One of the workshops in the Fall 2026 series was People Making 101. In conversation, participants explored what materials-making methods support how stories represent the diversity of Friends in our worldwide family.
The slide presentation that opened the workshop can be found here. Several resources for people figures are linked in the slides!
Some ideas to highlight from the workshop conversation:
- While wooden peg people are most-often milled from lighter-color wood, Friends are encouraged to paint ALL figures to represent a diversity of skin tones. (Do not leave the “white” figures unpainted; this normalizes the idea that whiteness is a baseline.)
- There are companies making peg people from varying wood shades — two options are shared in the slides.
- Adding wooden circles glued on figures to represent people using wheelchairs is encouraged — and we hope just the beginning of finding ways to show people with mobility aids and represent disabilities. If you have an idea for how to make a figure with a disability, please share!
- There have been good questions asked about how to represent the Lenape people in the story, “John Woolman and the Lenape People Visit at Wyalusing.” Several learnings, from Friends in conversation with Lenape neighbors, are included in the slides. The story currently available for download will be updated again with this input and with additional language to remind those experiencing the story that the Lenape people live among us today.
As we begin to plan for a third, revised edition of Faith & Play Stories, conversations continue about updating the materials-making section of the publication, including people-making directions. We are called to continue listening, learning, and widening the representation of people in stories. So that everyone in any circle can wonder, “I wonder where you are in the story, or what part is about you.”