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Singapore XXI IOHA Conference – 23-27 August 2021 ..here..
Call for Papers: Oral History, Place and Environment
Discussion published by Carla Pascoe Leahy on Friday, July 31, 2020
Studies in Oral History (formerly Oral History Australia Journal) has issued a call for papers on the theme oral history, place and environment.
Humans are profoundly emplaced beings. We become attached to places – be they homes, cities or natural environments—so that when we are separated from them, we become homesick. Geographer Yi-Fu Tuan referred to this love of place or sense of place as ‘topophilia’, and it can also be connected to cultural belonging or family identity. Hence our place memories can be deeply felt and intensely personal. Moreover, place memories can retain a special resonance in the mind over time,associated as they are with sensory experiences, emotional associations and social inflections. Place matters, as oral historians have shown across a range of settings.
Place can be specific and localised, but it can also be extrapolated to the physical environments we inhabit more broadly. Increasingly, the fields of oral history and environmental history are finding productive intersections. Oral history offers attention to the ways in which humans remember and narrate their relationships to environments. Environmental history insists upon close attention to the more-than-human world, and the relationships between nature and culture, people and place. As environmental catastrophes with anthropogenic causes become more common in the twenty-first century, understanding human interrelationships with specific places and the environment is arguably more critical—and more urgent—than ever before.
This special issue of Studies in Oral History invites reflections upon the ways in which oral history can illuminate and expand our understandings of place and environment. We invite broad and varied interpretations of this theme, which may include (but are not limited to):
- Childhood memories of place
- Connections to home, town, region or nation
- Indigenous connections to country
- Urban place memories
- Regional and rural place memories
- Place attachment and migration
- Family history and meanings of ‘home’
- Intergenerational knowledge of and attachment to place
- ‘Natural’ disasters
- Environmental activism
- Histories of environmental degradation
- Environmental regulation
- Environmental protection and rejuvenation.
To be considered for peer review, articles should be between 5,000 and 8,000 words (excluding references) and are due 30 November 2020. Citations should be in the form of footnotes in Chicago style. Publication of the special issue is anticipated in late 2021.
Any queries about this special issue can be directed to Joint Editors Skye Krichauff skye.krichauff@adelaide.edu.au and Carla Pascoe Leahy Carla.pascoeleahy@unimelb.edu.au.
* The Advanced Institute will be held from August 9-13, 2021.
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Kia ora koutou,The Office of the Children’s Commission is looking to employ an oral historian to interview the last three surviving Children’s Commissioners as part of the first stage of book project, The job description and the contact details for anyone interested are below. There is some urgency to the project as the current Commissioner, Judge Andrew Becroft, is finishing in the role on 31 October. After that he reverts to being a Judge and cannot comment on government policy, so they want the interview done before then. Because of this it would probably suit someone based in or near Wellington.Children’s Commission – Oral History interviews with ex-children’s commissioners
Children’s Commission – Oral History interviews with ex-children’s commissioners
The project is essentially the first research phase in what will eventually be a book
about the progress of the Office following on from “Voices of Children” by John
Barrington, which covered the office from its beginnings until 2003.
It will involve interviewing the three surviving Commissioners that have been
appointed since 2003, Dr Cindy Kiro, Dr Russell Wills and the current Commissioner
Judge Andrew Becroft. The interviews should cover the big policy shifts and other
work the Office was involved with during their tenure, including any remaining
societal or political challenges.
There is a hard deadline is the interview with Judge Becroft which will need to be
done before he leaves the office on October 31. At that point he reverts to being a
sitting Judge and can’t comment on public policy. Ideally, the histories will be
gathered by the end of the year, but early next would also fit the time frame.
Two of the interviews will be in Wellington, and one in Hawke’s Bay. The Office of
the Commissioner will pay travel to Hawke’s Bay.
The Commission retain possession of the interviews and the transcript. These are
expected to inform the book project.
If you are interested please email Leah Haines a proposal at L.Haines@occ.org.nz
Wairarapa Library Service is holding in August, Beyond the Four Walls: Audio Storytelling Using Oral Histories.
Wellington oral historians Emma-Jean Kelly and Pip Oldham will be speaking in Greytown on 19 August about their experiences creating podcasts and audio stories on subjects ranging from New Zealand’s 2020 Covid-19 lockdown and the Wahine disaster to the lives of butchers.
Dr Emma-Jean Kelly, the Audio-Visual Historian at the Ministry for Culture and Heritage, will be talking about the oral history project she initiated last year on New Zealand’s Covid-19 lockdown, and how it grew into a podcast featured on Radio New Zealand, ‘Kei Roto i te Miru: Inside the Bubble’.
Independent oral historian Pip Oldham, whose work has included interviews with everyone from butchers to artists and people in the professions, will speak about how she came to use audio recorded for archival purposes to tell stories for audiences outside the archive, what’s involved and why it’s worth doing.
Hear Pip and Emma-Jean at the WBS Room, Greytown Town Centre, 87 Main Street, Greytown, on Thursday 19 August from 10 to 11.30am. All welcome.
Please tell anyone else who might be interested!
For more information contact Caren Wilton, email caren.library@swdc.govt.nz
Ngā Kōrero Tuku Iho: Manatū Taonga Oral History Awards – change to retrospective interviews condition for 2020 only ..here..
Due to the uncertainty surrounding COVID, the Auckland History Initiative has opted for an online event this year to support and celebrate research into Auckland’s past. Rest assured we intend to have our annual Symposium and Lecture again in 2021, all things going well.
We warmly invite you to register and attend our Online Webinar ‘The pleasures and problems of writing Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland’s local histories’, to be held on Friday 27 November, 11-1pm.
To register please visit: https://ahi.auckland.ac.nz/events/
Kia ora rawa atu