Why are stories compelling and powerful?
One of the most compelling, heartfelt ways to share your Peace Corps experience is through storytelling.
Storytelling is an excellent way to continue your service, show your commitment to the Peace Corps Third
Goal, and share the culture you encountered during service in a personal and engaging way. When you tell stories, they humanize and illuminate places and people with a unique, grassroots, Peace Corps perspective and inspire others to serve.
Personal stories are memorable. Evidence suggests we are hard-wired to receive and learn information better in story form. Stories are powerful. Stories combat stereotypes. As the eloquent Nigerian writer Chimamanda Adichie put it in her famous Tedtalk: The Danger of a Single Story:
“Stories matter. Many stories matter. Stories have been used to dispossess and to malign, but stories
can also be used to empower and to humanize. Stories can break the dignity of a people, but stories
can also repair that broken dignity.”
As Returned Volunteers, it is our responsibility to bring these stories home. Whether for select friends and family,