mojatu .com
28 Education & Career
Why Story-Based Inquiry” Should be
Critical Skills for all Youth
By Richard C Close, Servant - CEO, Chrysalis Campaign. Inc.
Why did we choose “Story-Based Inquiry” for the
framework for our Investigative Journalism Community
and courses www.iamthestory.org for global youth?
Since the beginning of human communication,
storytelling was the way we shared our human
experience. We learned life skills, grew communities
and stayed safe in hostile environments. To this day
storytelling is the nerve center of not only digital news,
it is still in the streets of rap music and the rumors of the
market place.
Our stories define who we are, What we do, When it
happened, Where it happened and Why it happened
(the five Ws). Just look at your phone and how Facebook
works, you will see it.
Digital storytelling is how we have become a global
community. Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and Linkedin
are all nothing but five Ws storytelling applications. For
the listener the story has always been, “Who am I and
how do I fit in?” It is addicting because it is who we are
and the space that gives life meaning. Yet, at times, it can
be, meaningless, deceptive, even tragically evil. Look at
www.martinlutherking.org by the white supremacist’s
Stormfront.
Moral storytelling in form of Sufi Tails, Confucius saying
and the parables of Jesus all drive us to dig deeper into
character development and the truth of what is going
down around us. When listening to any story we are
asking ourselves two things: “Is this true?” and “Is this
right or wrong?” Perhaps the entire culture’s character is
formed by how we tell an interpret stories. Corruption
has always known this and for this reason have
oppressed, twisted and now misinformed people on the
true meaning behind the story.
From stories of a war plan, social injustice to the boy dating
a daughter. Life is billions of stories woven to one big one
that we all live in. We train youth to both uncover the truth
in the story and the ethics of telling an honest one. Every day
deceptive stories cause the disaster of collapsed governments
to the death of a lied to refugees. All must know how to find
the truth in fiction. The skillful inquiry of a story is a mission
critical life skill and human right. From a local injustice to the
space shuttle blowing up, a sharp investigative reporter (or
analyst) knows the truth is the story between the facts.
For this generation the global collaborative changes all
of that. Never before in history did every civilian have the
technical means to hold up a cell phone and stream the
glaring truth. With this comes great power that has not
gone unnoticed. Today, tens of thousands of fake web
sites are created to dis-inform the public about every
thing from elections to product quality, while at the
same time live streaming from citizens convict and forces
the corrupt to deal with reality. The double edge sword
of the Internet is that it makes it easier for the powerful to
deceive while at the same time harder for them to hide.
The war is on between true and lies on a global scale.
Only a inquiry trained mind in will find and expose truth.
Through clear minded inquiry we can win this war for the
hearts of youth.
The five Ws of Who, What, Where, When and Why armed
the youthful mind with a razor sword to not only cut
through deception but also find solutions. The inquiry is