Storytelling is the social and cultural activity of sharing stories, sometimes with improvisation, theatrics or embellishment. Every culture has its own narratives, which are shared as a means of entertainment, education, cultural preservation or instilling moral values. Crucial elements of stories and storytelling include plot, characters and narrative point of view. The term "storytelling" can refer specifically to oral storytelling but also broadly to techniques used in other media to unfold or disclose the narrative of a story.
John Henry Faulk was an American storyteller and radio show host. His successful lawsuit against the entertainment industry helped to bring an end to the Hollywood blacklist.
Kathryn Tucker Windham was an American storyteller, author, photographer, folklorist, and journalist. She was born in Selma, Alabama, and grew up in nearby Thomasville.
Andy Offutt Irwin is an American storyteller, singer-songwriter, and humorist. Born and raised in Covington, Georgia, a small town outside of Atlanta, Irwin began his career in 1984 with an improvisational comedy troupe at Walt Disney World. After five years he shifted to performing as a singer-songwriter, touring the Southeast. In the mid-1990s, Irwin branched into performances for children.
Donald Davis is an American storyteller, author and minister. Davis had a twenty-year career as a minister before he became a professional storyteller. He has recorded over 25 storytelling albums and written several books. His long career as a teller and his promotion of the cultural importance of storytelling through seminars and master classes has led to Davis being dubbed the "dean of storytelling".
Connie Regan-Blake is an American storyteller, author, and workshop facilitator. Regan-Blake is well-known for her role as part of The Folktellers storytelling duo. She was a founding member of the National Storytelling Network or NSN. Regan-Blake served as the Artistic Director from 1975 until 1983. She was awarded the Circle of Excellence in 1996 by the National Storytelling Network after being recognized by her peers as a master storyteller. She has appeared onstage as a featured performer or emcee at every National Storytelling Festival since its inception in 1973.
Sheila Kay Adams is an American storyteller, author, and musician from the Sodom Laurel community in Madison County, North Carolina.
Bobby Norfolk is an American storyteller and arts educator.
Len Cabral is an American storyteller who was awarded the Circle of Excellence in 2001 by the National Storytelling Network after being recognized by his peers as a master storyteller.
Kevin Cordi is an American teacher, storyteller and author who has been awarded The Film Advisory Board of Excellence Award and The Storytelling World Award. He is a regular performer at storytelling festivals including the National Storytelling Festival. Cordi started the Youth Special Interest Group for the National Storytelling Network and founded the Voices Across America Youth Storytelling Project. Cordi also wrote the book "Playing with Stories: Story crafting for storytellers, writers, teachers and other imaginative thinkers" in 2014. He is the founder of the international StoryBox Project. Since 1995, he actively sends StoryBoxes loading with stories all over the world and they travel from place to place collecting more stories. This project has been mirrored all over the country and the world. For seven years he served as the Co-director for the Columbus Area Writing Project at the Ohio State University. He is currently teaching at Ohio University in Lancaster, Ohio. He was commissioned as the first Academic Storyteller in Residence for The Ohio State University. He used stories and narrative understanding to build programs for equity and social justice with the Multicultural Center at The Ohio State University. He is currently serving on the Advisory Panel for Teaching Tolerance with the Southern Law Poverty Center.
Jay O'Callahan is an American storyteller known for his performances at national and international storytelling festivals and in theaters worldwide. He performs from materials which he himself authors and is known for his large-scale oral stories that explore the rich details and nuances of different cultures and time periods through the perceptions of a central narrative character.
Lynette (Lyn) Ford, an American storyteller, teaching artist, author and creative narrative workshop presenter was the first storyteller in the state of Ohio to be nominated for a Governor's Award for the Arts. She is a regular performer at regional and national storytelling festivals and conferences, including the National Storytelling Festival, Hawaii's Talk Story Festival and the Timpanogos Storytelling Festival. Lyn has also shared keynote presentations, performances and workshops in Australia and Ireland, and for the Transformative Language Arts Network's and Ohio Literacy Resource Center's annual conferences and events.
The Timpanogos Storytelling Festival takes place the weekend after Labor Day at the end of each summer in Lehi, Utah. The festival draws a combined attendance of about 26,000 people each year, making it one of the largest storytelling festival in the United States. The festival typically lasts two days and invites professional storytellers from throughout the United States. In addition to daytime performances on Friday and Saturday, there are typically themed public performances in the evenings, such as Look Who's Talking, Bedtime Stories, My Favorite Stories, and Laughing' Night.
Fran Stallings is an American storyteller for people of all ages. She has performed at numerous national and international storytelling festivals, in schools and libraries, and on the radio. She performs primarily folktales from around the world. She has authored several audio recordings and books of stories and songs.
Joseph (Joe) Hayes is an American author and teller of stories mainly found in the folklore of the American Southwest. Hayes was an early pioneer of bilingual Spanish/English storytelling. Joe currently lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Lenard Ray Hicks was an Appalachian storyteller who lived his entire life on Beech Mountain, North Carolina. He was particularly known for the telling of Jack Tales.
Hugh Morgan Hill, also known as Brother Blue, was an American educator, storyteller, actor, musician, and street performer based principally in the Boston area. After serving as First Lieutenant from 1943 to 1946 in the segregated United States Army in World War II and being honorably discharged, he received a BA from Harvard College in 1948, was accepted into the Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) before transferring to receive a MFA from the Yale School of Drama and a Ph.D. from the Union Institute. While performing frequently at U.S. National Storytelling Festivals and flown abroad by organizations and patrons from England to Russia and the Bahamas, Brother Blue regularly performed on the streets around Cambridge, most notably in Harvard Square. He was the Official Storyteller of Boston and of Cambridge by resolutions of both city councils.
Judith Black is an American professional storyteller, who has toured internationally, telling stories to a wide ranging audience in the United States, Europe, and the Near East. She has produced thirteen CDs, and won a variety of awards, such as the coveted Oracle Award. Her work has been featured in venues such as the Smithsonian Institution and the Montreal Comedy Festival, and has been featured seven times at the National Storytelling Festival. In addition she has produced a variety of seminars and workshops for storytellers. She has been commissioned by the U.S. Department of the Interior, National Public Radio, religious institutions, and non-profit organisations to create original stories that strengthen their respective missions.
Margaret Read MacDonald is an American storyteller, folklorist, and award-winning children's book author. She has published more than 65 books, of stories and about storytelling, which have been translated into many languages. She has performed internationally as a storyteller, is considered a "master storyteller", and has been dubbed a "grand dame of storytelling". She focuses on creating "tellable" folktale renditions, which enable readers to share folktales with children easily. MacDonald has been a member of the board of the National Storytelling Network and president of the Children's Folklore Section of the American Folklore Society.
Linda Goss, sometimes known professionally as Mama Linda, is an American storyteller and performer in the African diasporic oral tradition. She is a co-founder of the National Association of Black Storytellers, which works to preserve folk traditions.
