Connect

Skip to content

Home
About
Services
Projects
MN Fringe Program
Blog
Connect

Home
About
Services
Projects
MN Fringe Program
Blog
Connect

Home
About
Services
Projects
MN Fringe Program
Blog
Connect

Connect

Send us a message…

Email: changenarrativeinfo@gmail.com

changenarrativellc

Building capacity in the climate justice movement through the power of our stories

'Stay With' is an album by our friend and collabor

'Stay With' is an album by our friend and collaborator, artist Ben Weaver, that feels particularly resonant at this moment.

The first time I listened to 'Stay With', I had planned to play it while I washed the dishes. But as the music played, I found myself compelled to sit down—something about it demanded my full attention. Stay With became a meditation, a full sensory experience.

I hope that as you listen, you too will find yourself immersed and transported. Most of all, I hope that you will stay with—whatever that means for you. For Change Narrative, it means staying with the intention, integrity, and importance of the work of climate justice. It means that, rather than shrinking, it’s time to double down—with more conviction than ever before.

Access the album ‘Stay With’ on Bandcamp, with link in bio 🔗

From Ben Weaver:
"'Stay With' was recorded roughly over a four year time span beginning early in the pandemic of 2020. The album was initiated by an exchange between myself and Henry Toft. I sent Henry words from poems I had been writing and Henry made the initial electronic sketches to accompany those poems.

From there engineer Tom Herbers and I added overdubs and manipulated those initial tracks further. I spent many hours riding around on my bike recording sounds from the seasonal landscape of Saint Paul, MN where I live. We then manipulated many of these sounds into their own instruments, and I used many of them to build the transition layers between tracks.

'Stay With' is a collection of sonic poems that was made to be listened to and experienced like a book. As in, you don't do anything else while you read a book. You just read. Or in this case, you listen. I hope this work will be helpful and healing to those who listen. I am grateful for your ears and curiosity.

The songs/poems that make up 'Stay With' have lives of their own, and they need to travel beyond me to do their work. I was nothing more than a helper. It is powerful when the work gets shared by people whom it moves. I believe that is what it is here to do, to be another reminder of our connections and relationships."

#climateresponse #meditation #changethenarrative

🌍✊ Follow the Frontlines for Climate Justice

🌍✊ Follow the Frontlines for Climate Justice ✊🌍

As we reduce our emissions and transition to renewable energy, we must also center justice so that we do not recreate the systems of extraction and oppression that have led to the climate crisis.

To get there, we must respect and be willing to see those closest to the issue as leaders to follow. Those on the frontlines are BIPOC communities, lower-income, people with disabilities, people who identify as LGBTQIA+, elders, youth, and others who are often the most impacted by climate disasters and systemic inequalities.

Frontline communities have a robust history and legacy of organizing, building power, and taking on the challenges of extraction. But whose voices are often invisibilized in mainstream discussions and decision-making on climate change.

Honoring stories from frontline communities as essential testimonies that will guide us in the just solutions we seek is a shift that is a necessary adaptation, especially for how we approach climate reparations and create the pathways to reckon and account for harm to those who are most impacted.💚🌱

Graphic + Caption by @changenarrativellc

#ClimateJustice #FrontlineVoices #EnvironmentalJustice #ActOnClimate #ClimateEquity #Followthefronlines

Mutual aid is a community response to climate chan

Mutual aid is a community response to climate change, and disasters like Hurricane Helene. In this climate reality, mutual aid is a call to action to care for each other's needs during times of climate crisis, especially those most affected and vulnerable to impacts. Mutual aid can directly distribute food, water, shelter, and immediate care such as fundraising, clean up, medical, and mental health resources without relying on traditional charity or government assistance which can lag in their response time. Mutual aid addresses the immediate needs of those most impacted while building long-term community resilience.

Artist Molly Costello @olly.costello.art beautifully encapsulates this solution through their artwork and words, sharing, "...Mutual aid is both a very old and a re-emerging system of collective care. It is a practice rooted in the belief in communal survival, prioritizing collective wellness over individual gain. it is beautiful, it is flourishing, and it is our future."

Please comment ⬇ and share mutual aid calls for action in response to Hurricane Helene, especially those organized by local networks.

#mutualaid #climateresponse #collectivecare #climatereality

Join us in celebrating the insightful words of Ami

Join us in celebrating the insightful words of Amirio Freeman, a passionate food systems advocate, writer, and environmental storyteller, and listen as they discuss the concept of "Narrative Intervention"—on the Climate with Kiana podcast. To learn more about Amirio's impactful work, follow them at @amiriofreeman.

I recently had the privilege of meeting Kiana, a climate justice and clean energy advocate. Her vision for fostering community through inspiring climate conversations is truly inspiring. As the host of @climatewithkiana, she explores solutions through a lens of joy and justice. If you've ever felt overwhelmed by the climate crisis, these conversations are just for you. Be sure to listen to the full episode, "Black Liberation and Climate Justice," and subscribe to the podcast for more.

#narrativeintervention #changenarrative #climatestorytelling #blackliberation

We are thrilled to ANNOUNCE: Resilient Landscapes

We are thrilled to ANNOUNCE: Resilient Landscapes for Re-imagined Futures a year-long pilot project to amplify the narratives of an Elder and Youth and their cross-generational visions of climate justice. In support of the community envisioning environmental justice at the Roof Depot site in East Phillips, Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Created in collaboration with community partners @eastphillipsurbanfarm and made possible with generous funding support @earthrisingfoundation whose mission is to resource a “people-powered approach to the climate crisis.”

This project is an effort to reframe the term ‘resilient landscape’ and whose voices are included in shaping and reimagining these spaces. There is a need to cultivate and amplify sustainable visions, and especially those of frontline communities most disproportionately impacted by climate change, and whose testimonies are essential for building a sustainable, equitable future.

Resilient Landscapes for Re-imagined Futures will partner with an elder and a youth as “storytellers” from East Phillips to engage in crafting and sharing narratives, what has been and what they want to see— as depicted in written stories and visual artwork.
A finished exhibition, and public event will engage the broader community to hear these narratives as told live by the storytellers, and through cross generational dialogue between the elder and youth to share their visions of climate justice for a re-imagined future. In addition, the exhibition will include artwork depicting an overlay of their visions for a new future.

Resilient Landscapes for Re-imagined Futures is co-led by Jothsna Harris @changenarrativellc and educator and artist Julie Marckel in partnership with an elder and youth storyteller in East Phillips. Huge thank you @oyatehotanin for being the fiscal sponsor for this project and for your ongoing partnership.

This project is part of a larger effort to support environmental justice in East Phillips.

Comment below ⬇️ to stay tuned and learn more about our public event, which is expected to take place this winter.

Follow @eastphillipsurbanfarm to learn more about their work and current community calls for action ✨

2024 Flower Power is a wonderful community gatheri

2024 Flower Power is a wonderful community gathering supporting our intersectional movements for justice. Thank you to all who were able to come out last weekend!

Creating intricate and beautiful mandalas of flowers in silent protest against mass incarceration, racial injustice, genocide, and climate disruption.

Held at Mounds Park Indian Burial Grounds, on Dakota and Anishinaabe Indigenous Lands, it is a sacred place and home to the only known remaining burial mounds within Minneapolis-Saint Paul.

For the past eight years, the Indigenous-led non-profit @oytatehotanin has been organizing Flower Power. This event, held from sunrise to sunset, is a gathering and a demonstration of the power of community-generated art. It's an opportunity for each of us to become one of the billion good relatives, standing with all life to decolonize our systems. Flowers represent the beauty we want to see in the world, remembrance, wishes for peace, and symbol for resistance.
#climatejustice #bringtheflowers

A Climate Just Future

“Our Futures Deserve Us”...
Our Futures Deserve Our Care, Devotion and Creativity…
Our Belief that We Will Exist, and
Our Power to Shape It

We all deserve dignity as we build a necessary future of justice—where all of us can breathe clean air, have access to fresh water, and eat locally grown nutritious foods to sustain ourselves, our communities, and the planet.

🌍 We Deserve a Climate Just Future Where We Can Thrive 🌏

First, we need to imagine it. What sights, sounds, and signs around you help you imagine the world you want to create?

⭐Thank you to Rommy Torrico @rommyyy123 ⭐ whose gorgeous artwork 🎨 helps us envision it. In collaboration with @oppagenda @amplifierart and their important work on “We Can Thrive Together: Visioning Economic Justice for All” - a campaign to help shift the narrative toward a more just economic system.

#shiftthenarrative #climatejustfuture #sightssoundssigns #ourclimatefuture

Join Change Narrative and collaborators @oyatehota

Join Change Narrative and collaborators @oyatehotanin and @buffaloweavers for a special Climate Healing Circle on July 10th, 2024, from 5 to 8 p.m.

These circles are best suited for anyone who wants more support in processing their emotions surrounding the climate crisis and dreaming of what will follow.

Learn more through the Link In Bio.

While all are welcome, registration is free, but limited to 12 participants. The location is in the Twin Cities, MN; more details upon confirmation.

Healing Circles are inclusive spaces that represent the multi-racial, inter-generational, and cross-class climate movement we seek to create.

Rooted in Indigenous thought and held as small group workshops, Healing Circles allow participants to name, hold, and release intense emotions around climate change while contextualizing how we ended up here. Unprocessed grief can limit access to the present moment. We are often either stuck in the past or jumping ahead to the future.

Through cycles of music and poetry, participants engage in an outdoor, moving journey that engages the senses and prompts a path to our individual and collective healing. This unlocks the potential to shift the stories we tell and reimagine the future we are building.

We hope you can join us for this circle or a future one. DM us for more info or to learn about bringing a Healing Circle to your community.

#climategrief #groupprocessing #intothepresentmoment #climatesolutions #futurebuilding

Solarpunk is a unique aesthetic and social movemen

Solarpunk is a unique aesthetic and social movement that catalyzes positive eco futures and inspires radical change through art.

Solarpunk imagery often depicts a lush ecotopia where nature, technology, and humanity coexist harmoniously. It empowers our communities to respond to and thrive in a climate-changed world. Rooted in punk culture's "do-it-yourself" ethos, people are not passive bystanders but active participants in building the new.

Which image is your favorite? Share in the comments
Image 1: Reimagine by Yuumei
Image 2: Eco villages of the future @katiepatrickhello
Image 3: Climate Afrofuturism @kidcadaver
Image 4: Pineapple Island @geosotaru
Image 5: Renaturalize rooftops @punktiert

Cover image by @changenarrativellc

Are you dreaming of a Solarpunk future? What examples of Solarpunk can you see already happening around you? How might we change the narrative on climate change to include imaginative climate solutions like Solarpunk?

Search #solarpunk and get inspired!

#solarpunk #biophilicculture #ecoliving #illuminatethefuture #stopfossilfuels #renewableenergy #ecotopia #climatesolutions #humancentereddesign #changenarrative #climateoptimism @solarpunkstories

Our recent collaboration, debuted at the 2024 Na

Our recent collaboration, debuted at the 2024 National Adaptation Forum, “Stories of Great Lakes Restoration.” It has been a joy to facilitate with @laurenxheartseed @coastalstates_cso @changenarrativellc

This project demonstrates how we can creatively engage hearts and minds through first-person narratives and artwork illuminating science, such as the Coastal States Organization’s habitat restoration work on the shores of the Great Lakes.

Check out these beautiful climate stories as powerfully told by Mechiya Jamison, Mark McConnell, and Vidya Balasubramanyam. With story coaching from Change Narrative, brought to life through gorgeous original illustrations by Heartseed Creative.

Recently, we shared this project at a Storytelling Workshop in North Minneapolis @healmpls in partnership with @mnrenewablenow @macalestercollege , and it felt so good to share ways for people to creatively communicate their stories for greater impact.

🌊What is your Great Lakes Story?
The five Great Lakes - Erie, Michigan, Ontario, and Superior have a total surface area of 94,600 square miles and are connected by various lakes and rivers, making them the largest freshwater system in the world.

Which Great Lake do you feel connected to or disconnected from? What is one thing you like most about it? Or, what is one thing that affects your relationship with it?

Thank you to the Coastal States Organization for your partnership and belief in this project, which was possible through funding from the NOAA Office for Coastal Management in partnership with the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative. @noaa @nationaladaptationforum

#climatestorytelling #climateart #habitatrestoration

The Six Americas is a framework for understanding

The Six Americas is a framework for understanding American attitudes on climate change. And for the first time in history, public opinion has shifted, with Americans now more than twice as likely to be Alarmed or Concerned about climate change than Doubtful or Dismissive.

Do you want to understand your opinions about climate change better? Take the Six Americas Short Survey, designed for users to upload their data. Visit: climatecommunication.yale.edu/visualizations-data/sassy/

If you work on climate change? How have the results of this study helped your efforts to engage hearts and minds?

Graphic and caption by Change Narrative LLC. Want to learn more about our services and programs? Please visit the 'Link In Bio.'

#sixamericas #climatechange #globalwarming #publicopinion @yaleclimateconnections

Martina (Marta) Toledo Alcarraz, Change Narrative

Martina (Marta) Toledo Alcarraz, Change Narrative intern, shares her climate story, "When The Sun Sets In Valizas"

"...By the end of the summer, when I got back to the U.S., a different story was happening back home. It had not rained in 4 months, and our main freshwater source, the Paso Severino Dam reservoir, dried up. This has been the thirstiest my people have ever been in 74 years. Years of political negligence by different governments have led to divestment from more freshwater sources due to lobbying. Uruguay was the first country to name drinkable water as a human right, but those rights became increasingly neglected each day, with each liter of bottled water sold..."

[Read the Full Story —Link in Bio]

What is your climate story? How have you considered the changes you are witnessing, and what personal motivation keeps you going?

Artist Luise Hesse visually depicts "Until the Las

Artist Luise Hesse visually depicts "Until the Last Tree Falls" based on the true story of activists who built tree houses to occupy and protect the deforestation of an old-growth forest in Germany. In the first image, Police Officers, among deforestation crews, wait on the ground to bring the forest down. The second image shows a different perspective, high in the trees, and the daily life of the community that has made a vow to protect the forest.

“I feel helpless. Frustrated. Sad. Angry. I sit in my little self-made treehouse, watching the forest around me disappear.” Visit the Link in Bio to read the full personal story on which this art was based, written by a German activist (who wishes not to be named)

Luise is part of Climate Illustrated’s artist team. When asked 🎨What does art mean to you? She shares: “I see illustration as a powerful tool to offer an easier or just different access to a certain topic. With illustrations, I can build a bridge between the topic and the viewer, making the topic more tangible. I can visualize something that does not exist yet, make it possible on paper, open the minds of the viewers, and inspire their imagination. Personally, I often draw to sort my thoughts and feelings. It works like an outlet for me.”

Follow Luise @lufie.nesse
@climateillustrated

Posted with permission from Luise Hesse—thank you for your gorgeous and impactful work!
#climatecreative #climateactivist #forestoccupation

For Women's History Month, the Minnesota Women's P

For Women's History Month, the Minnesota Women's Press featured Change Narrative's Jothsna Harris and collaborators Sachiko Graber and Monica McDaniel (above l-r). They each share personal essays on their love for farming and reflections on a sense of place in a climate-changed world.

In the following essays, they combine life experience and scientific knowledge to explore how spending time with nature has prompted their paths to heal following climate grief, burnout, and an altered sense of place.

Read their stories in "Burnt-Out People Cannot Serve a Burning Planet" @mnwomenspress, along with climate storytelling tips in the Link In Bio.

Photo by Sarah Whiting

#alteredplace #climatechangedworld #climateburnout #restoration #climatereflections #spring #womenshistorymonth

With climate change's uncertainty, it can be chall

With climate change's uncertainty, it can be challenging to imagine the future.

Reflecting and writing about your experiences can create clarity, build confidence, and serve as a tool to advocate for solutions.

As winter days turn towards spring light, journaling is a form of cognitive and active processing that can help organize thoughts about the change we are experiencing.

The words don't have to make sense when you are free-writing, and this can allow us to be fully honest, present, and sincere with ourselves, which can help release stress and anxiety. It can also help us make sense of our place in this world, what is underneath our motivations, and the reasons why we care. These imperfect drafts may form the basis of what your climate story might be about.

Is journaling something that you do? If so, why?

Graphic design by Lauren Boritzke of Heartseed Creative LLC
Caption and words by Jothsna Harris and Marta Toledo Alcarazz of Change Narrative LLC

#writethroughit #climatewriting #climatestorytelling

Research tells us that an information-alone approa

Research tells us that an information-alone approach will not move us to change our behaviors.

“In many professions, what used to matter most were abilities associated with the left side of the brain: linear, sequential, and spreadsheet kinds of faculties. Those still matter, but they're not enough. What's important now are the characteristics of the brain's right hemisphere: artistry, empathy, inventiveness, and big-picture thinking." According to Daniel Pink, author of the book, A Whole New Mind.

Combining climate data and personal stories, connects left and right-brain thinking, essential for making the information and facts relevant to the human experience.

#climatedata #awholenewmind #climateaction #climatestorytelling @danielpink @jerome_bruner

We are kicking off the New Year by sharing a clima

We are kicking off the New Year by sharing a climate-action project we've been working on for the last 18 months, called S.O.M.E.Society of Mother Earth (S.O.M.E.), in collaboration with Dakota Elder Strong Buffalo and Laura LaBlanc of @oyatehotanin and Ben Weaver (benweaver.net).

S.O.M.E. intends to foster relationships between humans and the environment to prompt healing in our broken world through performances, healing gatherings, and storytelling initiatives. S.O.M.E is an invitation to connect at a time when so many are feeling disconnected.

One aspect of the S.O.M.E. project is Climate Grief Healing Circles, a response to unprocessed grief around climate change, which can limit access to the present moment. Climate Grief Healing Circles are collective spaces that allow participants to name, hold, and release intense emotions around climate change while contextualizing how we ended up here. "What brought you here today? How are you showing up? What are you struggling with?" Through cycles of music and poetry, participants are invited into a sensory experience and to consider possible paths to individual and collective healing, necessary for unlocking the potential to shift the stories we tell and reimagine the future we are building.

Society of Mother Earth (S.O.M.E.) is made possible by funding from the Minnesota Humanities Center @mnhumani, 2022-2023 Cultural Heritage and Community Identity Grant. Special thanks to filmmaker Nick Kapanke, who captured these circles beautifully. Big gratitude to all who participated in these circles and for the powerful experience you helped shape.

Are you interested in bringing a Climate Grief Healing Circle to your community? Please send us a message for more info.

#climategrief #climatehealing #collectiveaction @buffaloweavers #joy #thepresentmoment

A jacket made out of found plastic waste at Pedder

A jacket made out of found plastic waste at Pedder Bay in Vancouver Island by Uruguayan artist Eva Ingver. Eva's artistry represents an emerging sustainable future, utilizing the abundance of plastic pollution in their local environment to create worn art that embodies self-expression and creativity while raising concern and awareness of the problems as a call to action.

How can we reframe solutions to include artistic activism or 'Artivism' to reclaim what our future can be?

Eva challenges the idea of waste and encourages us to repurpose it, transforming harmful materials into something beautiful and useful, that holds power to ignite imaginations.

Have you experienced the transformative power of art? How might art influence your perspective or create agency to act?

Graphic by Marta Toledo Alcaraz
Images provided by Eva Ingver, as captured by @oli_dambo
Learn more about Eva's work @evaevaevaeva__

#artivism #Upcycling #repurpose #reframe #reimagine #climatechange
#plasticpollution #vancouverisland

Created in 1996 by "...forty people of color and E

Created in 1996 by "...forty people of color and European-American representatives met in Jemez, New Mexico, for the "Working Group Meeting on Globalization and Trade." The Jemez meeting was hosted by the Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice with the intention of hammering out common understandings between participants from different cultures, politics, and organizations." Since its creation, the Jemez Principles have been adopted globally by thousands of groups organizing on climate change through democratic processes.

View the Jemez Principles at www.ejnet.org/ej/jemez.pdf

Have you heard of The Jemez Principles for Democratic Organizing? If so, has it influenced your perspective or work on climate change? Let us know in the comments.

Graphic by @changenarrativellc

#jemezprinciples #organizing #climatejustice #frontlinevoices #environmentaljustice #collaboration

Thank you, @triplepundit for sharing the power of

Thank you, @triplepundit for sharing the power of storytelling as a strategy to cultivate belonging for underrepresented voices in the climate movement.

This article's author, Amy Brown, writes, "A rising chorus of young and diverse storytellers want to change that narrative, building on a growing body of evidence that demonstrates storytelling can change human behavior. Connecting personal narratives to the challenge of climate change sparks emotional responses that ease anxiety and promote a sense of agency rather than helplessness, according to a 2023 analysis published in Psychology Today."

The article recaps the panel discussion with @kiana.kaz @mattscottgw @changenarrativellc @zznelsonzz @aditimayer @cocoafrique on storytelling for climate action at the Nest Climate Campus event during 2023 Climate Week.

With the takeaways that when "done well, storytelling around the climate crisis will:
💐 Invite a sense of belonging
🌼 Create an emotional connection
🌸 Acknowledge the importance of culture
🌻 Actively engage the listener
🌺 Embrace each person's unique identity
🏵 Offer solutions and action, not gloom and doom."

👀 Read the full article in the Link in Bio.
Cover Image @theclimategroup

@projectdrawdown @imagine5_official

Load More Follow on Instagram

Copyright © 2024

Home
About
Services
Projects
MN Fringe Program
Blog
Connect