National Storytelling Membership Association

Values & Beliefs
NSN believes that the age-old art of storytelling is as crucial in modern society as it ever has been in history and that its practice should, therefore, be revived, expanded and widely supported.

NSN further believes that storytelling is a unique and powerful performing art. Utilizing both humor and pathos, it engages the emotions, the imagination and the intellect of people of all ages.

Storytellers serve as agents of positive change in the world.
NSN holds storytelling to be:

Relevant
Storytelling is essential to education: neuroscience is demonstrating that the human brain organizes, retains, and accesses information most effectively in narrative form
Storytelling plays constructive roles in the workplace, in organizations, corporations, government agencies, non-profits, and small businesses
Because telling and listening to stories can have powerful healing effects, storytelling is essential in the work of therapists, clergy, and health care practitioners of all kinds.

Inspiring
Because storytelling expresses, teaches, and preserves values and beliefs, it is of primary importance for all individuals and the communities to which they belong.
Stories provide a community with the common historical knowledge and shared vision needed to inspire collective action.

Transformative
Listening to stories is essential to the development of human imagination, creativity, and abstract thought processes.
Diverse and even antagonistic communities come to understand and respect one another through listening to each other's stories, and therefore storytelling is an essential tool for peacemaking.

Create new educational content, provide resources for inclusivity among all forms of storytelling, explore new partnerships, solidify national outreach and national partnerships, showcase storytelling as an art form nationally and as an academic field.

With the assistance of members and volunteers, NSN has been reinventing our organization focus to be inclusive of all forms of storytelling through our events like the National Storytelling Summit, Special Interest Groups, and other programs and resources. We are creating new programs and resources and advocating for storytelling within communities.

Membership is currently increasing and inquiries into future National Storytelling Summits have started coming into our office. We want to make NSN a world-class organization. We have put together a solid vision statement that imagines our organization as an inclusive organization that advocates on behalf of storytellers and storytelling. A place where we grow passionate and inspired storytellers. A place where NSN provides storytelling grants, mentoring, special interest groups and financial resources to help fund exciting projects that transform and tell our human experience.