"I took that story out to not only help myself deal with it, but to help people focus on what's important, and that's the kids." "Before I found storytelling, I would push that under the rug and not think about it again," Howe said. She recalls telling one story about a former student who was killed because his brother was in a gang. Howe, who deals in storytelling even in her day job as events producer for Leadership Story Lab, a consulting firm that helps business people use stories to promote themselves and their causes, found in storytelling "my urban tribe, my artistic family," and an important outlet for expression. "It's about living more openly and honestly and creatively and vulnerably." Scott Whitehair, who produces several storytelling shows in Chicago, agrees the desire for connection is feeding the trend, though he adds: "My pessimistic perspective is that we've become so confessional as a society that it's one more layer beyond a Facebook post."įor Howe, who got involved in storytelling after she got laid off from her job as an English teacher at Chicago Public Schools and entered "a very dark time in my life," the growing community isn't so much a scene as "a way of looking at life and connecting with other people," she said. "There's something irreducible and irreplaceable about being in a shared space in real time with other humans, sharing an experience." "My theory is that it's largely in response to the screen-based isolation in which many of us function all the time," Belknap said. The prize is money donated to a charity of the victor's choice.īelknap, a former actor and stand-up comedian, launched Write Club at The Hideout in 2010, around the same time a handful of other live literature shows were starting to crop up in Chicago, because "I wanted a show that would be fast, loud, feature original writing and have actual stakes." He has since opened chapters in Atlanta, Athens, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Toronto, and locally launched another monthly show at Space, in Evanston, so the under-21 crowd could join in.īelknap believes the hunger driving audiences to hear live stories stems from our distinctly modern condition. Write Club, for example, is "literature as blood sport," wherein two people argue in defense of opposing ideas as the clock counts down their seven-minute time limit, and the audience votes by applause. OUTspoken is now a Podcast – ON THE MIC: OUTSPOKEN LGBTQ+ STORYTELLING at Sidetrack! Since its inception, we have recorded all audio from the stories each month and have created a podcast around these stories.Ĭheck out all our episodes of ON THE MIC: OUTSPOKEN LGBTQ+ STORYTELLING at Sidetrack available on:Įveryone has a story.Belknap insists on the term "live lit," rather than "storytelling," for the burgeoning scene in order to encompass the varied manifestations of the word-spewing genre, from the popular personal narrative to essay competitions. “Consistently great stories…and it’s ground-breaking.” People introduced themselves to the storytellers, IF YOU PLAN ON ATTENDING OUTSPOKEN AND REQUIRE SPECIAL ACCOMMODATIONS, PLEASE Reviews for OUTspoken! Sidetrack is open daily: Weekdays 3pm-2am, Saturday 1pm-3am & Sunday 1pm-2am. Typically there will be 6 storytellers and one intermission. OUTspoken is held on the first Tuesday of each month at Sidetrack. Join us for OUTspoken LGBTQ+ Stories, our monthly storytelling event celebrating uniquely personal stories from a cross-section of the LGBTQ+ community.
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