The Workshops:
Bad Story Guru Medicine is a series of (two) workshops on recognising and doing something about craft misinformation: the way narrative structures, development processes, character design, etc, are framed. Most Story Gurus give storytelling advice that is full of misleading ideas about creativity and the way the world works. To stop the cycle, we’ll go through common tactics used and ways to intervene.
The goal of the workshops is to stop spreading misinformation ourselves, be free to draw inspiration from any source without taking on the counter-productive ideas, and nurture a world where good medicine is the default.
Actions we’ll cover include:
* Terms & phrases to avoid, & ones to use instead
* How to respond to misinformation from colleagues
* Narrative methods & techniques that promote mutual flourishing
* Research to draw on…
Workshop 1: Tactics 1 + 2
Workshop 2: All Tactics!
Who This Is For:
* If you’re a creative and/or advisor who doesn’t think of yourself as being susceptible but are curious!
* If you’re a creative who has been misled by craft framing before.
* If you’re an advisor (teacher, give peer advice, mentor, craft author or researcher) who wants to know what to avoid and how to do it differently!
* If social change through storytelling is your thing and you’re curious about the approach I’m using!
* Anyone else who wants to come!
What I’m Drawing On:
I draw 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! A big thank you to my super helpful format testers, including John Willoughby — who tested a couple of iterations! 🙂
How to cite this page:
Dena, Christy (2026) “Bad Story Guru Medicine,” Next World Narrative, 12 May. www.nextworldnarrative.org/events/bad-story-medicine/.