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Advancing Narrative Strategically and Collectively

In the United States

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What is narrative?

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"A narrative reflects a shared interpretation of how the world works."

- Narrative Initiative

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What is framing?

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"A frame is a guide. It directs people where to look, but more importantly, helps them interpret what they see. Every message - whether written, spoken, illustrated, or signed - is presented through a frame of some kind. Simply put, every communication is framed."

- Frameworks Institute

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What is solidarity?

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Solidarity is "unity or agreement of feeling or action, especially among individuals with a common interest; mutual support within a group."

- Oxford Languages

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Strategic Collective Communications

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Pursuing a Strategic Collective Narrative requires abandoning assumptions that partners and communities are using similar narratives and instead intentionally bringing everyone together to identify shared interpretations of how the world works and then organizing around them. It will make our communications and our work more effective and impactful.

Communal framing is a practice that attempts to strike the balance between meeting individual communications and messaging goals while also partaking in a Strategic Collective Communications effort. It aids in the creation of distinct, individualized messaging that meets the needs of each communicator’s unique audiences and lifts up individual calls to actions all while layering Strategic Collective Narratives (which are created together among partners) into those messages

Solidarity encourages communication practices that look beyond the value of clicks, the number of press hits, or viral content. It flies in the face of ego-centered communication practices by embracing the reality that communication-related successes are intimately tied to the success of other community and partner communications efforts.

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Operationalizing the Practice of Strategic Collective Communications

Working internally to shift understanding of communications work

Commit to working with one another frequently and consistently

Actively invite people into collective space while remaining adaptable to all needs

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Pursuing a Strategic Collective Narrative requires abandoning assumptions that partners and communities are using similar narratives and instead intentionally bringing everyone together to identify shared interpretations of how the world works and then organizing around them. It will make our communications and our work more effective and impactful.

Communal framing is a practice that attempts to strike the balance between meeting individual communications and messaging goals while also partaking in a Strategic Collective Communications effort. It aids in the creation of distinct, individualized messaging that meets the needs of each communicator’s unique audiences and lifts up individual calls to actions all while layering Strategic Collective Narratives (which are created together among partners) into those messages

Solidarity encourages communication practices that look beyond the value of clicks, the number of press hits, or viral content. It flies in the face of ego-centered communication practices by embracing the reality that communication-related successes are intimately tied to the success of other community and partner communications efforts.

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SCONE (Strategic Collective Narrative) Coalition

Identified collective and emergent narratives for five issue areas - Food and Climate, Racial Equity in the Food System, Food Access, Food Sovereignty, and Land and Water Access Gathered feedback from dozens of communities Virtually organized 40+ communicators for first year Ran collective metrics project with a nine groups demonstrating how we reached 468k on Instagram and 388k on Facebook and Garnered 31k Likes and Comments on Instagram and 9k Reactions, Comments, and Shares on Facebook

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SCONE Coalition Cont.

Struggles

Lack of capacity and resources led to a drop off in participation.
Outside demands on communication content, made it difficult for folks to adapt

Next Steps

Leaning into what folks are already doing and celebrating
Looking for funding to support work within the SCONEs

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Questions? Thoughts?

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Communal Framing:

Moving from Narrative to Messaging

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"A frame is a guide. It directs people where to look, but more importantly, helps them interpret what they see. Every message - whether written, spoken, illustrated, or signed - is presented through a frame of some kind. Simply put, every communication is framed."

- Frameworks Institute

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Parts

of a Narrative

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Invest in local farm infrastructure that is in support of agroecological production practice

Support productive, resilient farms, that can feed communities consistently

More intense and unpredictable weather patterns makes farming more difficult and energy intensive and increases food costs for communities

Farms should be using natural cycles, local seeds, building healthy soils, and wasting very little

Local decision-makers who don’t know agriculture very well but are sympathetic to other issues

Crafting a Message

To ensure our family, friends, and neighbors can run productive and resilient farms that feed the community, especially in the face of unpredictable weather which is making everything harder, we need to provide farmers with monetary resources to adapt to natural cycles, buy local seeds, build healthy soils, and waste less.

Agroecology cares for the land, animals, and people – all at once

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Work Time

Identify the audience you want to communicate with
Choose a call to action you want that audience to take
Look at a key message
Use the worksheet to practice framing messaging based off those narratives

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Thoughts?

Questions?

Reflections?