When Anastasia Sotiropoulos joined the Stanford chapter of the Prison Renaissance Project, she got paired up with a man named Adamu Chan, who had been incarcerated at San Quentin prison for two decades. Their relationship began a few weeks before the pandemic, and the first time they talked San Quentin was the site of one of the largest COVID outbreaks in the nation. Over the next three years, Anastasia and Adamu exchanged dozens of letters, had weekly phone calls, and dreamed of creating a film together. Neither of them could have imagined where that friendship would lead them: not just to Adamu’s release from San Quentin, but his admission to Stanford as a CCSRE Mellon Arts Fellow. Today Adamu is an award-winning filmmaker and community organizer. Adamu and Anastasia have continued their friendship, and together created the 2024 podcast episode, Friends in Liminal Spaces, through the Stanford Storytelling Project’s Braden Storytelling Grant.

Reclaiming, part 6: Friends in Liminal Spaces

Max Du was so obsessed with whales that his childhood friends called him Orca Boy. But when a SeaWorld trainer named Dawn was killed by an orca, his love for whales turned to shame…until he met Dawn’s best friend, a whale trainer named Lyndsey. She leads him back to SeaWorld on a journey of reclaiming the Orca Boy that he thought was gone.

This story was produced by Max Du and Carolyn Stein with support from Laura Joyce Davis and the Stanford Storytelling Project. Max Du is an incoming computer science Ph.D. student and Knight-Hennessy Scholar at Stanford University. By night, he is a writer interested in immigrant experiences and the human-animal relationship. In addition to working on pieces for the Storytelling Project, he is currently doing fieldwork for a non-fiction book that features the oral histories of whale & dolphin trainers. When he’s not wrangling robots or making friends with whale trainers, Max also enjoys improvising on the piano and listening to Jimmy Buffet.

Reclaiming, part 7: Orca Boy

“Back to the Garden” tells the story of an organic farming couple, Jose and Rich, who are committed to sustaining the environment . . . and who don't believe in climate change. This episode explores how that dissonance might be possible, the power of language, and whether or not the term "climate change" will help save the planet.

Produced by Anna McNulty, Shameeka Wilson, and Laura Joyce Davis.

Reclaiming, Part 8: Back to the Garden

Destiny Cunningham learned shame early. The comments that teachers, church leaders, and other kids made about her body led her to wear clothes like armor, hiding herself from others so she wouldn't be noticed. Years later, Destiny and her friends decide to visit a nudist retreat in the hopes that she'll learn how to become naked without feeling exposed.

Nakedness, part 1: Exposure Therapy

Being naked–or seeing others naked–can evoke a firestorm of emotions . . . everything from freedom to vulnerability to sensuality to shame. In three stories pulled from the Storytelling Project archives (created in 2012) we explore the glory and grit of stripping down.

Nakedness, part 2: Stripping Down

Growing up with Indian immigrant parents in a Wyoming college town, Aru was used to the tension of what her parents expected her to be and the person she was actually becoming. In this story, recorded at First Person Story in April of 2024, Aru takes the risk of emotional nakedness with her mom–even though it may leave her feeling exposed. 

www.firstpersonstory.org
www.storytelling.Stanford.edu

Nakedness, part 3: Okay With the Gay

What would you do for the sake of a story? In this live story, recorded at the 2024 Senior Story Slam, Alina Wilson shares the story that spawned this series on Nakedness for State of the Human.

Nakedness, part 4: Naked Retreat

To hear all State of the Human episodes, visit storytelling.stanford.edu/podcasts/ or stateofthehuman.podbean.com/

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