The newest installment of the Next to Normal Story Slam is scheduled for Friday, centered on the theme of the 60th anniversary of the March on Washington.
Story Slam was started in 2018 by Devon Lovell. Four times a year, storytellers connect with an audience by telling first-person stories that connect to a certain theme.
This time, those stories will connect to the 60th anniversary of the March on Washington, in August 1963. It’s best known as the venue for Martin Luther King Jr.’s iconic "I Have a Dream" speech that helped galvanize the civil rights movement.
“We have a storyteller lined up who had been a college student in the 60s and traveled to the south to work on voter registration drives after the Voting Rights Act was passed,” said John Bowen, Next to Normal Story Slam co-host. “He has some really interesting stories about being down in Selma, for example, and being sort of right there at the nexus of the movement down there, being attached to it, and trying to work on those kinds of issues. So he's got kind of firsthand stories about Dr. King and about all the leaders of the movement down there.”
Friday’s event is free, though donation proceeds will go to the Academic, Cultural, Technological Scientific Olympics, or ACT-SO.
“They do work in the community, allowing youth to grow their talents to explore their talents, and then they compete. And it’s a scholarship opportunity,” said Lovell.
The event is on Friday at 7:30 p.m. at the McLean County Art Center in Bloomington.
“I think there's something about telling a story to a group where people find the connection, they find themselves, even if it's a very different experience than their own,” said Lovell. “I think that makes our community a smaller place in a good way.”
Five to six storytellers are slated to come to the event and speak.
You can also listen to past storytellers by subscribing to WGLT's Next to Normal Story Slam podcast.
