Most of us, at some point, tell stories from cultures other than our own. Despite social distancing, the world is becoming smaller – our swaps for example, regularly have attendees from Canada, UK, Russia, southern Europe, Turkey and elsewhere. We are becoming more aware of how the history and culture of indigenous, or first nation people, as well as ethnic minorities, has often been stolen, suppressed or misrepresented by colonisers, majority governments, or writers who interpret these rich cultural stories through the prism of their own culture.
Through this discussion we hope to shed light on some of the key issues, why it can prove upsetting, and most importantly, to offer steps that you can take to treat stories from other cultures with respect, thereby reducing the risk of unintentional offence, while demonstrating to your audience the importance of another culture.
We have invited five tellers to sit on the panel and share their experience and suggestions for best practice: Hears Crow (USA) Norman Perrin(Canada), Jo Henwood (whose article on this topic we shared in the lastPlatter) and Lilli Rodrigues-Pang (both from Australia) and Richard Dian Vilar (Philippines).
We encourage all FEAST members to watch this discussion given the diversity of cultures that we embrace as an organisation.