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Florence + the Machine makes musical sense of our moment; taking part in our advanced testimonial writing workshop, & more.

Still from the video “Sympathy Magic,” off Florence + the Machine’s new record “Everybody Scream.”  Credit: Autumn de Wilde.

Can music help us make sense of our moment? 

It’s a mad, mad world for a woman. A noisy one, too. Here a “shut up and sit down,” there the procreationist directive to “hurry up and have children,” everywhere a cacophony of voices reminding the “Second Sex” of the limited number of things the female body is for. To which Florence Welch, the frontwoman of Florence + the Machine, channeling female frustration the world over, replies, “Everybody Scream!”

So opens A Righteous Scream: Florence + the Machine Makes Musical Sense of Our Moment, by Anne K. Ream and R. Clifton Spargo. In their latest piece for New City, Anne and Clifton - our Center for Story & Witness Co-Founders -  reflect on the social impact of one of rock’s most feminist bands, consider singer-songwriter Florence Welch’s unique capacity for turning her personal pain into politically powerful songs, and make the case that art that channels not just rage, but resilience is what the world needs now.

Partnering with Tearfund on a narrative advocacy training in Durban, South Africa.

Bring a Center for Story & Witness narrative advocacy training to your community.

Custom-created in partnership with and in response to the needs of our grassroots allies across the globe, our Center for Story & Witness narrative advocacy trainings challenge artists and activists to think in new ways about the ethics of storytelling; consider how language and word choice can help us break through ideological or partisan barriers; and consider which stories they seek to tell in their own work. 

Our trainings have been offered at the Clinton Presidential Center, the Buffett Center for International and Comparative Studies at Northwestern University, and the Obama Fellows Program at University of Chicago, among many others. Next stop, your community? 

Organizers and participants at the close of a writing workshop at Sojourner Peace Center in Milwaukee, WI.

Up Next, our advanced testimonial writing workshop, is coming to Chicago.   

Building on our Stories We Tell, Breaking Free, and Testimony & Transformation writing workshops, Up Next is a next generation, two-day writing program for Center for Story & Witness workshop alums seeking to take their writing to the next level in a setting that is as trauma-informed as it is creatively ambitious. Ideal for writers with creative work in progress. The workshop is fee-based and will be offered in Fall, 2026; date TBA. Watch this space for further details.

UPCOMING EVENTS

CREATIVE INTERRUPTION: THE THEOLOGY OF PEACE CONFERENCE.



Center for Story & Witness co-founders Anne K. Ream and R. Clifton Spargo and ethicist and theologian Wolfgang Palaver are keynote presenters.

July 7, 2026 | 9A-5P CST

DePaul Center

Chicago, IL

THE HAROLD WASHINGTON LITERARY AWARDS: A PRINTERS ROW LIT FEST EVENT.

Keynote TBA; Co-Chairs Anne K. Ream of Center for Story & Witness & Rosellen Brown of Art Institute of Chicago to give opening remarks.

September 2026

The Union League Club

Chicago, IL

UP NEXT: A TWO-DAY TESTIMONIAL WRITING WORKSHOP. 

Co-led by R. Clifton Spargo and Anne K. Ream, for graduates of our Stories We Tell, Breaking Free, or Testimony & Transformation writing programs. 

This is a fee based workshop.

Fall/Winter 2026 (date TBA)

Simmons Center for Global Chicago

Chicago, IL

BEARING WITNESS: A CONTEMPORARY ART EXHIBITION & AUCTION.

Presented by Center for Story & Witness in partnership with Art Works for Change; curated by Randy Jayne Rosenberg in alliance with Tiphanie Spencer-Babinet.

Fall/Winter 2026