Think Critically - Act Creatively: Harnessing the Power of Fiction for Social Good
Overview/Description:
The “Think Critically, Act Creatively” workshop is a future-focused experience highlighting the power of stories as tools for fostering civic imagination and inspiring real world change.
The workshop reflects ongoing efforts by USC’s Media, Activism & Participatory Politics (MAPP) Project to integrate peer-based learning, popular culture, and media production into civic learning pathways.
Over the past four years, MAPP conducted five case studies of diverse youth-driven communities which translate elements of participatory culture into civic engagement and political participation. Our findings stress the interplay between individual growth, organization, networks, communities, and platforms.
As MAPP researchers learned, these groups often succeed by tapping the following practices:
Cultural appropriation
Storytelling
Remixing
Working across organizational contexts
Deploying metaphors from popular culture
- Drawing on sustained engagement with interest-driven and friendship-based networks