The meetings will take place usually from 10:00am to 1:00pm on the third Friday of the month. All meetings will take place in E-501 unless otherwise specified.
- Friday September 20th, 2024 (Meeting 1 #meeting01)
- The room has been changed from E-501 to E-322 for this meeting.
- Topics: Introduction to Oral History; Orientation to the seminar objectives and goals
- Activities:
- CTL housekeeping announcements (https://bit.ly/3ZdofjC )
- Icebreaking — self-introductions
- Establishing background context and theory of the unique field of oral history and its uses.
- Readings:
- General introduction to oral history
- Smithsonian Institution Archives (2020). How to Do Oral History. Smithsonian Institution Archives. https://s.si.edu/3PH9Cj6
- Ritchie, Donald A. (2014). Doing Oral History: A Practical Guide. Cambridge, Mass.: Oxford University Press. (Only chapter 1, especially pp.11-14) (LaGuardia Library link: https://bit.ly/3PnC4FB )
- “Oral History Research Method”: https://bit.ly/3rcgQm3
- Dávila Gronros, V., Hamilton, M., Collett, G., Thompson, K., Daly, L., Wantsala, N., & Riter, R. (2023). Developing a Student-Led Podcast on Community Archives. Archival Outlook, January/February, 3. (https://bit.ly/3PkRTgj; pages 3 and 17)
- Making it here Women in New York City Politics (https://bit.ly/3reGqH4 )
- For the seminar session:
- Sullivan, S. & Schreiner, M. (2023). If You’re Thinking About Starting An Oral History Project. The City Amplified: Oral Histories and Radical Archives. (https://bit.ly/46ahGyw )
- “Jack Currier,” An excerpt from Terkel, Studs (1997). Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do. xxx, xxx: The New Press. (https://bit.ly/4dTAcPM )
- General introduction to oral history
- Friday October 18th, 2024 (Meeting 2 #meeting02)
- Topics: Introduction to Oral History: Different Disciplines
- Activities:
- Participants will listen to oral histories, learn about different projects, and practice listening closely.
- Following this, participants will present and workshop their lesson plan in small groups.
- Participants start to develop lesson plan ideas (How do you plan on incorporating OH into your class?)
- Readings (link to the reading discussion page ):
- Biddle-Perry, G. (2005). Stimulating critical thinking in the theoretically timid: the role and value of oral history assignments within an interdisciplinary context. Art, Design & Communication in Higher Education, 4(2), 85-99. (https://doi.org/10.1386/adch.4.2.85/1 )
- Kenny, H. (April 15, 2020). Self-Care: The Social Worker’s Story. Electronic document, https://bit.ly/48fFZgg , accessed Monday, March 20, 2023.
- DasGupta, S. (July 24, 2008). Teaching Medical Listening Through Oral History. Electronic document, https://bit.ly/44YVrdM , accessed Monday, March 20, 2023.
- Tobar, C., LaNasa, N., & Feldmann, G. (May 13, 2022). “American Icons” (https://bit.ly/3LucYUf ), accessed Monday, March 20, 2023
- Friday November 15th, 2024 (Meeting 3 #meeting03)
- Topics: Invited Speaker Meral Agish / Queens Memory Project & Johnathan Thayer / Olde Towne of Flushing Burial Ground: Oral History as Activism (flyer )
- Activities:
- Participants will attend the talk by the invited speaker and will engage in Q&A/discussion.
- Readings:
- Review Queens Memory Project (https://queensmemory.org)
- Review Olde Town of Flushing Burial Ground Project (https://queensmemory.org/olde-towne-of-flushing-burial-ground/) and the interviews from the project (https://bit.ly/4anhaPT).
- Friday, December 13th, 2024 (Meeting 4 #meeting04)
- Topics:
- Invited Speaker Bridget Bartolini @ Five Boro Story Project / 34th Avenue Oral History (flyer )
- Connecting with community and building relationships through oral history projects
- Activities:
- Using readings and case studies, participants examine how we can use oral history to highlight individual stories within broader issues, especially those from the marginalized population.
- Participants bring in notes from readings to discuss in to the next meeting
- Working on the seminar projects
- Project Planning Sheet: https://bit.ly/47LkF1q | https://bit.ly/487v9I9
- Readings:
- Bartolini, B. (2022). Story of a Street. https://urbanomnibus.net/2022/07/story-of-a-street/ .
- 34th Avenue Oral History
- Pick a profile from https://34aveoralhistory.org/profiles/ and read about them.
- Topics:
- Friday, March 21, 2025 (Meeting 5 #meeting05)
- The room has been changed from E-501 to E-101-E for this meeting.
- Topics:
- Oral history listening session
- Sharing session of seminar participants’ projects
- Introduction to a NEH-funded oral history project (Bijoyeta Das and Noam Scheindlin)
- Oral history recording equipment
- Activities:
- Seminar participants will make a short (5-min) presentation about their project
- As part of the project, we want to post a project summary (e.g., lesson plans) in Academic Works: https://bit.ly/LG-LearningMatters | https://academicworks.cuny.edu/do/search/advanced/ .
- Guest speakers: Bijoyeta Das and Noam Scheindlin on their new NEH-funded oral history project (https://www.laguardia.edu/news/professors-bijoyeta-das-and-dr-noam-scheindlin-receive-neh-cultural-and-community-resilience-grant/)
- How to use the oral history recording equipment (https://oralhistory.commons.gc.cuny.edu/oral-history-equipment/)
- Seminar participants will make a short (5-min) presentation about their project
- Readings: None
- Friday, April 25, 2025 (Meeting 6 #meeting06)
- Topics:
- Invited speaker: Andrea Nelson (Rikers Public Memory Project) (flyer ))
- Consent forms
- Lesson plans
- Activities:
- Readings:
- Rikers Public Memory Project Oral Histories: The whole collection can be browsed at https://archive.rikersmemoryproject.org/tours/show/5. Watch interviews with Kandra Clark (here ) and Marvin Mayfield (here ).
- Caswell, Michelle and Robinson-Sweet, Anna (2023) ““It Was as Much for Me As for Anybody Else”: The Creation of Self-Validating Records,” Journal of Contemporary Archival Studies: Vol. 10, Article 10.
Available at: https://elischolar.library.yale.edu/jcas/vol10/iss1/10 . - Whelan, & Solís. (2025). Centering abolitionist principles of community care, safety, and wellness in archives. In A. Clemens & J. Farrell (Eds.), Archivist Actions, abolitionist futures: Reimagining archival practice against incarceration. (available at https://www.clir.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2025/01/Archivist_Actions_Abolitionist_Futures_CLIRpub193.pdf ).
- Topics:
- Friday, May 16th, 2025 (Meeting 7 #meeting07)
- Topics:
- Invited Speaker Ross Perlin (flyer )
- Activities:
- Readings:
- Topics:
- Friday, June 13th, 2025 (Meeting 8 #meeting08)
- Topics: Invited Speaker TBA
- Activities:
- Readings: TBA
- An optional showcase event will be scheduled some time in May or June.
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