About - Detroit River Story Lab

Reviving the Stories We Tell About Our Region

The University of Michigan’s Detroit River Story Lab is an interdisciplinary, grant-funded initiative that partners with regional organizations to reconnect communities with the river and its stories. Through collaborative research, education, and engagement projects, our partnerships amplify marginalized voices and foreground the role of the river and its shores as sites of connection, stewardship, and healing.

“As newspapers continue to collapse, as the academic freedom of teachers in US public schools continues to disappear, and as statues of slaveholders and confederate soldiers continue to fall in city squares, Americans of every demographic and political orientation have come to a renewed appreciation of two critically important facts—
First: Stories matter.
And second: Investments in narrative infrastructure are every bit as important to supporting the health and resilience of local communities as investments in roads, pipes, and buildings.”
David Porter, Founder and Director

Our Partners

To identify opportunities for collaboration, the Story Lab builds relationships with local organizations whose objectives align with the Lab’s core commitments and research expertise. In developing new partnerships, the Lab sets out to understand the histories and contexts of community priorities and to position itself in the role of a convener and capacity-building catalyst in helping to address them.  Priority is given to collaborative, river-facing projects to which UM faculty and students can make meaningful contributions through the narrative channels of journalism, curriculum, or public heritage. 

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