Chris Walter: We can change the media for the better

By Deborah Castellano Lubov

Stories are a powerful "currency," and we must change the way we tell stories, says Chris Walter, co-director of "On Our Radar," a UK organization that, comprised of a specialist group of journalists, filmmakers, digital storytellers and community practitioners, works through partnerships to establish community reporter networks and surface stories from unheard groups worldwide.

Walter spoke with Vatican Media during the Jubilee of the World of Communications on the sidelines of a global conference, organized by the Vatican's Dicastery for Communication in partnership with the Dicastery for Evangelization, that is seeking to address some of the most frequent questions that communicators in the Church face today.

The event is geared toward Presidents of Episcopal Commissions for Communication, Director of Social Communication Office, International Coordinators of Religious Congregations.

"On Our Radar," which has won six international media awards and been nominated for scores more, has had its work published by national and international media outlets across seven European and fifteen African countries, and been screened for global leaders. 

From flagship documentaries on slavery in Ghana to films co-produced with garment workers in Bangladesh; from networks of reporters experiencing homelessness and dementia in the UK to election trackers in the Niger Delta and citizen reporters on the frontline of the Ebola crisis in Sierra Leone, "On Our Radar" works with people to tell their stories in their own words and their own time.

In this interview, Walter shares his story and the story of On Our Radar, and offers advice on how to become "storytellers of hope."

***

Mr. Walter what brings you here, in the Vatican? From this global conference, what story have you come to tell?  

I'm here to tell everyone about the work that we do at "On Our Radar" and our mission to work with communities who have been historically marginalized or ignored or who haven't been heard, and to change the way we tell stories with those groups and amplify their voices.

On Our Radar: can you tell us a little bit about how it was founded, and a little more about the activities that you do?

Of course. So, On Our Radar, at its essence, was founded to combat the top-down form of journalism that has been going on for hundreds of years, where editors at the very top are often old men who get to decide what stories are told, how they're told, where they're shown, the formats.

Therefore, what we do at On Our Radar, is we work with communities who have been left out of the conversation, communities who are living through some of the world's most pressing challenges all around the world, and work with them to support them, to tell the stories they want to tell, in their own words and their own time. That's really our social mission. We want to change the way people tell stories, and want to do so with marginalized groups by telling stories with and not for communities.

An old school way of doing journalism might be quite extractive, turning up in a community for half an hour, quickly talking to someone, snapping a few photos, and then disappearing back to the editorial desk in London or New York. However, we want to do it differently. We believe that the communities are experts in their own experiences, so should be given the time and space to tell the stories they want to tell. When we do that, and bring new and diverse voices into the media, we can change the media for the better and bring unheard perspectives to the fore. Stories that are told by communities in their own words are more raw, more intimate, and more distinct, and have the power to provoke social change.

Out of those stories, is there a particular story of On Our Radar that you have found most moving? or that has left the greatest impression personally on you?

Last year we worked with a group of people, in Manchester in northern England, who had experienced homelessness and unfit housing. We brought them together in a workshop. There, they began to share stories of their experiences, what they've been through in their lives, what they were frustrated with, especially with how the story is told in national mainstream media about homelessness. They wanted to do something about that. 

Therefore, they came up with this idea to create an interactive web documentary called "The Manchester Maze," because they felt that a maze represented their own housing journey, including ending up at a dead end... constant barriers... ending up back where you started... trying to navigate a housing system that's just not fit for purpose. Therefore, they came up with this idea, this image of a maze, and we helped bring that to life with them.

Anyone can find the Manchester Maze online and experience it. When you enter the maze, you're faced with a decision as the audience. Specifically, you're faced with having to decide, at each point, between two binary choices. Are you going to spend your last £10 on a tent or try and get into a hostel? Where are you going to sleep tonight? And these were decisions that all of the group, their real life choices, experience in their lives.

Very interactive...

It really puts the audience in the shoes of what it's like to be homeless and try and navigate a housing system and find a safe place to call home. You see animations, films, audio, and you hear from the people themselves about the different things that happened in their lives to lead to the moment of crisis.

Often when you see stories of housing or homelessness in the media, you see someone at their moment of crisis and you don't understand what's happened in their lives that has caused them to reach that moment. This group wanted to tell stories that told the whole story, their live and what had happened to their lives that had meant that they'd ended up where they had, and in doing so, build empathy. If you know someone's story, you connect better with them and you build empathy. That's what we try to do. We try to tell a story that includes the context, human story, universality, love, family, and friendship, because these are things we all connect with. That's what we do.

Pope Francis has called upon communicators to be storytellers, storytellers of hope. What advice do you offer on how to do this?

I think stories are an amazing currency. It's how we experience and understand the world. And personally, I'm someone that if I'm faced with a big report full of data and statistics, I can appreciate it, but it can go a bit over my head. Whereas if I'm talking to someone telling me about their life, what they've been through, it really sinks in. Also their solutions, because I think communities that are going through some of the world's toughest challenges, they're not just experiencing the challenges, they have the solutions, because they know what would make their lives better. If we listen to them and use those stories as currency, we can kind of build a world that's more inclusive and a hopeful one.

Around the world right now, democracy is in crisis. We have a climate catastrophe. There's an immigration crisis. We're becoming really polarized and fractured. I believe stories have the power to to knit that back together. But to do that, we need to change the way we tell stories, because marginalized communities are still left out of the conversation. We're still not listening to them.

By sharing stories, working with them to tell the stories they want to tell in their own words and their own time, we can change the world, but we need to rip up the rule book a little bit in how we've told stories in the past and start telling stories with, not for, communities.

It must not be easy to always tell narratives, if they go at times at odds with other messages circulating throughout media... How can you stand strong and go forward even if sometimes there are barriers or forces that aim to impede your efforts or story?

I think it's about giving time to the process and letting the community arrive at the story they want to tell in their own words, and that will be genuine and authentic.

It's not a quick process to train communities with the skills and time to tell the story they want to tell. Sometimes that's training them up in basic journalism or camera skills or audio. It takes time to build their confidence. We must invest time and understand that we are all different, we have different perspectives, but that everyone's story is still valuable and equal.

No one story is better than another. Our human story is our own story, and I think when we listen and appreciate that, even if we may not always agree, we can disagree agreeably or we can appreciate that that's that person's story. It might be different to me, it might be different to you, but that's their truth. We need to respect that. It's built on mutual respect and appreciating there are different truths for different people, and that's okay. It's how we kind of react and talk to each other and deal with that is what's going to kind of make our world a better place.

Has this conference been enriching to you?

It really has been. Everyone keeps talking about this word, "hope," which, you know, can seem corny and cheesy, but I think if we do lose that hope, then what do we have?

And I think what's really interesting to me is hearing people from around the world talk about their different professional fields, different stories, tdifferent worlds in which they're working, but with a really common thread.

I hear this word "synodality" a lot, and, as someone that hadn't kind of engaged with that term before, it was really amazing to me to hear that that word comes from the Latin of "to walk with." For years at On Our Radar, we've been talking about telling stories with, not for communities, but we've just used that word "with." Now, suddenly I'm here and people are talking about synodality or being with people. That seems to be a common thread. Whether we're broadcast documentaries, podcasts, whether we're writers, whether we're working for charities and professional communications, that idea of being with and standing with communities, facing some of the most challenging things in our time has really, really stuck with me.