Impact of storytelling on women's empowerment and education.

Historically, inspiring and connecting human beings has been influenced by storytelling. Popular knowledge has always been influenced by storytelling because, although many of the stories told have not always maintained the same structure, they have followed a general pattern that has had a great impact on society because they were based on real experiences. However, on most occasions and at most historical moments, women have been left out of these narratives and have simply been passive objects in the stories told. Even in children's stories, women were weak ladies who had to wait for a knight to come to their rescue.

Storytelling is the art of telling, developing, and adapting stories using specific elements with beginning, middle, and end, to convey a message in an unforgettable way by connecting with the reader or listener on an emotional level (1). On the other hand, today it has become a key ally of marketing and advertising. It was not until the early 2000s that women began to play a relevant role in advertising storytelling, as for example in DOVE's ‘Real Beauty’ campaign, where for the first time real women appeared telling their personal stories of acceptance of their beauty and managed to connect with women all over the world, making them feel identified with what they saw. So why not make it a key ally of female education and empowerment too?

As a general tendency, storytelling has been characterised by forgetting women, as most stories are based on the stories of intellectuals, fighters, and brave men, leaving women in the background. As early as the French Revolution, with the ‘Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen’ drafted by the Constituent Assembly and by prominent figures such as Rousseau, women were relegated to the political and social background. This history, presented as universally important, leaves women as passive spectators, even though in Europe we have a long tradition of women fighters who resisted and challenged the imposed patriarchal structures. Without going any further back than this period, we find the figure of Olympe de Gouges, who, in contrast to Rousseau, wrote the ‘Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Citizen’, demanding equality and women's rights. However, her figure has been obviated and even erased from the narrative of the time, once again relegating women to second place. During this period, we also find in Spain the figure of Mariana Pineda, who defended freedom and fought in a period reserved for the male fight for democracy.

These stories should be key to education as they give a place to women who have been silenced throughout history and enable contemporary women to feel reflected and empowered. It allows them to take control over their own narrative and helps them to open up and tell their own experiences in order to achieve collective empowerment. An example of this collective female empowerment can be found in the #MeToo movement, which gained great strength thanks to the use of social networks, in which thousands of women used storytelling to achieve a change of mentality in society through the narration of their experiences.

Throughout history, storytelling has been a powerful tool for transmitting, educating, and connecting people. However, for centuries, women have been relegated to the background. With examples like this one, we are aware of the power of storytelling on a global level and how it is a key tool for female empowerment. Intensifying the storytelling of women fighters and new feminist movements in the field of education is also essential for women, as it will help us to build a more equal and just future.