My name is Laila Jensen and I am interested in the difference between Community Storytelling and Performance Storytelling.

Well, Laila, that is a great question. Community Storytelling is a form of oral narrative where the storyteller has already entered into relationship with the audience before the story begins. The problem here is that Storytelling, Community and Relationship are all words that people use various ways and have very different meanings inside different environments. For some people an online community where you have never met anyone before is a community and for others a relationship means that you have entered into Holy matrimony for over 20 years. So as you can see, there is a wide degree of ideas about what is Community Storytelling.  Performance Storytelling is (more…)

As a teacher of storytelling, I know that there are a lot of people who are interested, but not really invested, in the study of the art that I love so much. When I discover the passion for storytelling inside a student that matches my own, I find that experience exhilarating and thrilling. My students have described the experience as akin to going over a waterfall or turning on a water fountain.

I like to call this discovery riding the tiger. Sometimes in the jungle of life, we feel lost and closed in by all the daily activities of life. We are lost in a sea of sound and shadow. We know that, somewhere in the underbrush, there are tigers ready to pounce on us and eat us. We are grasping for something to support us, to shelter us.  Suddenly, without any warning, our hand grasps hold of the tiger’s tail. (more…)