Public Narrative: Online Course

Marshall Ganz is a lecturer in Leadership, Organizing, and Civil Society at Harvard University. Introduced to organizing in Civil Rights Movement, he worked on the staff of the United Farm Workers for sixteen years, became trainer and organizer for political campaigns, unions and nonprofit groups, and returned to Harvard where he earned his PhD in Sociology. He is credited with devising the successful grassroots organizing model and training for Barack Obama’s winning 2008 presidential campaign.

Learn from Professor Marshall Ganz through this Resistance School course on the organising skill of public narrative. Professor Ganz made the following points in What is Public Narrative (2008):

• Public narrative is a leadership art. Leaders draw on narrative to inspire action across cultures, faiths, professions, classes, and eras.
• A story of self communicates who I am – my values, my experience, why I do what I do.
• A story of us communicates who we are – our shared values, our shared experience, and why we do what we do.
• A story of now transforms the present into a moment of challenge, hope, and choice.

This free online self-directed course covers the following modules:

• Introduction to Public Narrative
• Approach to Leadership
• Theory of Organizing
• Professor Ganz’s Story of Self
• Motivation Through Story
• How to Tell a Story
• Public Narrative Example
• Debrief of the Example
• Introduction to Story of Self
• Questions for a Story of Self
• Introduction to Coaching Others
• Do’s and Don’ts of Coaching
• Debrief the Do’s and Don’ts
• Debrief the Public Narrative Course
• Conclusion and How to Applaud