The workshop seeks to function as an exercise for storytellers – anyone from short story writers to screenwriters – in creating diverse characters sympathetically. Sign up here!
Please be mindful when booking. This is a workshop for Black writers and writers of colour based in Scotland (or for people who, pre-COVID, would have normally been resident in Scotland).
An ‘Empathy Test’ for Your Stories
Join Kritika Narula for this free, 1.5-hour, online workshop!
As a mental health advocate & a person with lived experience, Kritika Narula wishes to see more people like her in the stories that she reads. An avid reader, she’s been observing how people with psychosocial disabilities or neurodivergence are rarely ever shown to be living a full life. It’s troubling & reductive when a character’s entire existence is boiled down to their diagnostic identity.
The workshop seeks to function as an exercise for storytellers – anyone from short story writers to screenwriters – in creating diverse characters empathetically. Participants will be introduced to tools like ‘Character Template’, ‘Empathy Map’, ‘The Sensitivity Un-Checklist’, to explore how they can accommodate the complexity of human experience when writing stories featuring people with lived experience. Consider this a part-writing, part-sensitivity training in creating character sketches.
Essential items include: access to the internet, a working camera and mic, and pen and paper
The Details
- There is a max of 15 spaces.
- This workshop will be hosted online using Webex (instructions will be sent to participants closer to the workshop date).
- Through the above-mentioned tools, participants will be encouraged to create character sketches and share their work.
- The workshop includes a 10-min comfort break.
- There will be time for Q&A and general conversation at the end.
- Our free events are very popular and have a waitlist. If you have registered for a ticket but then are unable to attend please do let us know so we can offer it to another person on the waitlist. Thank you!
- All SBWN events will adhere to our safer spaces policy. You can learn more about our policy here.
Access & Tech
To participate in the online event, you will need:
- a good internet/wi-fi connection
- a laptop, computer, tablet or mobile phone to join by audio and video
- pen and paper
- Please email your access requirements: scotbamewriters@gmail.com
About Kritika
Kritika is an Indian writer and communications consultant. She also runs a publication called The Mental Health Mirror & has written for IndigoBlue Magazine, International Journalists’ Network (IJNet), Feminism in India, Small Screen UK, among others. All of her work is undergirded by her mental health activism – she consumes books, movies, TV shows – and places these stories under a fierce assessment to see if they are feminist, empathetic or entertaining enough. She holds a Masters in Media Management from the University of Glasgow. Find her online @KritikaTweeting
