Want to tell a good story? Listen to Ira Glass
August 18, 2009
Ever tried to tell a story at a party that just bombed? I’ve done this a few more times than I care to count. We all have, right?
Thankfully, Ira Glass, host of This American Life, is attempting to remedy that. He has a YouTube video series about how to tell engaging, compelling stories. This is useful for anyone who:
- Would rather not watch another cocktail party story crash and burn
- Has a personal story to share with a large audience in a polished form
- Has information to share in a professional context — information that might snag people’s hearts, move them to action, entice them to buy something or help change their understanding of an issue.
Ira Glass knows storytelling better than just about anyone I can think of. I have heard second-hand (and I have reason to believe) that in this age of channel surfing, most people who stumble upon a radio broadcast of This American Life stick with it and listen to the whole, one-hour show, even if they don’t know what it is or weren’t planning to listen to it. It’s engaging enough to hook just about anybody, even though the show is little more than average people (who don’t have radio voices) telling stories that often sound like,
“OK, this one time this really weird thing happened to me. Isn’t that weird?!”
But Ira Glass makes it one of the most compelling programs of our time. The radio show is popular enough that it became a cable TV series. If he wanted to, he could probably use the show to affect great political or social change, and it’s possible that is happening already.
How does he do it? Here are some of the nuggets of goodness I gleaned from the video series:
An engaging story needs
Action/Anecdote + Information + Reflection (at least one of these should provide something previously unknown, unheard of or not considered)
Questions that are raised, questions that are answered
His approach comes straight from radio broadcasting, but there are elements of it that apply to just about any kind of communication. Rather than muddle up his words any further, I’ll just link you to the video series. Here’s a link to the first installment. Click here for the entire series (4 parts, each about 5 minutes) from Public Radio International.
I actually structured my “Intro to Creative Writing” class around “This American Life” with great success (Fall 2006). I would have students listen to the podcast (sometimes in class, sometimes not) and then we’d read and write stories based on the theme for the week. There were so many benefits. The students modeled good storytelling, developed active listening skills, and approached the weekly installments with excitement and a sense of wonder (not always true with the formidable “Paris Review” uber-anthology–as much as I treasure the prose, poetry and interviews within). I’m proud that many of the works from that class went on to find a greater audience, won some awards, and got a few people into grad school! I think the reason it worked so well reflects some of what you’ve articulated in your blog–the works find that audience and invoke a sense of wonder, curiosity, and active engagement. Wish I would have known about the “How to” video back then!
Ok, is This American Life on the Stuff White People Like list? It should be.
Ms. A! That is brilliant! I was just pondering something similar when I was in teacher-school this evening. I’m so glad to hear a bit about how you structured the activities and to hear how successful the students were with it. Thank you for the idea! And for being awesome.
Christy, it’s not directly on the list, but it’s part of a much bigger item on the list of Stuff White People Like: Public Radio. http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/2008/01/31/44-public-radio/
I just came from an evening of teacher-school, so I have to say that even though This American Life is about as white as it gets, I would hope that something like a TAL-based writing class would work well with students from other cultures too. There’s something so empowering in sharing your own story about basic elements of the human experience that TAL focuses on… Geez! I sound so white right now!
Thanks, Charity. I would give it a shot as a writing assignment, at least. It really helped and had a good structure for the students to focus on. If you want any other info or lesson plans, just let me know! We paired the podcast of “Bullet in the Brain” with Borges’ short story “Funes the Memorious” with a lot of success.
Yes! I will definitely be in touch with you on that! I won’t be actually teaching for 18-24 months still, but in the meantime this could be fun to use in tutoring or if I ever volunteer with Write Around Portland, which is a nonprofit that you would love (http://www.writearound.org/).