By Kristian Kirk
Story-telling has always had a place in the folk high school, for stories can do something very special. Narrative can reach back in time and link us, both as individuals and as a culture, with our shared history. We know all about the Nordic myths and the Bible stories as they were told from the very beginnings of the folk high school. But story-telling, like song, can also link us to our contemporaries in the here and now, at the folk high school or in other groups and networks. Story-telling draws upon the grand narrative, our shared story. But stories are also highly significant for us as individuals. When we listen to or tell a story about our own lives, we build up an identity by creating a form of order out of random and often incoherent events. The narrative become a glue that binds our life story together. This happens throughout our lives as a common thread of narrative but also in our personality – deep-down inside, there is narrative coupled with our very personal feelings and experiences. Here, the narrative creates meaning, order and categorises our experiences. The story constitutes, then, both a broader common narrative and our own personal narrative and identity. As such, it can also be used for pedagogical purposes.
When we listen to or tell a story about our own lives, we build up an identity by creating a form of order out of random and often incoherent events. The narrative become a glue that binds our life story together.
Kristian Kirk
I had an experience of story-telling in the summer of 2017, when I was fortunate enough to be invited to participate as a teacher in a story-telling project. The idea was to bring together six young refugees or their children or grandchildren. During the course of five days in October, they would be taught story-telling and would then tell their stories at an event at which, among the audience, there would be politicians with influence on government policy for refugees. The main purpose was to put a voice and a face to some of the many statistics that filled our newspaper columns.
As we approached October, Evelina, the project manager, had managed to assemble a team of story-tellers. To get a sense of whom I was to be working with, she had conducted extensive interviews with all the narrators and sent them to me. I read through them all, and all the participants had amazing stories to tell. About fleeing from Syria to Denmark. About lying in a boat in the Mediterranean and hoping they would be among the lucky ones to get to the other side. About feeling different in Netto, when everyone was staring at them as though they were thieves who only came to Denmark to deprive Danes of their welfare. All stories that could be hard to relate to if you are a Danish lad with an untroubled upbringing, but they were also stories that undoubtedly needed to be told.
I read the interviews over and over again and was excited to meet these storytellers – but also excited.
Special treatment
October came, and with it the story-tellers arrived at the folk high school, where they were to spend five days together. Five days of intensive teaching and story-telling.
They all had good stories to tell, but one story I remember very clearly.
It came from Basir, an Afghan boy, who had grown up in a ghetto area in Fredericia and who had enjoyed being called Osama by the other boys at school – until he found out who Osama actually was. From the moment he stepped through the door, Basir was bursting with stories, and he had a passion for rap, which was clearly reflected in his very poetic and streetwise way of telling them. He was deeply engaged in the project and wanted to have loads of feedback on the stories he told.
After the first day, I had fallen in love with one of his stories. It was about his study trip in the 6th form, which was going to USA. He was really looking forward to it, and especially to seeing the Bronx, where hip-hop culture started. Back home, in front of the mirror in the bathroom, he had practised saying in ringing Bronx American, “Know what I’m sayin’?”. But the rules governing entry to USA are really tough if your name is Basir and you come from Afghanistan – even though he had a Danish passport. Before they left, like everyone else in the class, he had to answer a set of questions about himself and his travels. One of the questions was: Have you been in Afghanistan within the last two years? And Basir had been there. He had gone to visit that part of the family that had not fled to Denmark. However, he was afraid that answering ‘Yes’ to the question would stop his trip to USA before it had even started.
So, instead of telling the truth, he took a wild risk and answered ‘No’. On arrival in USA, his name, his appearance and his background ensured – not surprisingly – that he was given ‘special treatment’ by the immigration authorities. There was constant suspicion that he had something to hide. Finally, he ended to being interrogated by two policemen, the way we have seen in films. He was asked about his travels over the past two years and whether he had been to Afghanistan. With thumping heart and sweating palms, he answered “No”. The officer looked him in the eyes and, after a couple of seconds of silence, he placed his hand on Basir’s passport, slid it across the table and said, “Welcome to America”.
As long as we remember to tell stories
I was really excited by this story. I could not say precisely why, but Basir found my enthusiasm infectious, and he, too, grew fonder of the story. We talked a lot about where and how the story should finish. What should be included and what left out? It was as though talking about the ending became a more general talk about what the story was really about. What was its main theme?
Basir tried out a lot of endings, and then at some point he tried an ending that we all knew, the moment it came out of his mouth, was the right one. Basir knew it, too. I could see his eyes light up like stars. Even though the ending had lain there in his head, it was only when it came out of his mouth and became sound that he could hear that it was the right one.
And so it is for all of us.
Even though the ending had lain there in his head, it was only when it came out of his mouth and became sound that he could hear that it was the right one.
Kristian Kirk
We do not know what we have stored in our heads before we allow it to come out of our mouths. It is only then it really comes to life. Only then it finds a voice. Like mute notes on a piece of paper, which do not become real until instruments turn them into sound.
And our voice is the instrument we use to try out stories, to give them life and to hear whether they sound the same as they did inside our heads. For we all walk around with stories about ourselves inside our heads. There are complete or half-finished manuscripts about our lives and how we perceive them. And some of those stories we think we understand, even though they have never been told.
It is like the first time we try to talk into a microphone, and we hear our own voice as others hear it. And we think, “Is that really how I sound?”
Basir told his story over and over again during those five days. And every time he told it, I could see him getting more preoccupied with the question, ‘What is this story about?’
Perhaps Basir has now discovered what his story was about. Was it an expression of his complex past? Or an attempt to create a new narrative – a new identity? I do not know. But, as with a card trick that we have seen through, when we find what a story is about, it is easy to lose interest in it. And then it disappears into the darkness until maybe one day, several years later, it emerges again and is retold. And then we realise that the march of time throws new light on stories. And now once again we can start wondering what the story is about. For it is not necessarily the same as last time. That is the amazing thing about good stories. They are never locked into any particular interpretation. They keep bounce and echo with our present moment – as long as we remember to tell them.