This course will introduce students to the field of oral history and provide opportunities for firsthand experience in processing, interviewing, and interpreting oral histories. In this course, you will learn about the history of the field, the ethical issues confronting oral historians, and how oral historians design and execute good (and bad) projects. This course will provide hands-on experience alongside the classroom structure of a more traditional readings course. Our semester will be divided into two parts. Part I will take the form of a traditional graduate seminar with assigned readings and discussions each week, and a final paper at the end of the first part. The readings will cover:
Introductory classics in the field
Contemporary uses of the methodology, with a regional focus on the South.
Critiques and new directions in oral history methodology.
During this component of the course, you will be responsible for the following:
Leading one discussion section about the reading(s) for that week. A sign-in sheet will be circulated. You are welcome to discuss your questions beforehand with the instructor.
Coming to class prepared and participating actively in discussion
A 10-paged paper (TNR, double-spaced, emailed to the instructor by midnight) that brings into conversation books from each of the three units to answer the questions: “to what extent do oral history methodologies fulfill the promise of broadening or exploding established historical narratives? If they do, will they continue to in the future?”
Part II will take the form of an oral history lab. In this section of the course, we will create an oral history workgroup using the resources of the Center for Oral History. We will decide the priorities of the workgroup together and work on-site at Special Collections and University Archives. Required work group components include:
A vision statement for the Center (3-5 pages)
One interview transcribed and processed per person
One work group deliverable. Options include but are not limited to:
A grant application draft
An online exhibit
Playlists or other curricular materials
We will decide these together in class. The vision statement, one-paged plan for final deliverable, and group deliverable are the responsibility of students and will be emailed directly to the instructor by midnight on the due date. At the end of the semester, students will include in the email with their final paper their role in the creation of the deliverable.
The final paper will be a reflection (TNR, 5 pages, double-spaced) integrating at least three readings and your experiences in the workgroup. The paper will answer the question: “what is the role of the individual oral history practitioner in advancing theory and methodology for the field at large?”
Assignment recap and weight:
Participation: 45%
Class participation: 20%
Oral history lab participation: 20%
Leading class discussion: 5%
Paper 1: 15%
Oral history lab product: 20%
Paper 2: 20%
Policies:
We can decide to move a due date as a class if necessary, but requests for extensions on papers must be made at least two days in advance.
You may miss one class without explanation before absence affects your participation grade. All other absences require documentation.
On participation grades: Please understand that in this methodology course, participation is required for you to learn and for the course to be successful for everyone. Participation does not equate to attendance and saying out loud anything on the topic of oral history. Participation in a methodology course means generating new, informed ideas and critiques in discussion and taking charge of YOUR role in the classroom and in group work.
In addition to text readings, you will also find links to oral history projects in various mediums found online. When you peruse these, look for:
Project design: what is the project’s research question? How large is the project, and what was its duration? Who are the researchers and what are their fields of expertise?
Timeliness: what world events or historiographical threads or gaps does the project respond to?
Narrators: who is included in the project, and who is missing? What role do they serve beyond narrator, if any?
Presentation: who is the intended audience? What is the central message of the project? What are the products or outputs?
1/18
Introductions, syllabus review
READING GROUP 1: Foundations
1/25
Robert Perks and Alistair Thomson, eds., Oral History Reader (3rd Edition) available as eBook on lib.vt.edu
Introduction – 58, 92-266
Special attention to Thomson and Portelli
Behind the Veil oral history project: https://repository.duke.edu/dc/behindtheveil
Voices Remembering Slavery: https://www.loc.gov/collections/voices-remembering-slavery/about-this-collection/
2/1
Oral History Reader (3rd Edition), 297-333, 412-489, 536-580, 674-688
Special attention to Blee, Shopes, and Jessee
Blue Ridge Parkway Folklife Project: https://www.loc.gov/collections/blue-ridge-parkway-folklife-project/about-this-collection/
2/8
Tonkin, Gluck, Women’s Words
The Virginia Feminist Oral History Project: https://archives.library.vcu.edu/repositories/5/resources/554
Black Women Oral History Project: https://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/schlesinger-library/collections/black-women-oral-history-project
2/15
Portelli – The Order Has Been Carried Out: History, Memory, and a Nazi Massacre in Rome
Shoah Foundation: https://sfi.usc.edu/what-we-do/collections
Tenement Museum: https://103orchard.tenement.org/stories/103-orchard/?_ga=2.241696386.1292137876.1672787381-336170765.1672787381#
READING GROUP 2: Contemporary Applications
2/22
Jesse Wilkerson, To Live Here, You Have to Fight available as eBook on lib.vt.edu
https://www.historians.org/teaching-and-learning/teaching-resources-for-historians/teaching-and-learning-in-the-digital-age/the-history-of-the-americas/like-a-family-the-making-of-a-southern-cotton-mill-world/overview
https://www.southerncultures.org/article/the-sonic-south/
3/1
Ren Harman, Center for Oral History, comes to class
E. Patrick Johnson, Honeypot: Black Southern Women who Love Women available as eBook on lib.vt.edu and on JSTOR
Southwest Virginia LGBTQ+ History Project: http://lgbthistory.pages.roanoke.edu/
https://www.midwestqueerspaces.com/
3/8 – SPRING BREAK
Instructor will provide feedback on class participation
PART II: ORAL HISTORY WORKGROUP
3/15
https://www.inclusiveconservation.org/
Karida Brown, “On the Participatory Archive,” Southern Cultures (available on JSTOR)
Denise Meringolo, “Introduction”; Anne Valk, “Recalling Our Bitter Experiences”; Daniel Kerr, “Allan Nevins is Not My Grandfather” in Radical Roots available on JSTOR
READING GROUP 3: New Perspectives and Problems
3/22
Beyond Women’s Words, 1-37, 48-55, 149-183, 217-222, 277-320 available as eBook on lib.vt.edu
3/29
Nēpia Mahuika, Rethinking Oral History and Tradition: an Indigenous Perspective, available as eBook on lib.vt.edu
Christine Anne George, “Archives Beyond the Pale,” American Archivist available online
https://www.nativeoralhistory.org/ (under construction currently)
4/5
Paper Due
4/12
Group vision statement due
Group deliverable plan due
4/19
Optional fieldwork trip; office hours for students
5/3
Last day of class – transcripts due
5/10
Final reflection paper due
Final deliverables due
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