Story
“Story” is the use of word, image and/or sound, in any medium (print, web, film, video, novel, art, etc.), to narrate an experience, typically with an emphasis on emotion, character and insight. As cave art tells us, storytelling has been essential to human communication since before recorded history.
Public storytelling is story made widely available, with the potential to influence individual opinion and community and national policy. Story stands in contrast to exposition, the straightforward conveying of information, such as the standard “hard news” piece that is a journalistic mainstay.
Public Square
“Public square” is any place that a story can be shared: a newspaper, magazine, book, website, blog, song, broadcast station or channel, street corner, theater, conference, government body and more. The American origins lie in the colonial village square and the first presses, which published the pamphlets and newspapers that advocated the birth of a new nation.
“Storytelling and Institutional Identity: The United States Marine Corps”
BY CHAS HENRY
Henry is a news anchor and national security correspondent at All News 99.1, a CBS radio station in Washington, D.C. Other examples of his storytelling can be found at www.chashenry.com.
From Pen to Sword: Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Abolition, and the American Civil War
BY DR. WILLIAM P. LEEMAN
Leeman is an assistant professor of history at Salve Regina. His primary scholarly interests focus on American political and military history, particularly the American Revolution, the Early Republic and the Civil War.