Oral History Flashcards
How can oral history succinctly be described?
As immediate history
What is a relevant African proverb?
Every old man that dies is a library that burns
Who founded the modern concept of oral history?
Nevins, Columbia University
What is the contradiction between the term ‘oral history’ and its origins?
Oral history is as old as history, despite the term being new
Who practiced oral history in the 19th century?
Michelet
When was Michelet born and what did he use in his history?
- Official documents and popular political opinion
How did Michelet describe people?
As “living documents”
What is oral history, if not a new branch of history?
A technique
Why is the term ‘oral history’ confusing?
Can be used in any branch of history
What is one major value of oral history for the study of history?
Valuable to study history not just through he terms and categories of contemporaries
What is the political nature of oral history?
Political aim of creating histories of the oppressed, to gain support for a cause, public affirmation, therapeutic benefit
What suggests that a major role of oral history is its empowerment potential?
Interviewees only agree to be interviewed because they endorse a project as worth doing
Who argues that reticence is an assertion of the narrator’s authority?
Layman
What is the impact of oral history on historical writing?
Engages and enriches scope of historical writing
What enables oral history to be flexible?
Able to pin down evidence just where needed
What kind of sources are traditionally more likely to be destroyed?
Personal, local and unofficial ones
What three major things can oral histories tell us?
What people wanted to do, what they believed they were doing, and what they now think tehy did
What kind of projects are founded on oral history?
Truth and reconciliation projects
What link was established in the 1960s?
Oral history and feminism
Who undertook the ‘Voices of Rwanda’ project?
Krauss
What did Antoinette from the Rwanda project say?
“If I die without talking here, my family will disappear from the root”
What does Thompson argue about the reliability of oral sources relative to written sources?
“Neither oral nor written evidence can be said to be generally superior. It depends on the context”
Whose study focussed on ‘boundary crossings’?
McCormick and Mouton
What kind of information do ‘boundary crossings’ provide?
Raw, vital and disruptive of the usual narrative
What has Peled argued oral history enables us to do?
Draw a vibrant historical portrait
Who argued that oral history was “intrinsically different and therefore specifically useful”?
Peled
Who has argued that Palestinian memory is at a “double jeopardy of erasure”?
Swedenberg
What can oral history (positively) undermine?
The gravitational pull exerted by the meta-narrative on local and personal narratives
What does Evans argue about oral history’s uses?
That it has a limited ability to transmit knowledge
What does Evans concede about oral history?
That sometimes, a body of factual knowledge exists only in memories
What does Vansina argue is the power of oral history?
To present humans from a different angle to that in archives
When did Edward Said stress oral history’s role in Palestinian history?
1998
Who argues that oral history has a role in documenting villages, and thus legitimising claims of refugees?
Gluck
What Palestinian Project was established in 2002?
Palestine Remembered
How many videos of oral history, in 14 towns, have been recorded for “Palestine Remembered”?
342
With oral history, there is the danger that the individual will…
Assume collective significance
What often occurs in Palestinian oral histories?
The “we” is often invoked
What is the use of ‘we’ problematic, according to Gluck?
Can mute experiences, mask differences and struggles
What is the impact of conducting oral histories in a digital age?
May tell story differently if online; instantly accessible and easily manipulated
What is the impact of using a transcript?
Turns oral objects into visual ones
When was oral history first criticised by conservatives, and when was it criticised by liberals?
1970s, late 1970s and 1980s
What was the main accusation made against oral history?
Critical of its “complacent populism”
What is often ignored by those outside of the oral historian community?
Oral history’s increasing theoretical sophistication
What are the key problems with using transcripts?
Tone, volume, rhythm lost. Carry implicit meaning and social connotations
How does the linguistic turn link to oral history?
Implication that there is no social reality beyond the language which forms the past
What is a genuine and legitimate criticism of oral history?
Academic conventions are looser with oral history citations and footnotes
What kind of oral history is difficult?
Elite. Rehearsed; lives for posterity
What are Starr’s criticisms of oral history?
“Memory is fallible, ego distorts and contradiction sometimes go unresolved”
Who stresses the reliability/credibility of oral sources?
Portelli
In what does Portelli see the importance of oral history?
Departure from fact, the influence of imagination, symbolism, desire.
Wrong statements are…
Psychologically ‘true’
What must be remembered about written sources?
They are often the uncontrolled transmission of unidentified oral sources
What did O’Farrell argue in 1979?
Oral history will lead us not into history, but into myth
What is a crucial difference between oral sources and analogue sources?
Written sources exist either way; they are fixed. Their content can only be interpreted.
Who argues that diaries and autobiographies are more circumspect that oral sources?
Marwick
What did Taylor argue about written sources?
Useless except for atmosphere. One-way communication. (?)
What does Plummer argue the aim of oral history should be?
To reveal bias, not pretend they can be nullified
Who stresses the importance of ‘traces’?
Tonkin
What reveals oral historians’ insecurity about their profession?
Reluctance to conceive their work as oral history
Who argues for the need for a “dialogue” between oral history and written sources? Why?
Peled. For the sake of striving for truth and balancing the historical picture
What three things does Thompson recommend doing to overcome illusions/memory faults?
Look for 1) internal consistency. 2) Aware of potential bias 3) confirmation in other sources
What does Harris remind us about what oral history does not do?
That it does exonerate historians from searching for and using written documents exhaustively
What did Green identify as a change in oral history in the 1970s, in response to criticisms?
Reorientated towards social and cultural contexts shaping memories. Focus on how individual recollections fit cultural scripts
What are memories of war shaped by?
Templates of war remembrance
What does a focus on ‘collective memory’ assume?
That there is little space for a consciously reflective individual
What does Thompson argue it is easier to identify for oral history?
Forgeries, author, social purpose
What was created and standardised in response to criticisms about oral history?
“Scientific model” for the interview.
What does the scientific model for the oral history interview recommend/stress?
The value of preparation, rapport and intimacy, open-ended questions, no interrupting, allow pauses and silences, no use of jargon.
Who argues that memories are fallible on individual events, but illuminating on character and atmosphere?
James
What is technically incorrect, but interesting for the historian?
The imagination of an alternative past
What kind of memories are often suppressed?
Discreditable and dangerous memories
What is the impact of oppressive political contexts on oral histories?
Produce repressed, conflicting and dissonant memories
How does Passerini view silences?
Silence is as much concerned with remembering as forgetting
Who conducted a story on the Holocaust?
Roseman
What did Roseman’s study unveil about memory?
The difficulty of remembering an unbearable reality
What problems and distortions arose in Roseman’s Holocaust study?
Small exaggerations, magnifications of experience, time doubled and trebled, e.g. father’s incarceration at Dachau
Who argued that “all memory is structured by a group identity”?
Fentress
What is the problem with treating memory objectively, according to Fentress?
It makes memory an object
Who conducted a story on French involvement with the FLN?
Evans
What enabled a richness in the memories recalled?
Many had been under 30 and so memories had “frozen over”; sharpness not diminished
What enabled Evans’ study to improve memory-recall?
Tried to recreate the atmosphere of the time
What memories were reignited during the Algerian War of Independence?
Memories of Vichy France
How does Thompson see memory?
Memories discarded over time. Initial most drastic and violent.
What does memory often link to?
Interest and comprehension
How does Halbswachs view individual recollection?
Within a framework of collective memory
How does Confino see collective memory as being created?
Through vehicles of memory, e.g. books and films
Who views memory as the mental faculty by which we preserve and recover our pasts?
Hynes
What separates memory from just an image of the past?
The process of reaching back
How does Wood distinguish between collective and individual memory?
Collective memory has a high degree of intentionality, whilst individual memory lacks a similar sense of purpose
What arguably makes individual dimensions of memory insignificant?
The fact that the context of remembering determines personal recall
Who argues that memory should be the object, at the centre-stage of oral history?
Frisch
How might the presence of others affect oral histories, according to Thompson?
Less boasting, more likely to conform
What kind of memories will be recalled if interview is conducted in a house?
Pressure of respectable, home-centred ideals
Who has seen as “shared authority” between historians and informants?
Frisch
What do historians realise when conducting oral history, according to Thompson?
That their activity is pursued in a social context with political implications
Why is the selection process important?
Self-selected groups are rarely fully representative. Dominated by the working class and middle class.
Finish the quote by Grele: Nowhere is that dictum…
‘history is what the historian says it is’ more apparent than in oral history
How can narrators assert their authority?
By redirecting the conversational narrative
What is the impact of the interviewee knowing the interviewer?
May say what they think the historian wants to known, based on who they think the researcher is
What must the interviewer give priority to?
To what the informer wants to say
What can oral history not be told without?
Without taking sides
Who argues that by engaging with objects of study, the investigator becomes part of the story?
Figlio
How can one view the inauguration of al oral history project?
As the beginning of a relationship (Filgio)
How does oral history undermine the position of a historian, according to Portelli?
Undermines the historian as an external and omniscient narrator
Who has pointed out that the personal involvement of the historian is now seen as the touchstone of OH?
Roper
What is the impact of the ‘reflexive turn’ in the social sciences on oral history?
Idea that knowledge is a production of interactions; thus, interview is a relationship, not a narrative.
Who argued that the interview is a transference situation, whether we like it or not?
Figlio
What is empathy shaped by?
Post-emotional residues
How can the interview setting be seen, according to Figlio?
As the enactment of emotional fragments of past relationships in the present?
Who asked, ‘do I like them too much’?
Yow
What does Harris think creates serious theoretical problems?
The injection of the historian into the scene
Who confessed that despite trying to be objective, sometimes historians become involved with the narrator?
Terkel
Where in Israel has been undertaking oral histories since 1959?
Hebrew University’s Oral History Department, and the Institute of Contemporary Jewry
What kind of project does the Hebrew University want to undertake?
With Holocaust survivors’ children (reflects concern with legacy)
Where did Peled undertake his oral history project and when?
Upper Galilee, 2006-11
What did Peled’s oral history focus on?
The relationship between social groups pre-1948
What concerns were raised about Peled’s background?
Whether a foreigner has the real ability to express the voice of a forgotten peoples. An Arabic-speaking Israeli Jew. “Devious orientalist”.
What are the potential benefits of Peled’s background?
Ability to understand differently; more willing to open up, like with strangers
What groups have been omitted from the written and photographic history of the Galilee?
Al Mawasi and Fatussa
Because of a lack of other sources, how can Peled’s oral history be viewed?
As the decision to record any history at all.
What does Peled’s history examine?
The relations between the Bedouins of Mawasi and the fellahin of Fatussa
What was one event which Peled managed to cross-check?
Mawasi wedding
What increases the reliability of oral histories collected by Peled?
These people were mostly illiterate, and thus skilled in oral transmission
Who funded a Nakba Oral History project?
Palestine Remembered, an NGO.
What did the Nakba Oral History project aim to achieve?
To increase community feeling and connect to roots
What is Yad Vashem specifically important for?
Recollection and collective memorialisation of the Shoah
What project was created in 2002 in Lebanon?
A Nakba archive
How many videos have been created by the nakba archive?
Over 500. 1000 hours worth.
From how many villages pre-1948, and UNWRA camps were the oral histories taken?
135 villages, 12 camps
What digital components are there to the archive?
Database and search engine
What is the continued problem with the ‘New History’?
It is macro-historical
What do Israeli historians deny, due to an absence in written documents?
Any massacres
How can the Nakba be seen>
As a site of/for collective memory and history; something that connects all Palestinians
What Israeli product was started in 2007?
Toldot Yisrael
What is the goal of the Toldolt Yisrael project?
To create a video archive and interactive database.
How many interviews have been undertaken, and amongst whom?
500; Prisoners of War, politicians, Mossad agents
How many Holocaust survivors were interviewed as part of Speilberg’s Shoah project?
52 000
Who created the Toldot Yisrael project and with what goal?
Halvini; curious about what he would have done.
How many potential interviewees are left?
50 000
By what rate are they decreasing annually?
20%
What can the project be linked to?
Growing attacks on Israel’s legitimacy; potential impact of Israel on Jewish pride and purpose
What project did Nusair conduct?
One on three generations of Palestinian women
What is often avoided in the oral histories of Palestinian women?
Question of rape
What did the first generation of women reveal?
That lift was immensely difficult at first. No education or Hebrew. Pride at maintaining dignity
What did all three women agree on?
Alienation from Israel
What was important about the locality?
Site for belonging and resistance
Where did Meari conduct an oral history?
In a village at Birreh
What did Meari’s project highlight?
The contradictory, gendered descriptions of agricultural work in the 1930s
What approach does Matar take?
A generational focus
What did one Jaffa refugee say in Matar’s project?
“We cannot let go. There is a need to keep talking and telling our story”
How was Nazareth portrayed?
As an “imagined Palestine within Israel”
Why does Masalha see oral history as important?
Vital tool for recovering the voice of the subaltern
What groups have been marginalised from Palestinian history?
Bedouins, peasants, women.
What role did oral history have post 1948?
As an “emergency science”, a buffer against national disappearance
What contributes to the silencing of Palestinian past?
Israeli historians’ insistence that only archival (aka. IDF) sources are impartial
What percentage of fellahin were literate in 1948?
15%
Who has stressed the bias towards written sources?
Khalidi
Who conducted a study of refugees in Lebanon and Jordan in 2001?
Esber
Whose work contested Morris’ conclusions?
Esber’s
What did Esber’s work show?
That expulsions began before 14th May
From where did Esber interview refugees?
75/225 locales that had fallen before 15th May. From Nazareth to Beersheba
What does Kassem’s project focus on?
How, not what, they remembered. Palestinian women outside Israel
How many people did Kassem interview in total? Male/female ratio? From where?
37 women, 6 men. Lyd and Ramleh
What kind of political terms did men use? What fraction of women used the same?
Conquest, occupation. 3/37 - communists
What term was used by some women, and what does this suggest potentially?
“Migration”. Internalisation of Zionist discourse? Kassem argues it represents resistance and agency.
Why is the term ‘nakba’ avoided?
Differentiates from refugees
Who interviewed refugees in Lebanon?
Allan. No passive verbs after 1948.
How does Masalha argue women’s bodies can be seen?
As ‘sites of memory’; protect Palestinian history from exclusion
When did Palestinian Police Project start?
2002 - launched properly in 2005
What was the budget per interview?
£200
What troubles did the project encounter?
Cost of full translation expensive. Some too old and feeble.
How many interviews were undertaken in total?
70
