Telling Your Climate Story: A Climate Imaginarium Workshop

What is your climate story? Our personal experiences often force us to confront what it means to live in the midst of ecological collapse — unseasonably warm fall days, a shoreline much different from our childhood memories, a sunny afternoon blotted out by wildfire smoke. And yet, we also encounter the whirr of new green technologies, the collective fervor of a youthful protest chant, and community gardens thriving against all odds.

On November 10th 2023, the Climate Imaginarium hosted a virtual climate storytelling workshop on the Ecological Design Collective platform. Participants were asked to follow a structured writing prompt format, which elicited observations of the changing climate, emotional responses to climate change, and motivations to confront the climate crisis. Attendees shared their stories with a partner or with the group and discussed strategies for using climate storytelling to promote positive ways forward through the climate crisis. Writers came away with deeper engagement with their personal responses to climate change, increased confidence in their ability to speak with others about the changing climate, and an enhanced conviction to confront the climate crisis.

The workshop was hosted by Jason Davis. Jason is a musician, teacher, and the director of Climate Stories Project, an educational and artistic forum for sharing personal stories about climate change. He leads workshops for students, organizations, and community members who learn to share their own stories of the changing climate. Jason also writes and performs original music which incorporates the recorded voices of people from around the world speaking about their personal responses to the climate crisis, with the goal of helping participants and audiences engage with climate change as an urgent human story. Jason teaches music and research methods at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts. He holds a doctorate in Performance Studies from McGill University and a master’s degree in Interdisciplinary Ecology from the University of Florida. 

• • Check out Jason’s tips for telling your climate story.

• • Share your climate story with our community at the Ecological Design Collective.

• • Share your climate story with the Climate Stories Project community.

• • Apply for the Climate Stories Ambassadors initiative, a 3-part online series to train you to tell your climate story and interview others about theirs.

The Climate Imaginarium

We need a cultural movement to confront the climate crisis with radical imagination and to inspire hope for a just and regenerative future.

The workshop kicked off our virtual community for the Climate Imaginarium, a collaborative public space run by a consortium of climate arts and culture organizations, including universities, museums, magazines, and Hollywood. Established by the Climate Imaginations Network at Columbia University, Imagine 2200 at Grist Magazine, and the Ecological Design Collective, the Imaginarium is weaving a network between the most influential institutions involved with climate storytelling in writing, film, theater, music, art, and design. We’re leveraging our collective power to imagine just, equitable, and regenerative futures, and to evolve our culture by dreaming as big as we can.

Through this consortium, we’re working together to develop a community center for climate artists and storytellers to convene and collaborate, a studio to produce and publish climate stories across a range of narrative media, a lab to inform interdisciplinary pedagogy and research for translating stories into climate solutions, and a space for learning, performance, exhibition, and engagement with the public. Our vision is to present a myriad of opportunities for climate artists and storytellers to amplify their reach, visibility, and impact, while uplifting underrepresented voices from frontline communities.

Our virtual community space will operate in parallel with a physical community space, currently in development in New York City. We hope you’ll join our community, whether virtually or in person, as we continue to weave together opportunities for collaboration, publication, exhibition, learning, research, engagement, and collective imagination in the weeks and months ahead.

• • Join our virtual community space on the Ecological Design Collective platform — and introduce yourself!

• • Check out our website.

• • Express your interest in future collaborations.

• • Support the Climate Imaginarium.

Stay tuned for upcoming events, workshops, and opportunities to collaborate on climate writing, art, music, theater, film, and more!