Narrative Style Guide
The Word Force Narrative Style Guide is a tool to help your organization drill down on the narrative change you are advocating for through your movement work. Doing the work of building community, organizing around a cause, and mobilizing people toward progress is only one component of social change work. The other is telling people about that work and communicating both intentionally and effectively while doing so.
Such communication requires an intimate understanding of not only what you’re doing, but why you’re doing certain things, and the help and the hindrances that may stand in your way. These whats, whys, helps, and hindrances apply not only as external or worldly challenges but narrative challenges as well.
At Word Force, which is a project of Narrative Initiative, we believe that narrative is integral to organizing and that narrative work is organizing. We want you to use this guide so that you can better understand your own narrative, but also the narrative landscape in which your social change project resides.
To do so, you must know your position, the harmful narratives you seek to disrupt, and the helpful narratives that aid your cause. Additionally, everyone within your organization should know the language of your narrative and be able to parse nuanced definitions specific to your movement work from words commonly quoted in social justice spaces. Equally important as knowing how to speak, is knowing who you’re speaking to. Your audience and your target, where they gather and congregate (IRL or online) and how to move them to action.
This guide will help you surface all of these key components of narrative strategy and utilize them in your daily communications. This guide is a living document that can and should shift (be updated) as goals are met and change occurs.
Narrative Positioning Statement
What change are you seeking in the world? That is both your position and your narrative. It is a succinct declarative statement.
Example: We believe in the abolition of the child welfare system.
Example: We believe incarcerated people should have access to education.
Example: We believe birthing people should have access to comprehensive health care that includes access to abortion and contraception.
We use the language “We believe” at the beginning of the statement because it not only communicates a mission and vision for the organization, but it makes the achievement of that mission personal. From such a statement you can expound further on what achieving your social change looks like from a narrative perspective. That can include a language shift, such as speaking person-first when discussing people who are or were previously incarcerated similar to the work of Word Force member organization FICGN. No matter your position, you must communicate the vision and the value for accomplishing it in the world.
HELPFUL & HARMFUL NARRATIVES
Narrative organizing is generational work. The goals are long term. That also means the harmful narratives you seek to disrupt, uproot, and replace have been around for a long time. In the tables in this section we want you to identify your helpful and harmful narratives.
A helpful narrative is a big idea that your message and stories support that will make progress toward your long-term (3-5 years) organizing goals. Conversely a harmful narrative is one that prevents progress toward your long-term organizing goals.
Deep narratives, one that has persisted for generations, are seeded by stories. Those stories become messages, those messages surface narratives and finally deep narratives. For your issue area, think of the stories and messages that have persisted for years that align with the social change you’re working toward and also those stories and messages that work against your forward progress. Click here for definitions and an example.
Key Terms/Definitions
What words do you use all the time in your movement work? Is it jargon or easy to understand? No matter how banal or trite you may think this is, take the time to list those words and phrases and define them in your own words as you would use them in relation to your movement work. It may be helpful if this is done as a group activity within the organization so that everyone has the same level of understanding.
Audiences/platforms/mediums where audiences get information/are influenced
At Word Force, when we create content for our member organizations we always ask two questions:
Who is your audience?
Who/What is your target?
They are not the same. Your audience is the people/groups/coalitions you need to reach and organize around your narrative. Furthermore you need to know where your audience is. Who or what do they listen to? What do they read? Who are they influenced by? How do they get their information. Understanding who your audience is, what they care about, and how they can be reached can help guide which communication strategy and medium will be most effective in speaking directly to them and organizing them toward action. For more on how to identify your audience check out the Narrative Initiative audience worksheet.
Target(s)
Your targets are the people/groups/coalitions that your audience can influence and move toward action. For example: Lawmakers. Targets are the people with power/in power who can actually make, and at the very least be a catalyst for, change.
