Storytelling and the REAL TRUTH of it all

As some of you may know, one of the first sources we encountered in the course was about Apple Products and globalization from a podcast of This American Life. NPR and This American Life have retracted the story, you can read why by clicking here.

The host, as cited in a USA Today article, claims "Daisey lied to me and to This American Life producer Brian Reed during the fact checking we did on the story, before it was broadcast."

Last week, NPR also released that Foxconn, the factory in the original podcast, has reached an agreement with Apple and will improve working conditions. The report on the working conditions in the factory outline some major violations.

Here is ABCs accompanying story for the video. You can also just read the Fair Labor Report in full by going to their website.


This story is interesting because it brings up one of the central issues Minh-ha discusses in her book: storytelling and its relationship to TRUTH. Note that the NPR radio show host says of Daisey that "he lied" and yet, as the accompanying video and reports suggest, there was truth in his story, even if all interviews he claimed to have did not happen.

So, what do you believe all of this means? What part must be fact, truth, nailed down to the wall, verifiable in order for the story to COUNT and be real? What counts as legit? How do we decide?

What was the point of Mr. Daisey's story? What did his narrative try to do? Does it matter that he did not actually do all that the story claims? How does this discrepancy between FACT and truth impact the narrative being told about globalization and neoliberalism, labor laws, US consumption, the Apple brand?

Thoughts?