Examining how power, history, and institutional memory shape financial system narratives.

Dahna Chandler | Founder and Principal Scholar

Financial Institution Narrative Scholar | Public Scholarship Researcher

I am an American finance narrative historian whose work examines how institutional narratives shape public understanding of economic systems, financial access, and wealth formation in the United States.

Grounded in my doctoral research at the University of Southern California's Rossier School of Education in organizational change and leadership, my work explores how financial institutions communicate trust, legitimacy, and access across evolving social and economic conditions.

Through interdisciplinary inquiry, essays, and public scholarship, I study how historical memory, institutional language, and narrative frameworks continue to influence financial behavior, policy interpretation, and perceptions of economic participation.

The Narrative Praxis Institute serves as a platform for research, writing, and collaborative inquiry focused on institutional trust, financial communication, and contemporary economic systems.

I also collaborate selectively with aligned institutions, scholars, and organizations exploring the relationship between narrative, public understanding, and financial access.

My doctoral research at USC Rossier School of Education investigates how institutional communication shapes financial access and trust formation among historically underserved populations in the United States.

The work examines a specific gap: between what financial institutions offer and what communities with documented histories of financial exclusion understand themselves to be offered. 

Using qualitative inquiry methods, it draws on organizational change theory, narrative analysis, and adult learning frameworks to examine how institutional memory, language, and structural positioning shape who understands themselves as belonging inside or outside the financial systems those institutions govern.

Financial institutions structure access to wealth-building products and services in ways that create systematic barriers for communities seeking to build and maintain wealth. Those barriers are embedded in standard financial industry operations, not exceptional to them. 

My research interrogates how institutional communication sustains those conditions and what it would take to change them.

My research also informs The Narrative Praxis Institute's broader public scholarship mission: producing rigorous, accessible knowledge at the intersection of financial systems, institutional communication, and community economic life.

"Dahna communicates complex financial narratives with clarity, depth, and scholarly precision. Her work is rigorously researched and engaging—whether for academic peers, sector professionals, or general audiences. She’s among the strongest researchers I’ve worked with and brings an exceptional level of professionalism and insight to every project.” —Dr. Corinne Hyde, Professor of Clinical Practice, University of Southern California Rossier School of Education