytelling extravaganza. All you need is a list of recorded stories (your storytelling CD’s or performance tapes) and an rss feed. Both Switchpod and Lypsen hosting sites include an rss feed as a part of their
service. You could be podcasting for $5 a month if you have about twenty minutes of material already recorded.
If I have you interested in creating a complex podcasting project then you might want to sign up for my free e-course - Artist or arts organization’s centered podcasting and new media at… http://www.storytelling withchildren.com/podcast
Eric James Wolf is known around the world to children as Brother Wolf. He is the host if the “Art of Storytelling with Children” podcast, a hour long show recorded in a conference call environment once a week. He also writes weekly in a blog (The Dyslexic Storyteller). All of this can be viewed at http://www.ericwolf.org
Elizabeth Ellis will be interviewed by Eric Wolf on the relationship between Storytelling and the Development of Ethical Behavior on the Art of Storytelling with Children on Wednesday, Dec. 3 at 8pm EST. Elizabeth Ellis Writes… If I had a nickel for every time someone (attorney, state trooper, loan officer, IRS agent) [...]