Narrative Now

For this episode we speak to Tara Poole, Coordinator of Creative City Ballarat, and Trevor Coad, a project collaborator and survivor, from the Continuous Voices project. Framed as a project that connects trauma and creativity to stand for change and resistance against sexual assault and sexual abuse, Continuous Voices will result in a co-designed memorial to survivors of sexual abuse in the city of Ballarat. The project was unique in its long development time-frame and collaborative, art-based workshops bringing together council, artists, and survivors. We discussed creative collaboration, trauma-informed storytelling, and place-based narratives.

In this episode we speak to Dr Tyne Daile Sumner, a literary scholar at the Australian National University. Tyne is currently conducting an ARC-DECRA project called ‘Beyond Big Brother: New Narratives for Understanding Surveillance’ where she looks at how new forms of digital surveillance are represented in literature. We spoke to Tyne to hear more about this project and find out how classic literary narratives - such as George Orwell's 1984 - and new surveillance novels alert us to trends in the present and help us imagine the future

In this episode we speak to Dr Mariam Tokhi and Dr Fiona Reilly, both clinicians who are also affiliated with the University of Melbourne’s Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health sciences. Mariam and Fiona are both involved in Australia’s first university subject in Narrative Medicine and they share what they are trying to teach students in this course. We also speak to them about the role of stories in health care and what allowing room for telling and listening to stories of both patients and staff can bring.

In this episode we speak to radio producer and podcaster Miyuki Jokiranta about audio stories. We discuss the challenges of capturing people’s attention via their ears as well as the seductive power of conventional modes of storytelling. Miyuki introduces us to the ethical imperative to rethink how we structure narratives and who we centre as storytellers. This ‘how to’ episode offers insights into the process of planning and creating stories for audio. For an extra feature of Miyuki’s list of listens see the Narrative Network website [https://blogs.unimelb.edu.au/narrative-network/2023/09/19/episode-thirteen%E2%80%A6miyuki-jokiranta/].

For this episode we spoke to Edwina Shaw, who teaches creative writing in schools, libraries and at the University of Queensland, and also is a writer herself. Edwina’s work focuses on the healing power of stories and in this episode we explore how storytelling can be a way of working through trauma. We focus on Edwina’s creative writing sessions with people who grew up in out-of-home care and hear about how imaginative and creative writing exercises hold the potential to tell one’s story in a different way. Edwina also addresses the extensive work that goes into making these sessions safe for everyone. Please note: the episode does contain references to traumatic life events that may be confronting. If listeners need to seek support, we recommend the following services: Lifeline [https://www.lifeline.org.au/] (AUS) Beyond Blue [https://www.beyondblue.org.au/] (AUS)                Lifeline [https://988lifeline.org/] (US)  NHS overview of services [https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/feelings-symptoms-behaviours/behaviours/help-for-suicidal-thoughts/] (UK)