The Single Story or Multiple Stories

Originally Published January 2017

  Two times this month I have attended professional learning experiences in which the same Ted Talk video was shown.  The Ted Talk is of novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie speaking on “The Danger of the Single Story.”  In it she speaks of her own bias in telling a single story of others to experiencing another person’s single story of her.  The video has a definite impact.

     We have all told a single story about someone else at some point.  Why?  Because we have a world view based upon our own upbringing, experiences, culture, ethnicity, gender, etc.  But what if we acknowledged that we have told the single story, as Adichie does, and then work to learn the multiple stories of those with whom we share this world?

Today I attended a session of Developing Global Thinkers.  At first glance you might have thought that the attendees were a homogenous group.  White educators.  But the facilitator started by asking us each to share our backgrounds: where we grew up, our culture, our heritage, how that has impacted us.  What did I learn?  We are not the same at all.  We each have a cultural heritage that is different.

But it was learning our differences that brought us together.  We became interested in one another’s background.  And then we found what makes us similar.  Beautiful!

We are fortunate to live in a very diverse world.  We really are a global community, and that is wonderful, but only if we are open to truly learning our stories.  Before we decide what a person is based upon some characteristic that you can easily identify -skin color, language, religion, ethnicity – we need to learn their real story.  How?  Just ask. Take the time to learn and not judge.  Take the time to listen, and then you can tell them your story.

What can happen?

Amazing things!

“The Danger of the Single Story”

https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story