PROJECT
OBJECTIVES:
(1) To provide students an opportunity to create and preserve a primary source
through an oral history interview.
(2) To develop an understanding of the oral history process and the strengths
and weakness of this historical methodology in comparison to more traditional
historical sources.
(3)
To allow students the opportunity to deepen their understanding of a particular
period of United States history of their choice.
PROJECT DESCRIPTION:
According to historian Henry Luce, the twentieth century was the “American
Century.” This was a dynamic time in history shaped by the lives and
experiences of Americans from different backgrounds who do not receive equal
recognition in the history of this period. This project provides students
the opportunity to further uncover the American Century through interviews
with individuals who helped shape or witnessed events or periods that form
the American experience. Students are required to interview a nonfamily member
about a particular period or event of the American Century. The project allows
students to probe deeper into a content area of their choosing while at the
same time utilizing many of the skills used by historians. This project is
an extension of our history studies and not a separate entity of the course.
Interviewees have ranged from war veterans, civil rights activists, politicians,
and restaurant waitresses to survivors of the Great Depression and the Holocaust.
The breadth of interview subjects supports the traditional coverage of each
period or event, leading to a fuller understanding of American history. In
order for students to become excited about history, they must see the relevancy
of the past to their own lives. Oral history provides such an opportunity
as students go into the “field” and, as oral historian Studs Terkel
once said, they uncover the “living repositories of our past.”
Historian James Hoopes once said that “every good history course includes
work meant to give [students] the experience of doing history. This is often
a research paper, and it should be the most interesting, stimulating aspect
of the course. Too often, though, it is tedious, not because it is hard work,
but because the challenge to human sympathy and imagination is neglected.”1In
the case of this oral history project, a traditional research paper is no
longer the final product but rather a necessary stepping-stone from which
students go into the field and interact with people who were part of, or possibly
even made, history. Unlike most of the work done in conventional history classes
in which projects are often developed for an audience of one—the teacher—and
are complete after receiving a grade, the rich archives that your project
will become a part of are shared with the larger community through the annual
Oral History Coffee House and published on the World Wide Web at www.americancenturyproject.org.
Like all historical sources,
oral history cannot stand by itself and has its pitfalls. Therefore, this
project draws from a wide range of primary and secondary historical sources
to ensure not only historical accuracy but also the most complete presentation
possible. After selecting and receiving written permission for an interview,
students will thoroughly research the history surrounding the period or event
in a seven-to-ten page research paper using a minimum of eight sources. Students
use their research as a basis in formulating open-ended interview questions
that not only focus on gaps in the existing literature but also challenge
the interviewee to address the complexities surrounding historical events.
Each project concludes with analysis of the historical value of the interview,
and where it fits into the history of a period or event in American history.
THE
AMERICAN CENTURY PROJECT PROCESS AND PRODUCTS:
1. You must select an individual—who is not related to you—to
interview. Take risks in selecting someone to interview. The interviewee must
be cleared by the instructor and must be willing to sign both the release
formand additional materials form, though restrictions can be attached. Inform
your interviewee of this requirement immediately.
• Establish date, time, and place of the interview well in advance.
You may wish to call and remind the interviewee a few days before you appointment.
• Establish informal banter with your interviewee. You do not want to
show up, turn the tape recorder to play, and start taping. The more your interviewee
becomes comfortable with you, the better the interview will be.
• Clearly state the purpose of the interview at the beginning and show
the interviewee the end result on the project website, www.americancenturyproject.org.
Explain why this class is doing the project and all the components of it.
You might have to convince him or her of the importance of the story to creating
a complete picture of America’s past.
2. Your interview must focus on a particular period or event that your interviewee
either witnessed or was part of. You are required to broadly research the
period or event, using at least seven sources (minimum of 4 print sources).
This research will allow you to develop sophisticated, open-ended questions.
Begin developing questions throughout your research. Photographs, speeches,
and video can also be helpful in engaging the interviewee.
3. Each interview needs to be recorded either by tape or minidisk or, in certain
instances, with a video recorder, and must be conducted in person. The beginning
of the tape must include your name, the interviewee’s name, the date
and location of the interview. The tape must be labeled accordingly. Do this
prior to the interview.
4. You are expected to take notes during the interview to serve as reference
points when doing your analysis as well as for helping to develop follow-up
questions.
5. You are responsible for transcribing the questions you asked and the response
of the individual while trying to maintain the tone of the responses. Expect
six hours of transcription for each hour of interview.
6. You will analyze the historical value of the interview. What was its value
as a historical source? Where does it fit into the existing history, the sources
you researched? Can it be useful in better understanding our past?
PROJECT
COMPONENTS AND FORMAT:
The final project will be ordered as follows:
Part I: Title page
Part II: Table of contents.
Part III: Interviewee
and interviewer release forms signed (restictions can be attached)
Part IV: Statement of purpose of the project and your interview (provide setting,
dates, and location).
Part V: Biography with photo. Introduce the reader to your interviewee by
supplying a short (1 page) biography. Include a physical description of the
interviewee.
Part VI: Historical contextualization. You must assume the reader is intelligent
but knows nothing about your subject. Therefore, you are responsible for a
minimum seven- to ten-page research paper, drawn from a minimum of eight sources
(including newspapers of the day), that highlights the history surrounding
the event or period that the interview covers. It should provide context for
better understanding the interview and therefore will need to be revised following
the interview.
Part VII: Interview. Transcribed as outlined in class.
Part VIII: Historical analysis. Possibly the most important aspect of this
project because as a historian you must determine the historical value of
the interview. Was it biased, glorified? Does the interview shed new light
on a particular period or event in America’s past? How does it compare
with the “traditional” history that you conducted in your historical
context?
Part IX: Photographs, charts, and maps that might clarify responses for the
reader can only be used with written permission from the interviewee on the
borrowed materials receipt. Part X: Time indexing log of each 5-minute portion
of the interview (Typed and included in your final, bound project).
Part XI: Works Consulted of all sources you used to conduct this project formatted
according to MLA standards.
Part XII: A handwritten thank-you note, which includes the formal invitation
to the Oral History Coffee House.
Part XIII: Museum exhibition (poster, Power Point, Web design, theatrical
performance, etc.) presented at the annual Oral History Coffee House.
Part XIV: Submission of properly labeled disk and tapes and e-mail copy of
complete project for Internet archiving.
Part XV: Baked goods. Each student is required to bake or prepare some food
for the annual Oral History Coffeehouse