We interviewed Oren Karp '20 (he/him/his) for the Independent Concentration Student Spotlight! Oren is a senior from Pepperell, MA concentrating in Storytelling. Here is an excerpt from the interview:
What is your independent concentration?
Storytelling is a concentration that studies stories as a form that’s used in many different contexts. What I’m trying to do with the concentration is recognize storytelling as a valid way of knowing and teaching because I think that often, stories are thought of as something that’s less formal than other more institutional ways of knowing because they’re oral and not written. What I’m trying to do is consider them just as valid a way of recording history or passing knowledge from generation to generation or providing entertainment. I recognize that stories are something that kind of exist in different ways across every culture I know of. I’m thinking about how stories can be used for intercultural exchange and communication.
One of the things I’m really interested in thinking about in storytelling as a concentration is the ways that stories and what stories we’re told affect how we perceive ourselves and the world around us, and how we understand our role in the world through stories.
Why did you want to pursue an independent concentration?
I definitely didn’t come in freshman year like, I want to do an independent concentration in storytelling. I kind of just took whatever classes I thought were the most interesting freshman and sophomore year. Initially, I declared Middle East Studies because I was taking Arabic and that was most of the concentration so I thought, why not?
I wasn’t really satisfied so I came to an independent concentration less because this was something I had planned and more because I wasn’t satisfied with other concentrations. The classes I had taken were a little bit too all over the place to allow me to declare any other standard concentrations.
I basically came to the CRC and was like I really think I want to do an independent concentration, but I’m not sure how all my classes fit together. Then I brainstormed with the IC coordinator. I think I submitted my independent concentration 4 or 5 times before it was accepted. It was a really long road. I think the IC process definitely helped me realize that storytelling is something that I’m really interested in, in a way that I couldn’t explain before the process. After the process I’m like, oh yeah of course that’s a common thread but beforehand I was just taking the classes that I was interested in and didn’t realize storytelling was drawing them together.