What We Share: Story Circle Trainings

By Ben Fink

When I organize in the Appalachian coalfields, as I’ve done off and on for the past ten years, I tend to introduce myself as a “communist Jew from the Northeast.” 

I’m not serious, of course. I have yet to find a communist party worth joining. In any case, it’s true that when I show up in rural Kentucky, Virginia, Alabama, Georgia, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, and even parts of my native Connecticut, I’m often the odd man out.  

But what’s also true, and surprising to many people, is that all those differences in politics, religion, culture, even rural vs. urban, rarely get in the way. When I’m upfront with people about who I am, where I’m from, and what matters to me, it gives them permission to be the same way with me. And from there it doesn’t take long for us to figure out how much we really do share, which often turns out to be a lot. 

I didn’t make any of this up. I learned it from Roadside Theater, a grassroots theater company from Kentucky and Virginia coal country, who in turn learned it from elders in the civil rights movement, who in turn learned it from elders in the populist movement — the biggest mass movement in U.S. history, rooted in the rural South and Midwest. (Martin Luther King, Jr. once said “populist” was the only political label he’d accept.) 

One of Roadside Theater’s main methods, which they developed during their long collaboration with civil rights organizers, was the story circle: a method that makes it possible for people to share their diverse experiences, listen to the experiences of others, and find genuine common ground.  

Before the 2024 election I ran a series of story circles with the Center for Rural Strategies to amplify rural perspectives on the economy. Now I’m part of the Rural Faith Initiative, helping rural faith organizations use story circles and related tools to make it possible for everyone in their communities to be heard and valued. 

Learn how you could use story circles in your community or congregation at the next Story Circle Facilitation  Thursday, January 22, 12:30-2:30pm ET. Register here.

Ben Fink is an organizer who works with residents of rural, urban, and suburban communities across the country to share stories, find common ground, and build grassroots power together. In 2020 he was recognized by Time Magazine as one of “27 People Bridging Divides Across America.” Ben is part of Jewish communities in his hometown of Philadelphia and across the river in rural New Jersey.