Intergenerational digital storytelling: a sustainable community initiative with inner-city residents

Abstract

Digital storytelling (DST) is being increasingly used in a range of contexts to exploit current technological capabilities of capturing and reproducing community stories. Methods of storytelling collection are typically realized over short time frames of days or weeks, and appropriate visual images and interview data produce multimodal outputs. A particular stream of work has developed in community-based DST around intergenerational storytelling in environments where student researchers may work with older storytellers in culturally diverse urban settings. DST also emphasizes the participatory nature of the process and outcomes with respect to enabling untold but significant stories to emerge, and technical and storytelling skills to be transferred to participants through the process. This article addresses the particular concerns of relationship building and the pedagogical aims of training students to carry out research using this participatory DST research approach where intergenerational and cultural issues are foregrounded. In the conclusion, the author reflects on this particular focus and the shortcomings of the project with regard to the substantive participatory and democratic benefits exemplified by other projects; he also provides evidence of the other achievements of this project in an intergenerational project supported by an inner-city health organization in Melbourne, Australia.