Information, Medium & Society: Twentieth International Conference on Publishing Studies

Abstract

The concept of transmedia storytelling has long been associated with either high-budget, blockbuster Hollywood sci-fi franchises or as a predominantly digital publication strategy. This study examines how transmedia storytelling can be effectively deployed in physical, locative spaces to support and deepen complex storytelling across digital and physical media. This approach can provide deeper narrative engagement for small-scale and socially concerned stories that are forced to compete in a rich digital mediascape. We examine the case of Shining Light into Shadows, an experimental project to deploy geocaching for a local history storytelling project that elevates the stories of women and marginalized populations in and around a small city in the American Midwest. This storytelling experiment found that a new public engaged with the larger transmedia storytelling project through a new medium, and created a singular, locative experience of stories that would otherwise only be encountered through the fleeting and often shallow engagement of social media. This study illustrates the importance of bringing stories into the physical spaces associated with their subjects and helping those stories inhabit the reader’s physical world. Local history publishing — a critical infrastructure for community building and placemaking — can benefit greatly from these techniques.