Your stories create you. What are your favorite stories?
Because those stories you love deeply are at the very center of who you are and will become.
So, what stories :
affect you emotionally
make you laugh or cry
recall your childhood and family
celebrate your culture / heritage
fill your dreams
raise your hopes
inflame your desire
increase your joy
pique your curiosity
move you spiritually
perhaps scare you witless or even
cause you pain, fear, and suffering ?
First, last, always: what are the stories that remind you of your own most fun times, great adventures, intense challenges, or other special moments in your life?
The creation and sharing of stories is my life.
C’est moi: Storyteller Joe Paris.
My passion is sharing stories with "children of all ages" (those people, regardless of chronological age, who still have that childlike sense of wonder and awe and love of story).
The stories I share can also be prepared and adapted for age-specific, theme-specific, and/or adult-only audiences such as:
school children, special-interest clubs, families (reunions especially), groups of friends, corporate events (roasts and other events), associations of all kinds, educational and governmental groups, weddings, churches, and non-profit and for-profit organizations,
Because families and friends and businesswomen and businessmen and working folks in all professions know the value of a tale well told and how stories can heal, motivate people, increase profits, raise morale and productivity, and perhaps most importantly - create lifelong positive memories that leave a lasting impression.
Especially challenging and rewarding to me is sharing stories with the ill (especially children), dying (I am a HOSPICE Volunteer, as was my mother) the handicapped, the injured (emotionally and physically), the gifted, and to all who face tough challenges or who are trying to heal, and who will not only listen but also - and more importantly - share their stories.
It can be very life affirming to participate in the Sharing of Stories that help the healing process. I also love to sign in ASL for deaf children - but will need enough advance notice to properly prepare.
As you can tell by now, I love to share many kinds of stories under many different circumstances.
I love teaching the art and science of storytelling to both teachers and all kinds of students from pre-k through college and lifelong learning students for credit as well, in all sorts of workshops, schools and universities.
Visiting the north, south, east, and west in this fabulous country, and several other countries, has been one of the great joys of my life. Each person I meet has an interesting story, and most want to share it.
Because I have completed my Master"s Degree course work in communications with an emphasis on storytelling and semiotics, I am able to award continuing education credits (CEUs) for teachers and other professionals. Just ask.
By far my deepest passion is sharing my family stories from my Cajun French culture of south Louisiana, where I spent an idyllic childhood and lived for many years.
Ask me about my Cajun Culture Package, where I teach Cajun dance (two-step and waltz), share Cajun stories, and cook (as well as teach how to cook) a basic Cajun meal (gumbo or etoufee or jambalaya).
This special cultural program of all things Cajun can be for a day or evening or weekend or whole week or month or semester, and has been presented from coast to coast, at colleges, in schools, and in private homes and at retreats and camps. Ask for more info.
I am also a working Rosarian (i love Roses), and have many garden stories to share. As a Certified (by LSU) Louisiana Master Gardener, I can not only teach you about gardening (esp roses), but also want to share stories from the garden with you.
Also in my heart dwell Texas stories - those cowboy, hunting, Alamo, Pecos Bill, cooking, great pets (esp dogs and also cats), and "the rituals of outdoor life" stories that pepper that southwest landscape. I lived there from November 1991 to July 2001.
First Nations (Native American Indian) tales have always held special interest for me. I flourished in the West Seattle, Washington, and The Columbia River Gorge and Portland, Oregon areas, and so am excited to have added the compelling stories of the Pacific Northwest to my list of stories that I tell.
I grew up next to folks from the Middle East ( really loved their food !) and love re-telling some of the great stories from the Arabian tradition they shared with me, especially tales from the 1,001 nights.
Recently, I have been on the road traveling and telling stories, and i am often reminded just how nice folks are all over the world, in every culture, and what interesting & personal stories they each have to share ! If only someone would listen.
IF you would like me to visit your community - please read on further down on how to bring me to you !
Stories from the fabulous LEWIS & CLARK Corps of Discovery trip from May 14, 1804 to September 23, 1806 are now part of my repertoire and I have loads of fun showcasing several characters from that journey, especially the French trader / interpreter / cook named Toussaint Charbonneau (that’s me dressed as him below).
He was the husband of the Shoshoni maiden Sacagawea (SAC-uh-ja-WAY-uh) soft "g" please, as was the custom in her native language. The infamous hard "g" way of pronouncing her name was common ONLY in the language of her kidnappers, the Hidastas. Why honor her kidnappers by pronouncing her name their way?
Charbonneau is my favorite Corps of Discovery character by far because he was such a rich, complex person, with both likeable and unlikeable features in his personality.
I feel Charbonneau has been maligned by most who recorded an opinion of him (especially Meriwether Lewis), with the notable exception of Capt. William Clark, who understood Charbonneau and loved him, raising both of T.C"s children (Jean Baptiste and Lisette) born to Charbonneau and Sacagawea. Author W. Dale Nelson of Laramie, WY has written a book about this very topic. Read it.
Respect and reverence accompany my telling of history"s Classic Tales including the Bible, Greek Myths and Roman Myths, Medieval Tales and Renaissance Stories (esp Chaucer), the Norse Legends, Fairy Tales, the Brothers Grimm collection, Charles Perrault, Aesop’s Fables, Hans Christian Andersen, adventure & hero tales, and stories of reconciliation and redemption.
One of my favorite ways of telling stories is as an historical character who comes to dinner at your home or business or group. You choose the character - and I will research, rehearse, and deliver to you that character, once we agree on who that character is. In character, I will sit down and have a meal with your chosen guests, provoking a lively exchange of ideas and experiences true to that character. This is fun and educational for all who attend.
I will also conduct a Murder Mystery at your home or business for fun, in character as Hercule Poirot, the French detective.
I am also humbled yet excited when telling stories from the many cultures from around the world, and also tell my own original "Christopher Paris" (tm) stories (Christopher is my son, born in the 11th minute before the 11th evening hour before the 11th day in the 11th month of 1994). He is my hero. I love you, Christobear !
I have been so very fortunate to have shared stories in many places:
- at the swapping ground during the National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough, TN; as the very first featured storyteller on a main stage at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival; at Children’s Museums in New Orleans, Houston, and Lafayette, at my home area’s Festivals Acadiens (Oct) and Festival Internationale (April) in Lafayette, my hometown Rice Festival in Crowley, La., and at many other regional festivals and fairs throughout the United States.
I have especially cherished telling at the Hans Christian Andersen statue in New York"s Central Park; DisneyWorld (FLA) and Disneyland (LA); on the Trinity College Lawn in Dublin Ireland; at Speaker"s Corner in Hyde Park in London, England; at the Palais de Chaillot plaza across from the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France as well as at the base of that French icon.
What BIG FUN it was creating a State Champion Liars (Tall Tales) Contest for the State Fair of Texas in Dallas at the foot of BIG TEX!
The Dallas Morning News was kind enough to champion me as "A Master Storyteller" (many thanks to writer/columnist Kent Biffle) and many other newspapers and radio and television stations have covered my tellings when I was in their area.
Although I appreciate all of them, those are only words of praise, and I feel and know that stories must go beyond just the words, achieving something at both the emotional and spiritual level.
One of my favorite quotes from the Great Book reveals why:
"Our love must not be thing of words and fine talk; it must be a thing of action and sincerity." - 1John3:18, Barclay translation.
Replace the word "love" in the above quote with "storytelling" and you will sense how deeply I feel about storytelling as well.
That preceding Bible verse was first shared with me by my maternal grandmother Lillian (1910-1993), who was ALSO fond of saying
"Choose your friends not for money, you can always earn more; not for knowledge, you can always learn more; not for looks, we grow older by the season; favor disposition : that’s the best reason."
Perhaps closest to my heart are my tellings at local, city, and county public libraries and school libraries and to children, wherever they may gather. In fact, one of my first "Storyteller-in-Residence" appointments was at the Iberia Parish Library in New Iberia, La. for 1983-4.
My mother Jane Alice ("Sis") (1932-2005) was an elementary, middle, high school, and university librarian.
My father Emile - 1925-2008 - was a pro baseball player with the Brooklyn Dodger organization, then a community businessman, and coached children for two decades (in addition to raising, along with mom, eight of their own!).
So, in honor of my parents, if it can be worked out, I will never charge a library or children’s group for storytelling. Instead, I prefer and ask that local adults find local businesses that will sponsor me to share stories as a donation to the children of their community.
Ask me how to do this.
So act now. Contact me.
I will share with you stories from the center of my heart and soul.
REMEMBER: "Share a story with someone you love, everyday!" -tm
And check out my written articles on this site - there"s a link to them on the panel at the upper right side of this page >>>^^^
If you or your family, organization, fair or festival, school, library, group, church, business, club, or anyone wants to know more, please visit the links I have listed below and then contact me :
See my fav. & homemade videos at www.youtube.com/cparisb4udie. On FACEBOOK, Find me as Joe Paris. On My Space, I’m at www.myspace.com/joeparis
