Narrative in the World: Interdisciplinary Uses and Insights of Narrative Theory
Since 2018, Erin James has been the Co-Director of the Confluence Lab, an interdisciplinary group that brings together scholars in the arts, humanities, and sciences to grapple with environmental issues impacting rural communities. The Lab’s central premise is that the tools of the humanities and the arts—especially those related to storytelling—are important complements to scientific knowledge and can help develop novel approaches to the climate crisis. With the Confluence Lab team, James uses the concepts and equipment of narratology to better understand pressing problems such as wildfire, deforestation, and climate skepticism.
In this talk, she explores Confluence Lab projects to illuminate the potentials of narrative and narrative theory in interdisciplinary studies of climate crisis and offer up a set of “how to” guidelines for holding your own as a narrative scholar among scientific peers. She also speaks about what she, in turn, has learned about narrative via this interdisciplinary work—especially in terms of her changing understanding of authorship, narrative empathy, and the relationship between fiction and science.