the collective danube story
The collective danube story is a project questioning the power structures of narration. The stories published are the result of a collective approach to story creation. The characters, plot and final stories have been co-created by many participants from different areas. The process included character invention, a role play story creation workshop and bringing the results to paper in different forms. The outcome of this process is presented in a booklet, combining all the different contributions to a collective story.
get your own copy for a free donation in Störling & support the LIFE sterlet project
If you are interested in the result, the process, would like to participate, cooperate or just talk, feel free to write to
donau-story@student.uni-ak.ac.at



the process
CHARACTER CREATION
First, the characters for the story have been created by people who are somehow related to the Danube: a freshwater ecologist and sturgeon breeder, a hydro biologist, an artist, a person owning a Daubel and the founder of a swimming club.
STORY CREATION WORKSHOP
After that, other participants got into the role of those characters and played them in a story-creation role play workshop. In this workshop they interacted with each other and thereby created the material which served as base for the content of the story.
BRINGING IT TO PAPER
In the last step, again other participants brought the content that has been collected to paper. For this they received different “content-packages” and were free to choose the format of their contribution.


Liebe Donaugrundel, mit mir ist nicht mehr gut Fische essen, versprochen. Wenn jemand die Donau austrinkt, dann bauen wir ein Aquarium. Wenn es mehr Sand gibt als Wasser baue ich deine Kiemen um.
Sophia Dostal in the collective danube story



aber glücklicherweise spült die blaue Donau – mit ihren ach so glanzvollen kackbraunen bugwellen – den leichenschmaus in das koronale 640er jenseits
Pia Steiner in the collective danube story


Ich bin hier zuhause. Auf der Donau und die Farbe des Himmels teilt ihren Namen mit mir. Ich bin die Blaue Donau. Ich bin ein Schiff, das Menschen stromabwärts und dann wieder durch die Wellen hindurch zurück, das alle immer zum Hafen bringt.
Friederike Teller in the collective danube story