It’s been a week since I asked the question “What are all the types of storytelling telling”. I have chatted back and forth on social media and email. I have books and articles that I have only began to sort through. I even talked to some people on the phone (crazy, right)! As you can expect, I have learned one simple lesson…I have a lot more to learn. The biggest challenges I have had so far are:

  • Some types of storytelling are called different names in different places but are the same thing
  • Getting information about storytelling from cultures other than my own (U.S.)
  • Staying focused on only oral storytelling (There are so many other ways to tell stories that I won’t go into for the purpose of this blog series)

Since I still have a long way to go in learning all that I can learn, I figure I will share what I have so far. I don’t’ think the list is complete, but is a good starting point. So, in no particular order:

  1. Folktales
  2. Historical Tales
  3. Literary stories
  4. Biographical stories
  5. Myths
  6. Fairytales
  7. Fables
  8. Biblical stories
  9. Folklore
  10. Horror/ghost stories
  11. Legends
  12. Tall tales
  13. Personal narrative stories
  14. Nakali (Iranian)
  15. African oral traditions
  16. Sigana Storytelling performance (which may fall under African oral traditions)

There are 2 so far that were recommend that I’m not totally sure about, but will look into more:

  1. Jokes
    1. As someone just starting stand-up comedy, I get there is a connection between jokes and stories, but not sure yet they are the same. We’ll see what I can find out.
  2. Wisdom tales
    1. It sounds like this may fit into one of the other types of storytelling, but we’ll see

Despite the list being lengthy, I feel like there are more type of oral storytelling out there. If you know them, I’d love to hear about them. I plan to start telling what I learn about each time starting in Aug. I’m looking forward to the journey into understanding storytelling. I’m hoping you follow along with the post and comments to help me help others understand storytelling. Thanks! And remember to tell your story, on purpose.

Published by Nick Baskerville

After years of being an instructor in the military and the and the fire service, I realized I needed to improve my delivery. My students needed me to improve delivery. But how do I improve my delivery? Simple. I finally took a member of Toastmasters up on the invitation to come to a meeting. It wasn't long until I joined. Along the way of improving my skills at delivering a message, I came to understand that of all the ways to get a point across, telling stories is the best way to get it done. Around this time, another friend from Toastmasters told me about The Moth monthly story telling shows. What better way to test out my theories on storytelling. It's in my travels there to the shows that I found more and more shows, and classes, and events centered around storytelling. Despite how many people know about the storytelling world, not many people know about the storytelling world. So now, I'm out to tell the world about storytelling.

5 thoughts on “The Stories We Tell – The List So Far”

  1. I just love that you write:Despite how many people know about the storytelling world, not many people know about the storytelling world. So now, I’m out to tell the world about storytelling.
    I too was out to tell the SCHOOL world how POWERFUL storytelling was as a way to build community, confidence, and a sense that we ALL have Culture and are PART of an American culture that is very diverse. I wrote a book called Storyteller,Storyteacher… out of print but like my daughter who moved away, I still like introducing people to ‘her’… Thanks for this great blog. Happy I found you!

    Like

    Reply
  2. Pingback: The Stories We Tell – Folktales – Story Telling On Purpose
  3. Pingback: The Stories We Tell – Personal Narrative – Story Telling On Purpose
  4. Pingback: How are you celebrating World Storytelling Day? – Story Telling On Purpose

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