NCTE Presentation Transcript

Story has many jobs, as a learning modality through memory, as a way to address our
connection to the changing world around us, as a form of reflection against the flood of
ubiquitous access to infinite information, as the vehicle to encourage social agency, and finally
as a process by which we best make sense of our lives and our identity.
Audio:
Today I want to thank you for listening to this story. Its a story about a group of community
storytellers, and how they used digital storytelling to speak back to stereotypes and develop
rhetorical agency, but it is also by default my story, as a researcher I have been moved beyond
words, humbled, and privileged by the opportunity and great responsibility to share with you this
story
In the summer of 2012 I traveled to McDowell County, West Virginia to volunteer with the
Hollow project, an interactive, community participatory project aimed at understanding the ways
access to digital tools and spaces disrupted negative, and damaging stereotypes that had been
created and circulated by the media about the region and the people who live there for years.
Here are some glimpses of what I experienced, that also serve as some of the data that inform my
research project:
Videos (b-roll)
When I returned to my life and work in Ohio, I realized these experiences stayed with me, and I
as I continued to read and understand my own identity as an Appalachian, I couldnt shake the
emotions and connections I felt to the McDowell storytellers. At the request of the projects
director I began researching the ways access to the digital tools and spaces affected the identity
and agency of storytellers. Here are the specific research questions we came up with:
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How are the identities of the McDowell County storytellers remediated (or
reappropriated) as they engage in the process of creating and publishing their own digital
stories?
Has active participation in the project or the process of creating and publishing their own
digital stories allowed them to develop a sense of rhetorical agency and self-efficacy?
How?
What are the impetuses for this literate activity on the part of community storytellers?
How are community storytellers ascribing more humanistic possibilities to these digital
tools? What can we learn from paying close attention to the ways in which theyve used
the tools to tell their own stories?

I interviewed and followed the McDowell storytellers through the production and postproduction process, and traveled back to the county to assist with the debut of the documentary
in June 2013. Id like to share some of the stories we shared that day with you.
Video 1: Linda
I was born and raised up a hollow called number four hollow. I was six years old when my
mother passed away. She was 28 years old. I was raised by my father. We began living with my
grandmother, who was my Nonna; Im Italian. She was 80 years old at that time. And there was
also a widowed Aunt in the home. I was raised by a village of Italian women and my Dad. At the
age of six I was pulled up to a cook stove and I was taught to make bread, I was taught to make
sauces. I was taught to do everything that I was supposed to grow up and have children and make
bread and make sauce (laughs). My husband worked with US Steel Mining, weve pastored since
1987 in the Methodist church. Weve had the food bank for three years, we were given it totally
free of charge, we were handed the keys and a check book with 19,000 dollars in it. At that time
the food was not in the condition its in now. No type of ministry, no type of outreach. When we
were given the food bank we felt it was a way to reach out to the community. We now have six
viable pantries in McDowell County. Our numbers have not grown but the numbers that are in
the homes have grown. Households served has remained about the same. We had a large month
last month, we served 765 households. We served 1873 individuals. I have two households that I
serve, one has 12 in the home and the next largest is eight and I have one that is seven. Those
three homes that I just mentioned all three of them are grandparents one of them is a great
grandmother who is 73-years old who not only raised her grandchildren, but now shes raising
her great-grandchildren. When we were given the food bank and we came here to speak with the
former director, when I stepped out of the car and saw all that land, I looked at Bob and I said,
Theyll be a garden there someday. Only because gardening was so much a part of my life
when I was little, you know I being a girl raised by my Dad, there was so much he taught me
about life in the garden. There is something about a garden and table thats where relationships
are built. So this is the year that we are going to attempt a community garden. The thing that we
pride ourselves on here is that there are no salaries, no government funding, our donations come
from faith based organizations. Ill always call us the county of white vans, because in the
summer time were bombarded with white mission vans coming to help us. Most of the missions
that is there way of surviving, mission teams come here and they pay them to stay. That doesnt
happen here. There are such good people in McDowell County. I guess thats the reason we
never left. People just want to be part of something, and I really believe if they see the garden
growing and they see the door of the food bank open or they smell, if you notice you came into
the building today and you smelled, Ive always usually got something cooking. I believe they
will, it will enrich their lives. Thats our dreams, my dreams.
Video #2: Tony

You see how that fly just floats there? Its like a bug. See thats a little floating fly, and now Im
going to put one that sinks behind it. The trout here are wild, meaning theyre not produced out
of a hatchery truck like a lot of other trout streams in West Virginia, so most of our trout fishing
is hatchery supported whereas here theyre totally wild, they do it on their own with no help from
nobody. And they actually do it here rather successfully despite all the abuses, so its kind-of a
yin and yang thing. Thats a rainbow, theres two species here, theres rainbows and browns.
That was a beautiful rainbow; its a very healthy fish. Theres a lot of fish here. A lot of pretty
fish. Theres issues with the water quality. The trash doesnt hurt the trout, it just makes it kindof unpleasant for us to fish in, and the sewage its debated what it does, some people think it
makes the fishing better, and it probably does, its fertilizer. McDowell County doesnt get a lot
of respect for I guess a lot of valid reasons, but theres also a lot of good reasons to come here
too, so you just got to take to the good with the bad. Heres your brown trout, so this is the other
species thats here. It is a little one. I like the brown ones better than the rainbows.
Since the launch, Ive stayed in touch with the storytellers, visiting again and trying to
understand how participation with this documentary affected their identity and agency. Here are
some of their reflections, in their own words.
Elaine: I think by telling our stories it made us realize that we have a beautiful home. We have
beautiful people and we can do this, we can do this. Were the free state for a reason. We have
always taken care of ourselves and we can do it again. Theres no reason we cant do this, weve
always done it. And I think by telling our story ourselves, I think it helped. I think that has
probably helped us more than anything could ever help us. No one is going to help us, no one
ever has, well maybe somewhat they have helped but basically its up to us to help ourselves and
we know this. And I think by her having us talk about ourselves, talk about our home, talk about
our history, talk about our future, I think that has not only brought us together, but that hit home
for us, whatever our home is. And I think that will help us tremendously in leaps and bounds to
be who we are which is just a pride.
Alan: I said, its easy to write about you love. And its not really, I wouldnt say easy to write,
but easier for me. It might be easier for some people. Im not a writer on demand, but Im always
now, I always find myself trying to write something about my home. And Im continuously
looking for something to build up my home in McDowell County or Appalachia in general. I just
really want to share that with the world. And Im so proud of where Im from, you know, I can't
tell the world enough how proud I am of my heritage. I get a cold chill thinking about it. So if I
had a choice to be born anywhere that I could be born, it would be right where I was born and I
wouldnt be no where else.
What this research is showing me is that there is tremendous potential in digital storytelling to I
am learning about how they help make sense of our worlds and work towards bettering them.
Along these lines, Id like to leave you with some additional reflections from Joe Lambert,
founder of the Center for Digital Storytelling.