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Abstract
This paper describes a case study oral history project involving high school students who interview elders and publish in full text and full digital video on a public Web site, www.tellingstories.org. Telling Their Stories: Oral History Archives Project (OHAP) is a combination of a high school elective history course at The Urban School of San Francisco, a digital video oral history production protocol, a public Web site, and a growing collaboration with other educational institutions from around the country. Students learn oral history technique, conduct two-hour long video-recorded interviews, complete the transcription, edit movies, and publish to the OHAP Web site. Most OHAP interviews deal with witnesses of key twentieth century events involving acts of discrimination, including survivors, witnesses and liberators of the Nazi Holocaust, Japanese American internees, and elders involved in the southern Civil Rights Movement. The paper also examines the preparation and efficacy of student-conducted oral histories via the OHAP model.
Notes
1 The National Association of Independent Schools recognized Telling Their Stories with a Leading Edge award in 2004.
2 Steven Spielberg established the Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation in 1994 and has collected over 50,000 video interviews with survivors and witnesses of the Holocaust. The Foundation now resides at the University of Southern California at http://college.usc.edu/vhi (accessed April 1, 2011).
3 The author leads an annual summer workshop for adults, Telling Their Stories: Producing Web-Based Digital Video Interviews, which has been attended by educators, oral historians, and community organizers from around the country. See www.tellingstories.org/workshop (accessed April 1, 2011).
4 Students of Vanessa H. Arnaud, Community Engagement Faculty Fellow, Honors Program, California State University, interviewed Japanese American internee, Marielle Tsukamoto on September 8, 2009. See http://www.tellingstories.org/internment (accessed April 1, 2011).
5 Students of Conrad Hall, teacher at Cary Academy, Cary, North Carolina, interviewed several veterans and Holocaust survivors in 2008, soon to be published on the OHAP Web site.
6 Howard Levin, “Telling Their Stories: Student Production and Delivery of Digital Video Interviews via the Internet” (paper presented to the International Oral History Association Conference, Sydney, 2006). Reprinted in On Tape (Oral History Association of Australia, April 2008).
7 Four volumes have been published since 2002, including Volume 1: Wartime Memories from the Civil War through the Gulf War (Indianapolis: Park Tudor, 2002), Volume 2: Wartime Memories from the American Revolution through the Iraq War (Indianapolis: Park Tudor, 2004), Volume 3: Wartime Memories from America and Abroad (Indianapolis: Park Tudor, 2007), and Volume 4: Wartime Memories: Oral Histories from WWII (Indianapolis: Park Tudor, 2009). See www.parktudor.org/legacy (accessed April 1, 2011).
8 “For the survivor who chooses to testify, it is clear: his duty is to bear witness for the dead and for the living. He has no right to deprive future generations of a past that belongs to our collective memory. To forget would be not only dangerous but offensive; to forget the dead would be akin to killing them a second time.” Elie Wiesel, Night (New York: Hill & Wang, 1960).
9 “I have never seen myself as a spokesman. I am a witness. In the church in which I was raised you were supposed to bear witness to the truth. Now, later on, you wonder what in the world the truth is, but you do know what a lie is.” Julius Lester, “James Baldwin: Reflections of a Maverick,“ The New York Times, May 27, 1984, 7.1.
10 A selected list of Holocaust-related and Japanese American internment camp resources used by students are listed on the OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/about/resources.html (accessed April 1, 2011). The Freedom Song, written and directed by Phil Alden Robinson (Turner Films, 2000), a fictionalized account of events in McComb, Mississippi, was used to help prepare students. Other books used by students to prepare for the southern civil rights interviews include: Melba Pattillo Beals, Warriors Don't Cry: A Searing Memoir of the Battle to Integrate Little Rock's Central High (New York: Washington Square Press, 1994); John Dittmer, Local People: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Mississippi (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 1995); Deborah Menkart, Alana D Murray, and Jenice L. View, ed., Putting the Movement Back into Civil Rights (Baltimore: Teaching for Change, 2004); Charles E. Cobb, Jr., On the Road to Freedom: A Guided Tour of the Civil Rights Trail (Chapel Hill: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 2008).
11 Published works include: Max Garcia, Auschwitz, Auschwitz … I Cannot Forget You, As Long as I Remain Alive (San Jose: Think Social Publishing, 2008); Dora Sorell, Tell The Children: Letters to Miriam (San Rafael: Sighet Publishing, 1998); Zdena Berger, Tell Me Another Morning (Ashfield, MA: Paris Press, 2007); and Gloria Lyon, When I Was 14: A Survivor Remembers (Berkeley: University of California, Extension Center for Media and Independent Learning, 1995).
12 Sample preinterview forms available at the OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/about/technical (accessed April 1, 2011).
13 An interview with Masaru Kawaguchi, OHAP Web site, “Life in Topaz 1,” 8, http://www.tellingstories.org/internment/mkawaguchi (accessed April 1, 2011).
14 See additional description, Interview Team Roles, OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/about/technical/how-to/teams.html (accessed April 1, 2011).
15 Robert Perks and Alistair Thomson, ed., “Interviewing and Interviewer,” in The Oral History Reader (New York: Routlege, 2006).
16 See sample checklists at the OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/about/technical (accessed April 1, 2011).
17 See a sample of the OHAP agreement at http://www.tellingstories.org/about/index.html (accessed April 1, 2011).
18 See sample checklists at the OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/about/technical (accessed April 1, 2011).
19 See http://www.tellingstories.org/about (accessed April 1, 2011).
20 See Equipment and Software Tools Used in the Production Guide section of the OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/about (accessed April 1, 2011).
21 Urban School tenth grade student, Talia C., letter to Harold Gordon after her interview conducted at his home, February 3, 2008, Salinas, California.
22 See a blank Certificate of Acclamation on the OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/about, Sample Proclamation (accessed April 1, 2011).
23 See a postinterview debrief form on the OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/about/how-to/debrief-form.pdf (accessed April 1, 2011).
24 Express Scribe transcription software for both Mac and PC is distributed at no charge by NCH Software at http://www.nch.com.au/scribe (accessed April 1, 2011).
25 See Express Scribe training movie on the OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/about/technical (accessed April 1, 2011).
26 See Style Guide in the Production Guide section of the OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/about (accessed April 1, 2011).
27 An interview with Lucille Eichengreen on May 30, 2002, and April 24, 2003, OHAP Web site, “Transport to Lódz,” 4, http://www.tellingstories.org/holocaust/leichengreen (accessed April 1, 2011).
28 An interview with Max Garcia on May 9, 2002, OHAP Web site, “Arrested in Amsterdam,” 6, http://www.tellingstories.org/holocaust/mgarcia (accessed April 1, 2011).
29 See Angela Zusman, Story Bridges: A Guide for Conducting Intergenerational Oral History Projects (Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press, 2010).
30 See interview with Wilma Bass on the OHAP Web site at http://www.tellingstories.org/experts/wilma_bass (accessed April 1, 2011).
31 See Jennie Goldenberg, “The Impact on the Interviewer of Holocaust Survivor Narratives: Vicarious Traumatization or Transformation?” Traumatology 8 (2002): 215–31 (accessed April 1, 2011).
32 An interview with Kenneth Colvin on May 3, 2007, OHAP Web site, “Further Effects,” 16, http://www.tellingstories.org/holocaust/kcolvin (accessed April 1, 2011).
33 See interview with Freda Reider on May 15, 2003, OHAP Web site, “Telling Her Story,” 11, http://www.tellingstories.orgholocaust/freider (accessed April 1, 2011).
34 From E-mail correspondence with Deborah Dent Samake, December 3, 2010. Inspired by her work leading student oral histories, Samake returned to graduate school to earn a Master’s decree in clinical social work. She conducted her final research studying the impact of on the adolescent interviewers involved in OHAP interviews. She intends to publish her work in the future.
35 From E-mail correspondence with Vickie Malone, OHAP teacher at McComb High School in McComb, MS, November 30, 2010.
36 From E-mail correspondence with David Patrick Bickham, The Bickham Consortium, January 11, 2011.
37 From group interview with four high school seniors from McComb High School, after their two-day interview with Brenda Travis in San Francisco, May 7, 2010.
38 An interview with Floyd Dade, Jr., on January 18, 2006, OHAP Web site, “Telling His Story,” 11, http://www.tellingstories.org/liberators/fdade (accessed April 1, 2011).
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Howard Levin
Howard Levin is Director of Technology at The Urban School of San Francisco. Previously he served as History chair and teacher at the Overlake School of Redmond, WA, as well as Assistant Head of the Jewish Day School in Bellevue, WA. More information is available at www.howardlevin.com