Belfast punk and the Troubles is an oral history of the punk scene in Belfast from the mid-1970s to the mid-80s. The book explores what it was like to be a punk in a city shaped by the violence of the Troubles, and how this differed from being a punk elsewhere. It also asks what it means to have been a punk - how punk unravels as a thread throughout the lives of the people interviewed, and what that unravelling means in the context of post-peace-process Northern Ireland. In doing so, it suggests a critical understanding of sectarianism, subjectivity and memory politics in the North, and argues for the importance of placing punk within the segregated structures of everyday life described by the interviewees. Adopting an innovative oral history approach drawing on the work of Luisa Passerini and Alessandro Portelli, the book analyses a small number of oral history interviews with participants in granular detail. Outlining the historical context and the cultural memory of punk, the central chapters each delve into one or two interviews to draw out the affective, imaginative and political ways in which punks and former punks evoke their memories of taking part in the scene. Through this method, it analyses the punk scene as a structure of feeling shaped through the experience of growing up in wartime Belfast. Belfast punk and the Troubles is an intervention in Northern Irish historiography stressing the importance of history from below, and will be compelling reading for historians of Ireland and of punk, as well as those interested in innovative approaches to oral history. -- .

Practicing Critical Oral History: Connecting School and Community provides ways and words for educators to use critical oral history in their classroom and communities in order to put their students and the voices of people from marginalized communities at the center of their curriculum to enact change. Clearly and concisely written, this book offers a thought-provoking overview of how to use stories from those who have been underrepresented by dominant systems to identify a critical topic, engage with critical processes, and enact critical transformative-justice outcomes. Critical oral history both writes and rights history, so that participants-both interviewers and narrators-in critical oral history projects aim to contextualize stories and make the voices and perspectives of those who have been historically marginalized heard and listened to. Supplemented throughout with sample activities, lesson-plan outlines, tables, and illustrative figures, Practicing Critical Oral History: Connecting School and Community is an essential resource for all those interested in integrating the techniques of critical oral history into an educational setting.

An original and profound portrait of contemporary Britain told through the testimonies of its inhabitants. 'A spectacularly enjoyable and compelling reading experience . . . funny, moving, surprising and thought-provoking. It humanises literature in this toxic moment.' MAX PORTER, author of Lanny 'Seemingly simple yet so deeply profound, The Passengers is an absorbing insight into the lives and minds of so-called ordinary people: their hopes and fears and idiosyncrasies at a specific moment in time.' CLIO BARNARD, director of Ali & Ava and The Essex Serpent 'A nation's psyche comes to the surface. The Passengers is not just an oral history of the contemporary moment but, drenched in mood and texture, renders the country itself as a sonic collage.' SUKHDEV SANDHU, GUARDIAN Between October 2018 and March 2021, Will Ashon collected voices - people talking about their lives, needs, dreams, loves, hopes and fears - all of them with some connection to the British Isles. He used a range of methods including letters sent to random addresses, hitchhiking, referrals from strangers and so on. He conducted the interviews in person, on the phone, over the internet or asked people to record themselves. Interview techniques ranged from asking people to tell him a secret to choosing an arbitrary question from a list. The resulting testimonies tell the collective story of what it feels like to be alive in a particular time and place - here and now. The Passengers is a book about how we give shape to our lives, find meaning in the chaos, acknowledge the fragility of our existence while alleviating this anxiety with moments of beauty, love, humour and solidarity. 'A magical mystery tour of Britain . . . extraordinary.' DAILY TELEGRAPH 'Ashon's gloriously polyphonic book scales the heights. A deeply felt and humane portrait of where we are.' NIVEN GOVINDEN, author of Diary of a Film 'This book couldn't have come into my life at a better time. It's a guiding mate. It enters like a cat through a window, ready to take your attention and show you what it needs to.' TICE CIN, author of Keeping the House

In Bronx Faces and Voices, sixteen men and women tell their personal, uncensored stories of the New York City borough-before, during, and after the troubled years of arson, crime, abandonment, and flight in the 1970s and 1980s. The voices in this volume are as eclectic as the Bronx itself: elected officials, religious leaders, and activists who were determined to preserve the beauty of their parks and stability of their community. They had the courage to stay and fight against drug dealers, absent and indifferent landlords, banks that red-lined entire neighbourhoods, and a voracious media that made of the Bronx an international symbol of urban disaster. Some are no longer alive. But each of the sixteen played a positive role in a pivotal time, and they all deserve to be remembered and to have their voices heard. Portraits in this volume by noted photographers Georgeen Comerford and Walter Rosenblum document the Bronx "faces" in their beauty and diversity: young and old, witnesses to the history they lived and created.

The use of contemporary oral history to improve public policies and programs is a growing, transdisciplinary practice. Indispensable for students and practitioners, Practicing Oral History to Improve Public Policies and Programs is the first book to define the practice, explain how policy-makers use it, show how it relates to other types of oral history, and provide guidance on the ethics and legalities involved. Packed with case studies from disciplines as diverse as medicine, agriculture, and race relations, as well as many examples from the author's own work, this book provides an essential overview of the current state of the field within oral history for public policy and a complete methodology for the process of designing and implementing an oral history project. The comprehensive How To section demonstrates how to use the practice to advance the reader's career, their chosen discipline and the public interest, whether their field is in oral history or in public policy. This book is an important resource for oral historians, fledgling or experienced, who are keen to find new applications and funding for their work, as well as for professionals in the public and not-for-profit sectors who want to learn to use oral history to improve their own policies and programs.

Mireille Gansel grew up in the traumatic aftermath of her family losing everything-including their native languages-to Nazi Germany. In the 1960s and 70s, she translated poets from East Berlin and Vietnam to help broadcast their defiance to the rest of the world. In this half memoire, half philosophical treatise Gansel's debut illustrates the estrangement every translator experiences for the privilege of moving between tongues, and muses on how translation becomes an exercise of empathy between those in exile.

Churchill's War in Words transports the reader back to the storm-struck days of the Second World War. Focussing only on words used at the time, it reveals the way that Winston Churchill talked about the conflict in public and in private - and the way that he himself was viewed at the time by family, friends, politicians, military leaders, staff , voters, allies and enemies.Presented in chronological order and accompanied by short year-by-year introductions, the quotations convey afresh the full force of Churchill's oratory, the wit he displayed in the face of often appalling odds, and the hopes and fears that he inspired in those around him. Together they reveal to the modern reader what it was truly like to be locked in a struggle in which victory - or total defeat - was yet to be decided. Together they tell the extraordinary story of Churchill's War in Words.

This book is a unique collection: ordinary Londoners, in their own voices, tell about ordinary London lives. Interviews with over a hundred people in eight localities, from inner-city Battersea, to suburban Heston, to Greenhithe on the London fringe, have been edited with a linking commentary by Professor Sir Peter Hall. The first half, "London Voices", introduces the characters - their hopes and aspirations, their frustrations and struggles, their determination and optimism. The second, "London Lives", introduces the themes that dominate their everyday lives: the struggle to keep their heads above water, the search for a place to live, the hassle of the journey to work, their friends and neighbours, their concerns about crime, and the quality of their everyday lives. This is not only an extraordinary social record but also a compelling read for anyone and everyone interested in today's London, or in any other great global city. It will provide a mine of information for future historians on one of the world's greatest cities and will be of special academic or professional interest to sociologists, anthropologists, geographers, planners and social policymakers.

In addition to the problem of language, conducting oral histories with immigrant narrators often requires special considerations: past violence, cultural sensitivity, and lack of trust. Yet, these narrators are often witnesses to, or participants in, important historical events, or can describe otherwise-undocumented social phenomena. The first book to focus specifically on oral history practices with immigrant narrators, it -gives both the novice and experienced oral historian insights into their narrators' needs;-provides the tools to effectively plan and execute an oral history project in an immigrant community;-includes case studies, additional resources, and templates of important oral history processes.

***** 'There have been many books written about the events of Bloody Sunday, however, none has wrenched the reader as violently back to those CS gas-choked streets, dumping them right in the heart of the screaming, running, shooting and crying, as Julieann Campbell's On Bloody Sunday. A powerful chronicle of one of the darkest episodes of modern times.' - Sunday Times 'Powerful and moving ... The strength of this important new book lies in the artistry the author brings to the tasks of portraying both the community upon which the massacre was perpetrated, and the individuals within it.' - Irish Times 'Meticulous.... On Bloody Sunday possesses a veracity and cumulative power that sets it apart from previous accounts' - Observer 'A momentous chronicle, timely and vital, which highlights that the burden of change rests, as always, upon the shoulders of those who suffered and yet, have nurtured the desire that lessons be learned.' - Michael Mansfield QC, who represented a number of families during the Bloody Sunday Inquiry. 'It is a vital record of the time, the city, and its people, and more impressive still it does so almost entirely in their own words, their heartbreak, their anger, their resilience, their humour. Julieann Campbell has given their voices, so long silenced, the dignity they deserve. It is a staggering achievement.' - Seamas O'Reilly 'It's a wonderful book. The technique used - multiple voices speaking directly to us - is very simple but it has a profound effect. It puts us into the middle of the chaos of Bloody Sunday and keeps us there throughout the grief and anger that follow. A wonderful, wonderful book.' - Jimmy McGovern, BAFTA winning screenwriter, creator of 'Sunday' (2002) In January 1972, a peaceful civil rights march in Northern Ireland ended in bloodshed. Troops from Britain's 1st Battalion Parachute Regiment opened fire on marchers, leaving 13 dead and 15 wounded. Seven of those killed were teenage boys. The day became known as 'Bloody Sunday'. The events occurred in broad daylight and in the full glare of the press. Within hours, the British military informed the world that they had won an 'IRA gun battle'. This became the official narrative for decades until a family-led campaign instigated one of the most complex inquiries in history. In 2010, the victims of Bloody Sunday were fully exonerated when Lord Saville found that the majority of the victims were either shot in the back as they ran away or were helping someone in need. The report made headlines all over the world. While many buried the trauma of that day, historian and campaigner Juliann Campbell - whose teenage uncle was the first to be killed that day - felt the need to keep recording these interviews, and collecting rare and unpublished accounts, aware of just how precious they were. Fifty years on, in this book, survivors, relatives, eyewitnesses and politicians, shine a light on the events of Bloody Sunday, together, for the first time. As they tell their stories, the tension, confusion and anger build with an awful power. ON BLOODY SUNDAY unfolds before us an extraordinary human drama, as we experience one of the darkest moments in modern history - and witness the true human cost of conflict.

The Japanese invasion of Shanghai in 1937 led some thirty million Chinese to flee their homes in terror, and live in the words of artist and writer Feng Zikai in a sea of bitterness as refugees. Keith Schoppa paints a comprehensive picture of the refugee experience in one province Zhejiang, on the central Chinese coast where the Japanese launched major early offensives as well as notorious later campaigns. He recounts stories of both heroes and villains, of choices poorly made amid war s bewildering violence, of risks bravely taken despite an almost palpable quaking fear.

As they traveled south into China s interior, refugees stepped backward in time, sometimes as far as the nineteenth century, their journeys revealing the superficiality of China s modernization. Memoirs and oral histories allow Schoppa to follow the footsteps of the young and old, elite and non-elite, as they fled through unfamiliar terrain and coped with unimaginable physical and psychological difficulties. Within the context of Chinese culture, being forced to leave home was profoundly threatening to one s sense of identity. Not just people but whole institutions also fled from Japanese occupation, and Schoppa considers schools, governments, and businesses as refugees with narratives of their own.

Local governments responded variously to Japanese attacks, from enacting scorched-earth policies to offering rewards for the capture of plague-infected rats in the aftermath of germ warfare. While at times these official procedures improved the situation for refugees, more often as Schoppa describes in moving detail they only deepened the tragedy.

The third book in the five-volume Community Oral History Toolkit takes the planning steps outlined in Volume 2 and puts them into action. It provides the practical details for turning your plans into reality and establishes the basis for guiding your project through the interviews to a successful conclusion. Project directors are given concrete, useful advice on how to manage people, money, technology, publicity, and administrative tasks from the beginning to the end of the project. Volume 3 outlines details for developing the necessary forms to properly administer a community oral history project (sample forms provided). The authors advise how to recruit volunteers and interviewees and provide helpful tips for conducting thorough interview and transcription training sessions and how to make arrangements for the life and safety of the project once the interviews are complete.

Community projects often falter after the interviews are completed. This final book of the five-volume Community Oral History Toolkit explains the importance of processing and archiving oral histories and takes the reader through all the steps required for good archiving and for concluding the oral history project so that it is preserved and accessible for future generations. The authors give special attention to record-keeping systems and repositories, and provide several examples from actual projects to ground the information in practical terms. Charts, checklists, and sample forms also help the reader apply concepts to practice. Volume 5 finishes with examples of creative ways community projects have used oral histories, such as performances, exhibitions, celebrations, websites, and more, in order to promote history and engage the community.

The second book in the five-volume Community Oral History Toolkit walks you through all the planning steps to travel from an idea to a completed collection of oral history interviews. Informed by an extensive survey of oral historians from across the country, this guide will get you started on firm ground so you don't get mired in unforeseen problems in the middle of your project. Designed especially for project administrators, it identifies participants and responsibilities that need to be covered, and details planning needs for everything from budgeting to technology, and from legal issues to ethics. Planning a Community Oral History Project sets the stage for the implementation steps outlined in Volume 3, Managing a Community Oral History Project.

The Second World War is famed for being the conflict that changed the face of warfare, and it is the last that changed the face of the world. In addition to remembering those who passed away in those dark days of war, a sincere debt of gratitude is owed to all those now in their twilight years who gave all that they had for King and Country. In this new and revised second edition, Gary Bridson-Daley presents forty-three of over a hundred interviews he conducted with veterans over recent years, adding to the history books the words and the original poetry of those who fought and supported the war effort to ensure freedom, peace and prosperity for generations to come. From each corner of the British Isles and every armed service, from Dam Buster George 'Johnny' Johnson through to riveter Susan Jones: heroes, all.

The mass protests that shook France in May 1968 were exciting, dangerous, creative and influential, changing European politics to this day. Students demonstrated, workers went on general strike, factories and universities were occupied. At the height of its fervour, it brought the entire national economy to a halt. The protests reached such a point that political leaders feared civil war or revolution. Fifty years later, here are the eye-opening oral testimonies of those young rebels. By listening to the voices of students and workers, as opposed to those of their leaders, May '68 appears not just as a mass event, but rather as an event driven by millions of individuals, achieving a mosaic human portrait of France at the time. This book reveals the legacy of the uprising: how those explosive experiences changed both those who took part, and the course of history. May Made Me will record these moments before history moves on yet again.

This account of English working-class communities in England from 1940 to 1970 is told through the words and memories of those who lived then. The book is at once vivid, moving and eye-opening.

This was a period of change, usually seen as progress. People everywhere became better off. Healthcare was provided free and the education of children was universal. This was the first age of the domestic machine, releasing women for employment in paid work. The church, the police, teachers and the state became less sources of authority than of care. Television provided entertainment in the home. Improved methods of contraception emancipated sexuality. But, as Elizabeth Roberts shows, the caring state and the privatized family were also accompanied by a diminished sense of community an neighborliness, and by a loss of confidence in previously accepted standards and values in family relationships and the rearing of children.

"Women and Families" provides an always fascinating insight into the realities of social change during three crucial decades of English history. Few of the accepted generalizations - concerning the changing roles of men and women, the loss of working-class solidarity, the decline of family and communal life, the effects of high-rise living, and the benefits of healthcare and social welfare - survive the evidence so ably assembled here. This is an important and exciting book: it will be widely read.

In this people's history of Ireland, John Creedon introduces a fascinating collection of stories from the Schools' Collection. This treasure trove of old stories, ways and wisdom, which could have been lost for ever, was collected by schoolchildren as part of a nationwide project set up in the 1930s to preserve Irish folklore. Published here for the first time, this 'best of' selection includes chapters on ghost stories, agriculture, forgotten trades, schooling and pastimes. The result is an incredible arc of folk history that tells us about ourselves and how we lived long ago.

It has been half a century since the last book that addressed how historical societies can utilize oral history. In this brief, practical guide, internationally known oral historian Barbara W. Sommer applies the best practices of contemporary oral historians to the projects that historical organizations of all sizes and sorts might develop. The book -covers project personnel options, funding options, legal and ethical issues, interviewing techniques, and cataloging guidelines;-identifies helpful steps for historical societies when developing and doing oral history projects;-includes a dozen model case studies;-provides additional resources, templates, forms, and bibliography for the reader.

Hollywood: The Oral History covers the history of Hollywood from the Silent era up to the 21st century. What makes this book unique from any other survey of Hollywood's history is that it is the history of an art form through the words of those people who created it - from Harold Lloyd to Katharine Hepburn to Warren Beatty to Jane Fonda and beyond, including directors, writers, producers, editors, designers of sets and costumes. As such, the authenticity of the text is irrefutable. The material in the book - gathered over the decades by the American Film Institute - has never been published before, has never been heard before. It is comprehensive - a monument that will never age nor be surpassed.

How could Nazi killers shoot Jewish women and children at close range? Why did Japanese soldiers rape and murder on such a horrendous scale? How was it possible to endure the torment of a Nazi death camp? Award-winning documentary maker and historian Laurence Rees has spent decades wrestling with such questions in the course of filming hundreds of interviews with people tested to the extreme during World War II. He has come face-to-face with rapists, mass murderers, even cannibals, but he has also met courageous individuals who are an inspiration to us all. In Their Darkest Hour he presents 35 of his most electrifying encounters. 'A remarkably powerful collection' Antony Beevor, Daily Telegraph 'An incredible, well-written, must-read book' Glasgow Evening Times 'A lasting contribution to our understanding of the Second World War and a powerful insight into the behaviour of human beings in crisis' Independent

The interview is the anchor of an oral history project. The fourth book in the five-volume Community Oral History Toolkit guides the interviewer through all the steps from interview preparation through follow-up. It includes guidance on selecting interviewees, training interviewers, using recording equipment, and ethical issues concerning the interviewer-interviewee relationship. Packed with instructive case studies, Volume 4 offers concrete practical examples and advice for issues such as pre-interview research, developing interview questions and points for guiding discussion, ideal interview settings and conditions, strategies for stimulating interviewees' memories, acceptable communication techniques and behavior throughout the interview process, and rounding out interview documentation with supplementary materials and contextual information.

The first book of the five-volume Community Oral History Toolkit sets the stage for an oral history project by placing community projects into a larger context of related fields and laying a sound theoretical foundation. It introduces the field of oral history to newcomers, with discussions of the historical process, the evolution of oral history as a research methodology, the nature of community, and the nature of memory. It also elaborates on best practices for community history projects and presents a detailed overview of the remaining volumes of the Toolkit, which cover Planning, Management, Interviewing, and After-the-Interview processing and curation. Introduction to Community Oral History features a comprehensive glossary, index, bibliography, and references, as well as numerous sample forms that are needed throughout the process of conducting community oral history projects.