The Session:
This workshop covers common persuasive tactics used to benefit the story guru at the cost of creatives and greater society. In this co-operative workshop, you take on the role of a Story Guru. We’ll teach you the tactics to make other writers believe all you say and stick to your method, even when it doesn’t work for them! Maybe you’ll have cunning contributions to add, too?! Great! Then, with the part of you that wants this to change, we’ll explore how to transform the situation into liberation for all.
Why We’re Doing This:
Unfortunately, misinformation about story design keeps circulating and keeps too many creatives (and all those who apply story) from shining and making an impact. The myths also spread because of the naughty persuasive techniques story gurus keep using and the part of ourselves that wants what they’re promising. I believed their earnestness, and I championed their work. The thing is, until we figure out what our unique creativity is, it’s easy to spread limiting ideas and delay the process for others.
The aim of this workshop, then, is to recognise bad medicine and reattune so that more of us are free to explore and change methods as we desire and can participate in creating a world where bad tactics don’t work. With this, we also don’t want to treat such gurus as cynically as they often treat us. So we’ll understand how the bad tactics only work when both guru and creative try to heal with bad medicine.
As educator Paulo Freire said in Portuguese originally, ‘In order for this struggle to have meaning, the oppressed must not, in seeking to regain their humanity (which is a way to create it), become in turn oppressors of the oppressors, but rather restorers of the humanity of both.’
How We’re Doing This:
The format of taking on the bad story guru’s perspective is both playful and potentially impactful. The approach is based on the “prebunking” or “inoculation” method (which has been proven in multiple studies, including this one). Prebunking has been shown to be more effective in building a healthy resistance than messages that promote accurate information without mentioning the misinformation. Like the way a vaccine works, you get exposed to a weak version of the idea virus — just enough to trigger your mental immune system — without overwhelming it. (We won’t manipulate you on their behalf!) By taking on the manipulative role and actively engaging with the ideas, we understand how manipulations happen. But we’ll be doing this in a collective conversational manner, as this work can flourish when it is bottom-up and community-focused. This means, next time you get exposed to bad medicine:
- the manipulations don’t work,
- you can use their approach, if you want, without being hooked,
- you don’t spread their bad medicine to your fellow creatives,
- you can explain to others what they’re doing,
- you can avoid using bad medicine yourself,
- and (because we’ll transmute the tactics) you can use good medicine — to help bring about a world where we are drawn to craft communication that promotes mutual flourishing!
Who This Is For:
* Writers (and designers) of any artform
* Educators
* Researchers
* Anyone interested!
What We’re Drawing On:
We’re drawing on personal experience, professional experience, inoculation research, as well as research into story guru tactics (my own analysis from my written-but-not-released-book, published research from screenwriting scholars, rhetorical studies, hype studies, critical creative writing pedagogy, etc), as well as liberatory craft processes, your contributions, and more!