Terminology of the Storytelling Boom
Journalism | Media | Communications | Literature | Narrative
The language of the storytelling boom is interdisciplinary.
The storytelling boom is firmly located within communications practice — but the practice of storytelling is firmly located within literature studies. As a result, those who produce stories typically use language from Journalism, Media & Communications studies, and those who study stories typically use language from Literature & Narrative studies.
However — some words are shared across both disciplines, but are used differently. Most notably, “narrative” and “story”. As a rule of thumb:
People who study stories are most interested in the text itself.
People who produce stories are most interested in the opinions expressed in the texts.
This Glossary is intended to support communication between practitioners and scholars by providing simple explanations of commonly used terms.
Different words,
same meaning
Literature & Narrative
Corporate storytelling
Organizational storytelling
Instrumentalized storytelling
Text
Protagonist
Rhetoric
Rhetorical narrative
Journalism, Media & Communications
Strategic storytelling
Strategic storytelling
Strategic storytelling or impact storytelling
Content or copy
Interviewee, beneficiary (impact stories) or story participant
Messaging
Strategic storytelling
Glossary
Embodied simulation
Impact storytelling
Mental simulation
Narration
Narrative
Narrative affect
Narrative change
Narrative communications
Narrative effect
Narrative text
Organizational storytelling
Orgnizational communications
Simulation learning
Story
Strategic storytelling
Text
You know that feeling when you’re completely “in” a book and you feel what’s happening as though it’s happening to you? That’s “embodied simulation”.
Organizational storytelling about the human impact of an organization’s work.
The ability to imagine something in your mind. (Essentially, it’s imagining.)
An account of events that communicates a point of view. Narration produces a narrative text.
The cognitive process of narrating.
The feeling experienced from hearing a story, such as sadness or joy.
The work of shifting public opinion on a social issue.
Organizational communications that includes storytelling.
The change observed in the reader as a result of a story.
A text that is the product of narration. Also - a story.
Stories about people, narrated and published by the organization, in service to the organization. All organizational storytelling is strategic storytelling.
Communications produced and distributed on behalf of an organization and its spokespeople. Also “corporate communications” or simply “comms”.
“Simulation learning” is a cognitive process to choose an action by imagining actions and and their outcomes.
A story is the same as a “narrative text”; an account of related events or actions.
Telling stories that are produced to achieve an audience effect objective. All organizational storytelling is strategic storytelling; all strategic storytelling is not organizational storytelling.
A collection of information, such as a book, a podcast episode or a poem.