This is a quick source resource for anyone looking to find out more about the language of narrative change. We know there are a lot of terms, and we want to do some jargon-busting. It’s a work in progress and we’ll be adding lots of new terms over the coming weeks.
If there’s anything you’d like to see in here, please email info@publicinterest.org.uk
- Afrofuturism: A cultural and artistic movement imagining Black futures beyond colonialism and capitalism, blending science fiction, technology, and ancestral wisdom
- Base: People who are already (broadly) supportive of your issue: activists, campaigners, supportive parliamentarians.
- Black Feminism: A movement centring Black women’s experiences and analysis, recognising the interconnectedness of racism, sexism, and other forms of oppression.
- Campaign: A strategic effort to mobilise people around an issue, using communication, advocacy, and/or direct action to create change.
- Colonialism: The violent system of control in which nations invade, exploit, and dominate lands, peoples, and resources for power and profit.
- Community-led: An approach where those of us directly impacted by an issue lead the decision-making, strategy, and implementation of solutions.
- Community Organising: The process of bringing people together to build collective power, address shared concerns, and push for systemic transformation.
- Decoloniality: The ongoing process of dismantling colonial systems, reclaiming Indigenous knowledge, addressing colonial harm, and building new ways of being beyond colonial frameworks.
- Dominant Narratives: Widely accepted patterns of meaning that can reinforce power structures, often upholding colonial, capitalist, or oppressive ideologies.
- Discourse: The narratives and unspoken rules that shape how we think and talk about a subject, often defining what is sayable or even thinkable.
- Discourse Analysis: The process of analysing the implied meaning of particular stories, narratives or broader discourse and considering their potential impact, both positive and negative.
- Eco-Feminism: An approach linking environmental justice with gender justice, recognising how patriarchy and capitalism exploit both nature and marginalised communities.
- Feminism: A movement advocating for gender justice, challenging patriarchy, and addressing intersecting forms of oppression.
- Framing: The lens through which a story or issue is presented, shaping our interpretation by influencing what is included, omitted, centred, or sidelined.
- Grassroots: Community-led movements and organising efforts driven by those of us who are directly impacted, working collectively for systemic change from the ground up.
- Liberation: Freedom from oppressive systems, creating the conditions for people to live authentically, equitably, and with full access to our rights.
- Lived Experience: The direct, rich personal knowledge gained through real-life encounters, often by marginalised communities, distinct from academic or theoretical understanding.
- Marginalised: Individuals or communities pushed to the edges of society through systemic exclusion—physically or symbolically—limiting their access to resources, rights, and representation.
- Moveable middle: People who can be persuaded. These may be people who are undecided or haven’t engaged with your issue.
- Narratives: Broader patterns of meaning woven from stories, shaping societal beliefs, values, and power structures.
- Narrative Landscapes: The broader environment, including stories, narratives and discourse that surround a particular issue.
- Narrative Organising: Using storytelling and framing to shift dominant narratives, challenge oppression, and build new possibilities for justice and liberation.
- Négritude: A cultural and political movement celebrating Black identity, resistance, and self-determination, emerging from the Francophone African and Caribbean diaspora.
- Opponents: People who are strongly opposed to your issue. They are unlikely to ever be supportive of your message.
- Oppression: The systemic control and dehumanisation of groups through policies, culture, and power structures that privilege some while marginalising others.
- Political/Activist Lineages: The histories, movements, and thought traditions that inform and inspire current struggles for justice.
- Polyvocality: The inclusion of multiple voices, perspectives, and lived experiences in storytelling and knowledge creation, resisting singular dominant narratives and building shared power.
- Queer Politics: A political framework that challenges heteronormativity, gender binaries, and systemic oppression, advocating for liberation beyond assimilation.
- Reframing: Shifting the way an issue is presented to challenge dominant narratives and open new possibilities for change.
- Reparations:The process of acknowledging, repairing, and compensating for historical and ongoing harm, particularly related to colonialism, slavery, genocide and other systemic oppression.
- Restorying: The act of reclaiming and reshaping narratives to centre marginalised voices, heal historical erasure, and imagine new futures.
- Rewilding: Restoring ecosystems, communities, and ways of being by reintroducing natural elements and Indigenous knowledge to heal from industrial and colonial disruption.
- Shifting Power: The process of redistributing decision-making, resources, and influence from dominant groups to those of us who are historically marginalised.
- Social Justice: The pursuit of equity and fairness across social, economic, and political systems, challenging structural oppression.
- Story: Tales about particular events and people. Stories both give rise to and draw from narratives.
- Sustainability: A balance-focused approach that minimises harm and depletion, ensuring long-term well-being for people and the planet.
- Target: People (or institutions) whose behaviour you want to shift, by leveraging your base or moveable middle.
- Values: The core principles that shape beliefs, decisions, and actions, guiding movements and organisations toward justice and accountability.
