Events

Lectures

lectures > lectures spring 2004

How to find and tell stories

Speaker: Pat Williams
5 June 2004

We live in a period where we are deluged by frightening or depressing stories, often luridly exaggerated by the media. A different sort of story can be a healthy antidote - a joke, or a folk tale, or something else can (among other things) inspire optimism, strengthen resolve, show us a different way of looking at things, or simply allow us to laugh. Children in particular have a built-in need to hear good stories, as they have heard them all over the world throughout human history. Unfortunately, they are hearing them less often now because some schools are cutting story sessions to save money. But children can still hear good stories from people they know or people they meet.

This workshop is open to anybody, but is really for people who are not used to telling stories and would like to start learning how to tell them to children and adults alike.

Pat Williams has been a writer, broadcaster and consultant on psychology and human belief systems for more than 30 years. A psychotherapist in private practice, she is a Fellow and member of the Educational Board of the European Therapy Studies Institute. She was also Director of the College of Storytellers from 1980-1990. For the past eight years she has been giving workshops and seminars on metaphor and story all over Britain to audiences mainly of health professionals and members of the social services, but also including teachers, prison officers, priests, policemen, writers, stand-up comics, business people – and parents and grandparents.

Counter-Intuition - Dr. Kevin Byron
more info >>

Collective Behaviour and the Physics of Society - Philip Ball
more info >>

Music, Pleasure and the Brain - Dr. Harry Witchel
more info >>

see full list of new publications >>