We curate Community Narratives to amplify local knowledge, share powerful stories, & ask what is possible
“To be a storyteller is to recognize, break apart, and critically reshape the stories of our communities and our world.” -Tsering Lama, Storytelling Advisor, Greenpeace International
Community Narratives are ongoing community oral history and storytelling projects produced by Window Seat Media. Sometimes, we initiate a project with the guidance of a team of advisors and collaborators. Other times, our projects grow from a community, organization, or group of people in the South Sound and beyond who want to further a shared goal or vision for the future. In these cases, we serve as a "story midwife," convener, or facilitator.
Community Care & Engagement
We are so grateful for the many relationships we have developed with multimedia storytellers, artists, academics, community organizers, and organizations since we began our work in 2016. We've shared skills and tools, convened conversations, and created opportunities to glean wisdom from the lived experience of our neighbors, colleagues, family members, and friends.
Want to collaborate on a project? Contact Elaine Vradenburgh or Meg Rosenberg.
Current & Past Projects
Community Roots
Community Roots is an oral history project about visionaries and change-makers. The project shares individual contributions toward a collective effort--amplifying the vital and diverse ways we each contribute to our local ecosystem of creativity, mutual aid, and social change. Project participants learn interviewing techniques, gather community stories, and help explore: What threads from the past are woven into how we organize and create, here in the South Sound today?
Contact Memory Activist, Elaine Vradenburgh, elaine@windowseatmedia.org if you are interested in participating or collaborating.
Stories of Food, Food as Story
Our Foodways workshop series invites participants to explore their history and cultural heritage through food traditions. When we revisit the past with curiosity, humility, and care, it can create opportunities to listen for new or deeper meaning, even in the most enduring stories and traditions. Through a community-based oral history interviewing process, participants build and deepen relationships with people they love, share their own stories through creative products, and eat delicious food along the way!
Contact Memory Activist, Elaine Vradenburgh, elaine@windowseatmedia.org if you are interested in participating or collaborating.
Brave Practice Playback Theatre Collective
Brave Practice is a community engagement program of Window Seat, offering theatre and storytelling workshops and performances in partnership with local organizations. Our troupe of theatre artists are skilled Playback Theatre practitioners, a form of improv theatre where people tell true moments from their lives and performers play them back on the spot using music, conversation, metaphor, and movement.
Contact Community Weaver, Meg Rosenberg, meg@windowseatmedia.org, to invite Brave Practice to work with your organization.
The Third Thirty
The Third Thirty is a community oral history project that invites South Sound elders to reflect and share wisdom from a moment in their lives. The project began in 2018 as a community-based learning experience offered in partnership with Senior Services of South Sound Lifelong Learning Program. Participants learned the art and practice of oral history, built their listening and interviewing skills, and considered the ethical issues of gathering and sharing other peoples’ stories. They invited someone they admired to participate in an interview and then we shared edited versions of those interviewed at public readings at the end of the course. The Third Thirty has since evolved into a dynamic community-driven storytelling project that involves many creative collaborators and partners.
Contact Memory Activist, Elaine Vradenburgh, elaine@windowseatmedia.org if you are interested in participating or collaborating.
InhaleExhale
InhaleExhale is a multimedia, multidisciplinary conversation series about death and dying curated by Window Seat Media in collaboration with local artists, organizations, and groups.
.png)
InhaleExhale conversation series began in the fall of 2019 and is currently on pause. Check back for details or contact Memory Activist, Elaine Vradenburgh, elaine@windowseatmedia.org.
Community Storytelling Circles
Storytelling Circles are what brought us together online during pandemic times. We offered the "Extraordinary Lives of Ordinary People" series as a way to build community, highlight a central theme, question, or creative product, and engage in dialogue inspired by community stories. Now, Storytelling Circles are woven into our other programming. This activity is perfect for low-stakes storytelling and sharing memories. We work closely with partner organizations and individuals to choose a theme and adapt the structure to fit your group. We are connected to a team of talented facilitators who can lead small groups. We can teach the structure to you so you can facilitate future circles on your own!
Contact Community Weaver, Meg Rosenberg, meg@windowseatmedia.org with questions or potential collaborations.
Voices from the Harbor
Relationships, networks, memory, storytelling - all contribute to what makes a community work. The primary goal of Voices from the Harbor was to put the Grays Harbor region’s history to work as a community development tool. Some of the project’s core assumptions are that, if you know what to look for, a walk down the street can reveal the history of a community, a neighbor’s memory can provide insight into the lessons and experiences of a generation of citizens. By creating a space for community conversations about the evolution of the Harbor, we hope to add critical perspective to development efforts intended to solve contemporary issues like affordable housing and homelessness.
The Voices from the Harbor event series was co-produced by Window Seat Media and The Evergreen State College and was funded by Humanities Washington. It took place in 2017 in Grays Harbor County.
Preserving Working Farms
We offer multimedia storytelling services to help organizations raise awareness and funds. This collection of stories we produced (between 2015-2017) with organizations that are working to preserve working farmland and educate eaters about the challenges farmers face when producing food for local markets.
