Climate Stories Project

About Climate Stories Project

Climate Stories Project (CSP) is an educational and artistic forum for sharing stories about personal and community responses to climate change. CSP focuses on personal oral histories, which bring an immediacy to the sometimes abstract nature of climate change communication. Some of us may recount dramatic events such as floods and wildfires, or we may address our observations of changes in seasonal patterns and our fears for the future of our families and communities. We may discuss how climate change is forcing our communities to adapt to extreme weather and sea level rise. Or we may speak about how we are getting involved in movements to build more resilient futures and to fight the fossil fuel industry through community organizing or nonviolent protest. There is no "right" way to talk about climate change as it is a vast topic that is increasingly touching every corner of our lives.

In addition, some climate stories are being used as the basis for music and soundscape pieces that allow audiences to witness the effects of climate change in a novel way. By presenting climate change narratives through music, Climate Stories Project reaches new audiences that may not be currently engaged with the effects of climate change. These pieces can be found on the Climate Music page.

Photo credit: Randy Cole

Jason Davis, Director, is a musician, environmental educator, and leader of the environmental sound and improvisation ensemble Earthsound. He teaches music and environmental studies at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Jason holds a Doctorate in music from McGill University in Montreal and has Master's degrees in Music and Ecology. Jason was inspired to create Climate Stories Project from listening to Different Trains by composer Steve Reich, a piece which uses recorded interviews to explore the very different experiences of people traveling by train in the US and in Europe during World War II. Jason's goal is to create a "living artistic documentary" that engages audiences to share and listen to personal responses to climate change.

Kelly Hydrick, Program Manager, is a historian, visual artist, and a graduate student in Archives Management at Simmons University. She initially became interested in climate change communication after reading Amitav Ghosh’s book, The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable, which investigates the lack of climate change representation in modern fiction. Kelly realized that there was a profound disconnect between the ways people learn, think, and ultimately communicate about climate change. She continued to explore various aspects of climate change communication and during the summer of 2020 she discovered Climate Stories Project and volunteered as part of the first cohort of Climate Stories Ambassadors. Kelly plans to combine her work as an archivist with issues of climate change communication.

Avery Shoemaker, Program Manager, is a writer and artist currently working in non-profit fundraising and communications. Avery received her BA in Environment and Development from McGill University, where she discovered that her true passion lay in the intersection of environment, art, and humanities. Her interest in climate storytelling emerged via dissatisfaction with the data-based approaches for explaining, conveying, and discussing climate change that were the norm during her degree. Avery has explored the more personal side of climate change through McGill’s BLUE Fellowship, where she experimented with climate storytelling across creative writing genres, and as a participant in Cartographies of the Vanishing Now, a week-long artistic laboratory in Amsterdam.