Capturing oral history

Stories have been a significant way for people to share experiences and make sense of their lives since the beginning of spoken languages. Oral history is flexible, innovative, unpredictable, and full of rich detailsespecially with the added audio cues from the storyteller. Once a story is created, it opens up new possibilities for understanding life from multiple perspectives.

Check with your local historical society or public library for guidance on creating oral histories. Many communities actively support oral history projects by providing space, equipment, and how-to workshops. If you decide to go-it-alone, please consider the following tips.

Invest in or borrow a quality digital recorder and lapel microphone. Plan the session for at least one-half hour less than the maximum capacity of your recorder. Have extra batteries on-hand. Test your equipment before you start and be sure you are comfortable operating the recorder. When you have completed the session, back-up your files.

The focus of the session is the storyteller. Since telling stories is a normal part of everyday conversation, most people will respond with rich narratives when they are allowed to talk. Give the storyteller room to speak. Ask the storyteller to reconstruct their past for you or to tell his/her story. Offer guidance or prompts based upon what the storyteller provides rather than what you want to know. You can ask for more detail or clarification on your interests later.

Elliot Mishler (professor of social psychology at Harvard Medical School) suggests, "One of the primary ways human beings make sense of their experience is by casting it in a narrative form." The narrator helps the listeners relate ideas or events through the content of the story. New meaning or understanding is revealed to the listener in the context of the place, time and culture disclosed in the story. The oral history provides an opportunity to understand ourselves through telling and hearing the stories that shape the realities we share within our communities.

The oral history is a representation of the real life experiences of the storyteller. Each subsequent listener checks the reality of the story against his or her remembrances. Events and meaning are reinforced, reconstructed, or reinterpreted which creates new stories and new experiences. These collective acts of remembrance and new experiences weave part of the social and cultural fabric of our values and our communities.

Enjoy listening, telling, and re-telling stories with people of all ages in your community and you will discover the value of oral history through hearing what others value.