Speaking up and speaking out: making ourselves Heard

With all that we now know about the potency and impact of the poverty narrative, the challenge we face boils down to this: can we come to a collective understanding of the role played by this ‘story’, by this powerful poverty ‘narrative’ that is strategically framed and weaponised ad nauseam, in shaping our perceptions and, importantly, in keeping people poor and marginalised? And crucially, if we accept that this narrative has a fundamental and negative role in our societies, what can we do to change it? Can we end the shame game? Can we overthrow the labels, stereotypes and stigma? What can we do to tell a different story that can then be used to help fight for policies that protect the poor and give people a fighting chance, rather than cement and promote the privileges of the rich?

Can we tell a different story?

The answer, it turns out, is that awareness of the narrative, how it frames the poor, and how it contributes to entrenching poverty and social injustice, is growing. A different story is already beginning to take shape. Telling a different story – reworking how we communicate about poverty and inequality – is by necessity part and parcel of the political landscape. The dominant poverty narrative is pervasive because it penetrates the entire culture from politics and media to television and beyond.

However, the emergence of a different story to counter this toxic, destructive narrative is happening on a number of fronts.

In the first instance, alternative, sensitive and humane portrayals of poverty are breaking through as people find platforms, including books and social media, to tell their own stories and, by doing so, challenge cultural norms about what it is to be poor.