by Olivia Williams, PhD Candidate at American University with Benjamin Stokes
To guide our evolving design for the DC Storytelling System, we wanted a “snapshot” of how stories already circulate. I focused on one neighborhood (Woodridge), and mapped the flow of civic stories. My goal was to look across organizations and media channels using a powerful framework from urban sociology.
OUR SUSPICION: Neighborhood leaders struggle to connect their face-to-face organizing with their online organizing to circulate local stories. If successful, our design intervention will significantly increase the impact of neighborhood stories on group cohesion by fitting to the ecosystem currently connecting groups and residents.
Clockwise from top left: Tweet from DC Public Library about PorchFest, a local event taking place in the Woodridge Neighborhood; Woodridge Neighborhood Library bulletin board (credit: Olivia Williams); our and Smithsonian’s payphone storytelling system in the library for PorchFest (credit: Benjamin Stokes) and a free-standing local history exhibit inside Woodridge Neighborhood Library (credit: Olivia Williams).