Lecture by Jakub Mlynář (Malach Center for Visual History, Charles University) followed by a workshop on sociological aspects of oral history.
The lecture Sociological Aspects of Oral History in the Digital Age is going to provide theoretical foundations for the follow-up workshop focused on one of the largest digital archives of oral history: the USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive. This digital database consists of more than 54,500 audio-visual recordings of oral history interviews. The majority of the interviews were collected between 1994 and 2000, mainly in the USA and Europe. Most of the interviews (nearly 50%) are in English, but more than 35 other languages are also represented in the Visual History Archive. Over 150 interviews from the Archive are related to Luxembourg.
During the workshop, combining theory and praxis, we will focus on secondary analysis of archival interviews, discussion of their role in contemporary society, as well as interpretive issues in secondary use of archived oral history. In the introductory lecture, we will consider oral history more generally as a social phenomenon, and archived oral history interviews as social semiotic objects.
Programme:
| 10.00 | Lecture by Jakub Mlynář, Malach on ‚The largest digital archives of oral history: the USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive‘. This lecture is the kick-off for the new DTU lecture series organised by the ‚Digital History & Hermeneutics Doctoral Training Unit |
| 11.00 | Workshop – work with the USC Shoah foundation’s database; Analysis and comparison |
| 13.00 | Lunch break |
| 14.00 | Oral history interview as a social situation and the semiotic object |
| 15.30 | Coffee break |
| 16.00 | Oral history interview and genocides (discussion) |
| 16.45 | Closing |