Listen to the full, raw interview with Greisa Martinez Rosas of United We Dream. UWD has mastered the art of storytelling as Greisa shares everything you need to know about how to use it properly. She also shares tips on how your organization can build the necessary infrastructure to support effective storytelling.
The full, raw interview with Greisa Martinez Rosas from Ep. 5: Storytelling for Advocacy. Tune in to hear Greisa share some time-tested strategies for story collecting and storytelling that have made United We Dream the leader of storytelling in the advocacy space. If you want to start storytelling to augment your advocacy efforts or if you want to improve your preexisting storytelling infrastructure, this full interview is a must-listen!
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Taking a Long-Term Approach to Nonprofit Storytelling
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Martín Diego Garcia:
And we're back. I am super excited to be joined today by Greisa Martinez Rosas, who is always an inspiration to me whenever I get to see her or hear her speak. Greisa is the executive director at United We Dream also known as UWD. UWD is a national nonpartisan membership based organization of over 800,000 immigrant youth and allies which is led by the 126 affiliate organizations in 26 States. UWD advocates for the dignity and fair treatment of undocumented immigrant youth and their families. Originally from Hildago Mexico, Greisa came to the US with her family at a young age as an undocumented immigrant. They, she then went on to study political science and economics at Texas A & M University. And has since been organizing immigrant youth, students and workers for the passage of pro immigrant policies at the local state and federal level for the past decade. And I'm sure has plenty of stories to share from doing that work. Welcome Greisa, and thank you so much for joining us on this episode of storytelling.
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
Gracias Martín, I am so happy to be here.
Martín Diego Garcia:
It's always a pleasure to see your lovely face and your beautiful smile. You always light up a room.
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
Thank you.
Martín Diego Garcia:
As we Uh talk about this episode on storytelling. I know you have an amazing story and often share your story and was wondering if you would share a little bit of your story for our listeners and particular about how you got into this line of work.
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
Yeah, no, I first, I just want to say how proud and excited I am to be on this with you. Martín it's, it's an honor to be in any project that you're involved in, but also tell the story of what we're doing at UWD and and support you and your leadership. And you know, I think storytelling, I'm so happy that you're covering this because I think storytelling is at the heart of every, every strategy that actually wins. If you look at the fight for LGBTQ marriage, when you look at the fight for ensuring that like black people are treated as people in this country, all of it at the heart of it has been storytelling and what this moment means. And so for me my story begins when I come into this country with my mom and my dad their names started Louis and Eylea Martinez Rosas. Um we came to the U S when I was very young, we crossed the Rio Grande, the waters from Hidalgo to Dallas, Texas, which is where we grew up. And in Dallas, you know, I always knew that I was undocumented knew that there was something that I was, that was a secret that I couldn't tell a lot of people. And I knew that it was, I kept the secret, not only to protect myself, but mostly to protect my family and my mom and my dad, who I saw every day, get up at the crack of dawn and my mom making my dad like a little cup of coffee in the morning with tortillas and frijoles and my dad like running the truck and then like, it woke up the whole neighborhood, cause it was like one of those old rickety white trucks. Um and he at the same time that both of them led a congregation in Dallas, they were both Southern Baptist preachers. They also had to make ends meet. And so my dad was a guy, I don't know if you've seen them, but they're like these like wooden pallets that you see at Costco or like some of these places. And he would go out to the to the companies, like get them bring them home, fix them up and sell them, sell them right back to them. And it was like I thought that I was like the ultimate immigrant hustle.
Martín Diego Garcia:
I was gonna say, that is a hustle.
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
So that's what we lived off of. And you know, there was a lot of sometimes like shame that came from that work as growing up poor in Dallas. But a lot of lessons, like I remember every Sunday we would go out before like the big industrial, like trash would come on Monday mornings, we would go out and like, do like a scouting. So we would have like our check, like my dad, like with like pull us all up into the truck. And like, my role was to be like the lookout. So I would go into this big tub upstairs and like look out at the top of it and see like, Oh, is there any pallets here that we could take? And then there was, I was like, yeah, come over. And my motivation was that at the end of that trip, I always used to get hot Cheetos and an ice tea that was like my, my payment for being a good lookout
Martín Diego Garcia:
Staple snack in a Latino household.
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
And so one of those days it was a Sunday and my, we found something, my dad was backing up the truck, my mom, you know, it was like, okay, okay, you're close, are almost headed. And this Sunday was different because at the corner of our eye, we saw someone that worked at the factory. So my dad had over the years and like met a lot of folks. Like they like were help, but like help them sometimes call him and say like, Hey, I, I think that there's something here that you want to come see, but this time it was a new, a new person. And then this person was a white man. And instead of like curiosity, there was accusation and he I remember just the way he looked at our family with a lot of hate he started yelling at my dad. I'm like, why are you, why are you stealing? He called him a wetback, which is a derogatory term for, Mexicans and undocumented people. He told him that he should be ashamed of having his daughters there with him and in his eyes, I just saw, I never knew what it was, but I, I could feel his eyes on me and my mom and my dad and, and I could feel like deep hate and anger. And I was so confused. We were, we just had the music on, and all of that was on my mind was hot Cheetos, you know? And in my dad's eyes and my mom's, I saw shame. Um, and in that moment, I just, that moment comes back to me so often because those same eyes are, the eyes are that gaze are like, he gaze that we see in, people all across the country, that gaze is, from that man is lethal. And we've seen it in the recent months where you see black and Brown people being killed by police in the streets. And so for me, that moment of being undocumented, of being Brown, of being poor, mt's the thing that really energized me when I was a senior in high school. And there was this big announcement that there were going to be, hey we’re gonna put my mom and my dad as being felons like this law that passed in Washington DC that would have said that they were felons. And I just couldn't stay still. I couldn't let another, like more people be able to tell my mom or my dad that they should be ashamed for something like just trying to survive. And so I, and my friends organized like this big walkouts of like young people of our high schools and like, I don't know where that came from. Cause it wasn't really me. Like I was a girl that was just trying to like, let me put my head down, let me like, do what I gotta do. Um, I think that moment, that Sunday, I think is the thing that, that pushed me to do it, that like, I couldn't just stand back and do nothing. Um, and those walkouts led to then the mega marches of millions of people coming into the streets of, uh, 2000, 2006. And I I've been hooked ever since like young people setting the tone of what it means to be able to be really clear about what you want and demand young people like defying, you know, law and convention, even in your schools and then the community backing you up and saying, yeah, that was the right thing. And then showing up, and that led to the rise of this new wave of the immigrant justice movement. And that led me to, um, to doing this work here at United We Dream.
Martín Diego Garcia:
I mean, what an amazing story, I mean, like in and of itself, which leads me to my next question. I think you just demonstrated, why do you think storytelling is so powerful and such a powerful tool that advocacy organizations can utilize?
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
You know, I I was taught storytelling through the Marshall Ganz model. That really is a model that comes from the farm workers and the movement that, that happened in California and the farm worker movement and in that, and they always tell the story about how Cesar Chavez was like building this big union. And he was like, people were like, Oh, we can't ask members to pay dues. Like they barely have enough food to eat. And his response was like, it has to be like this movement has to belong to the people and they have to be able to feel a connection and ownership of it and the union will show up for them. And so in that same way, I think that storytelling is like ensuring that people feel it in their bones. Like they know what the connections are. We speak about values when we tell stories and values are the things that connect us and like that ground in our work. Well we tell when we paint pictures about the, the things that are guarded in our souls and in our hearts, people are able to not only connect with that part of you, but connect with that part of themselves. And then being able to, you know, storytelling isn't enough. And that's what we've learned within the immigrant justice movement. You have to be able to, to marry that with a clear theory of what you're going to change and a clear call to action. Um, so that's where we get into like, um, from a, the moth presentation to a revolution is the, the clear strategy and the clear, um, call to action.
Martín Diego Garcia:
Yeah, no, absolutely. I mean, I think you all have done it successfully. I think a number of groups and organizations are thinking through it and I think you're right. It is, it takes these big numbers of a hundred thousand immigrant youth, or like during the pandemic, when we're saying like millions of people, that number is just so big for people to comprehend that these individual stories like you just telling yours, right. Humanizes us again, right. And humanizes the issues. And it allows us to be empathetic again, as humans to be like, Oh, I feel for you as another human. Like, I feel your pain. I feel your suffering. And I want to be there to like naturally as a human to support other people, right, versus just throwing out these big numbers and figures and people can't really see that number in their head. Right. They don't, they don't see a hundred thousand people. They can't visualize that. But when you say I'm one of, many of these people who are, who are dealing with this, I think it, it really helps bring us back to them and ground us in our values. Like you said, and humanize us.
Martín Diego Garcia:
Are there ways that you can give us that you all at UWD have, have used storytelling storytelling effectively in engaging your advocates and supporters to push them to that call to action, as you mentioned?
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
Yeah. I mean, I think that part of you know, one of the organizing rules that they drill into your head is that organizing is about self-interest. It's about like, what does the other person that's listening to you or you're calling into your work? Like, what does, what, how is it that their lives are also transformed? And so I will say that like United We Dream has actually now grown to a group of 800,000 people. We have a reach of 5 million people every month and have been able to in the last couple of months, talk to 22.5 million Latinx communities across the country to tell them about like, what's like to ask them what's happening with COVID in their lives to tell them, to go out and fill out the census and to tell them about like the things that are coming up for our communities in the next couple of months. And so the way that we do that work is around three things I'll say the first is like being able to be very clear about the challenge. What is like the, what is the thing that we're facing? And it's not like let me tell you about a new problem that you want to have. It's like, but putting the, the, the moment that we're in into context. So what's the challenge. The second one is the choice. So what is it that if we make this choice together, are we like what is it that you're telling me to do? Like, what is the call to action that you want to do? Like, what is, and then the third piece is a hopeful outcome. Like if we do this, then this will happen. And so one of the examples is actually on DACA the Supreme at the Supreme Court we we have been like the Trump Administration has been leveraging attacks against undocumented young people since day one in his campaign. And he promised his base that he was going to kill the DACA program. They like first 100 days we are still now like four, almost four years into his election. And DACA is still in place. Obviously it's changed and like has attacked it and like basically killed it as it exists. But we preserved part of it because of our story. We told the stories of uh young undocumented people that were were part of essential workers that are the ones that are ensuring that we make it through this COVID nightmare that we all find ourselves into. We told them. And then, um, when we did that, we told the stories of someone like Aldo, who is a young, uh, a DACA recipient. He's a paramedic in Florida. Um, and he was able to say that it's not only his ability to be a paramedic was not only because of him. It was because of his mom, like his dad, like the people around him that have supported to do that. And, uh, and then be able to say how he sees his own role in this moment about like serving the community and how he wants, and, and actually is joining us in a demanding of protection for more and more people, including his mom and his dad. And he was able to take his story to the Democratic National Convention that just happened, um, a couple of weeks ago. And I think that it's about like, ensuring that people understand how their self interests of, uh, of being able to survive this pandemic is actually served by people's actions and like the giving dignity and protection to these people. Um, and then giving them a clear out here, which, you know, the, the one that Aldo was raising for folks, it's like, you need to vote in November because my life, the life of my family and also the life of these community members, which I serve as a paramedic are at stake.
Martín Diego Garcia:
Yeah. And it makes my heart sing. When you say, right, like choice, the challenge choice, what is the opportunity? Right? What is the outcome? That's obviously it as trainers. Right. But that's how we train very telling of, of structure that you had mentioned earlier, but how do you, um, similar to Aldo, how do you identify those advocates or supporters who have good stories and how do you, how do you help train or what techniques do you have to sort of pull those stories out of folks to know that like, this is going to be a really powerful story to be shared?
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
I'll say that that actually we had a we had people from Ireland and, and all over Europe come to the U S and get trained by United We Dream on storytelling. And the thing that we always hear from people are like, Oh, well, you know, your story is cool, but like, you know, it's heartbreaking and powerful, but I don't have a story like that. My life has been okay. And I think that sometimes people feel like I don't have a story to tell, like, my life has been pretty, you know, whatever. And I, I, I, that's not true. Like everybody has moments of choice in our lives. So we have made to be able to to call us into why it is that we're making the ask why it is we're part of this organization or this campaign, or this effort. Um and so being able to like, do some of that thinking for yourself, I think it's important figuring out, like, what is like the, what are the values that are in action as you're making this choice? Like, whether, you know, you signed up for this listserv because I don't know, like you, your girlfriend was undocumented and therefore, you know, you decided to jump in, like, those are the, those are things that are universal, like wanting to care for our loved one as a universal value that I think is important. So we we really ground people on knowing that your story is valuable. Your story is worthy of being heard. The second thing is that it is important to able to think about what your goal is. Whenever you're telling storytelling, and whenever you're doing storytelling and including that in your campaign, if your goal is to because your goal actually depends, your goal dictates who the right messenger is and what the right story is. Um depending on the audience and the, and the the target that you're trying to hit. And so, you know, that that actually varies depending on which of the pieces that you really want to be able to tackle, but for the immigrant justice movement and and undocumented, a young people, our goal is to ensure that we change the way that this country sees immigrants, that we humanize them, that we build independent political power for our people that we win policy change that is able to have material change in people's lives. And when we do that, then we, then the message is pretty easy. Like it's like the people most directly impacted to tell the story, the people that support us. So like we train a lot of teachers to tell their stories about why it is that they support undocumented young people. Um we did some of the storytelling with like with elected officials across the country. So as people are thinking about including storytelling into their work, be very clear, what's the goal who is like the best speaker or the best messenger for this. And then ensuring that people know that everybody has a story. So it's not about the sob stories actually. Like it's not, it's a, it's a sob story. Then I make sure that it's for strategic purposes, not just making people feel bad for you, because then people will just stay there. It's just like, we've all been there, right? Like we we've seen like the commercial, they're like, Oh, that's so sad. And then like, you just go on about your day. You need to be able to have, like, what is like, why is it important for them to move through it, like take action with you and why will their lives also be better if they take action with you?
Martín Diego Garcia:
Yeah. I mean, emotion is, so I would love to think that all humans think and make choices rationally, right. But humans are, are not always the most rational, but we are super emotional. And so when you can take folks through those emotions, right. Even if you right there is, there is that sad story where you get folks to feel empathy, you then have to bring them back into like inspiration or aspirational, right. To, to make them then feel like they have the power to make that change. So, yeah Completely agree with you. And you, you, you talked a little bit about this and wanted to get a little bit deeper, but for the listeners who are thinking of incorporating storytelling into their work, you mentioned some places to start. Um, what is your all's internal process look like for story collection? Uh, how do you capture them? How do you organize them? How do you track them?
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
Well, you know, we are, um, we take storytelling very seriously at, you know, so there's like whole like curriculum on how we train each other. Um, um, and from like all across our organizations, um, and storytelling, I think that, that, um, we're able to, I feel like we have like, uh, I don't want to brag, but I feel like my team is, my team is the best in the game on the digital storytelling piece. And so, um, with the leadership of like young, undocumented, queer people, um, we've been able to develop the digital infrastructure for people to be able to both tell their own stories using our social media platforms, um, as well as like sharing stories out. Um, so it can't just be like a, I mean, it depends on what your goal is, but for us, it's not just being a magazine and like a YouTube, a YouTube channel it's about, um, also, um, you know, giving people opportunities to share their own stories, because we believe that in storytelling, you go from there's transformation, you go from place like someone like myself that was like deeply, um, uh, disconnected from my queer identity and to someone that, because I heard so many stories that I was like able to like really deeply and fully embrace my, my own identity as a queer woman. And that happens because there's like loops where people can also not only listen to your story, but also share their own story. Um, there's obviously like this whole data thing that we've had to build on and we're actually still building out. It's really hard to be able to track those things, I will say. Um, and also, uh, making sure that there's, um, that we are creating our own channels of, um, of communication and how we want to tell our own stories, um, and using that in every opportunity possible, I'll share one example that we, um, we were just in the Supreme court case on DACA. And, um, we submitted the first ever, um, uh, video, uh, Supreme court. Um, what's it called? Like a Amicus brief. So like, there's like, um, in the history of the Supreme court, now the first stories that are being submitted by video or by undocumented people, and they're like vignettes of stories of undocumented folks. And so I think that that's some of the ways in which we track, we, um, bring stories into the fold and also we project them out, um, into the, into the world
Martín Diego Garcia:
And make history, hello,
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
We won at the Supreme Court, and a lot of part, because we told the story of what what's happening to us.
Martín Diego Garcia:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, as you think about like the culture that you have created internally, right? I would imagine everybody in the organization always has storytelling in their mind as they're talking to new folks, talking to volunteers, talking to supporters, sort of just out in the world. Um, have there been any challenges or lessons learned that you could offer to listeners about things they may encounter? The lessons you've learned pieces that would help them start the process?
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
Yes. Three, um, the first is
Martín Diego Garcia:
Love it. So organized. I got three,
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
Three, the first is, um, be very clear about what you're trying to achieve with your storytelling program or project. Um, sometimes stories, uh, also open up, um, very traumatic moments for people. And so you have to be able to be very clear by setting the container and also ensuring that there is support for people as they navigate through these stories so that you don't open, inadvertently open up, um, really deeply emotional pieces that you're not then able to close, which is, I think, particularly working with young, uh, queer poor people of color, like that's something that we, that we needed to, not just anyone can open up a storytelling piece unless you have like clear confines of it. The second thing is, um, they, it is about like the people most directly impacted telling their own stories. Um, and that is defined like in various ways, depending on what area of work you're leading, but you see this when we're, we're talking about, um, the March for our lives move, my worries, like people, young people that were directly impacted by like gun violence in their schools. We see this within our movement. Um, the movement for black lives, it's like young black people like telling the stories of how police. So that has to be at the core of what you're doing. Um, and the third piece I'll say is that, uh, I call it like leave room for the spirit. Sometimes I think we like, um, and this is like also my Southern Baptist and coming out, which is a whole different story, a whole different podcast. But, um, sometimes we set up with this idea of what we want, like our storytelling campaign to be like, and people are just, I think that people are just magical and so interesting and things just come out like from the storytelling pieces that can reshape the way that you were thinking about your campaign from even to begin with. And so if you be very clear with the people that you're engaging with this about, like what kind of input you want from your campaign, but also leave enough space in your planning for the spirit, like the human spirit to be able to move through it. Those are the three things I would say. Hmm.
Martín Diego Garcia:
It's Amazing, amazing. You touched on one thing that I want to sort of wrap up with that I think is also really important is about the care for storytellers, right? Like you were bringing these folks in and you're asking them to do something very brave and very vulnerable, right. And, and you were taking them to a place that maybe they do feel shame and maybe they haven't processed fully. Can you talk about how you all sort of hold your folks and ensure that you are also taking care of the folks while they're giving you as an organization this really powerful thing of their story?
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
Yes. I'll say one is that we, when you are requesting vulnerability from others, you must first be able to be vulnerable. And so everyone that leads a storytelling piece starts out with their own story and why they showed up in that day, why they showed up to this story training piece. So that is going to be important. If you don't feel like you have the right staff, you don't feel like you have the right people to be able to like reflect back the vulnerability that you are expecting from others. You know, I would just caution. The second thing is I think that whether you have it in house or outside, partnering with mental health providers is really important. We work with a couple of partners, the national Latinx Psychological Association, Soul Sisters there's a lot of resources out there for you to be able to like you know anchor your work with, with mental health in mind. So I'll say that, that those are two things that folks should think about when you're caring. Not only for like the people that are the storytellers, but also your own team as they like also process a lot of these things that will make be on there.
Martín Diego Garcia:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well yet again, you have got me all warm and fuzzy and feeling inspired and ready to take action.
Greisa Martinez Rosas:
Thank you for having me.
Martín Diego Garcia:
So we'll be right back, but if you want to learn more about what Greisa and her team is doing over at United We Dream, we will add a link in the show description as well as hopefully some other resources to help you out with your storytelling process. Yeah, we'll be right back.