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Exploring Oral History: Discussions of Race, Gender, Procedures, and Ethics

 

The Oral History Manual by Barbara w. Sommer and Mary Kay Quinlan explores in a very descriptive light what oral history is, the ways that oral history contribute to academic and non-academic realms, and what the practice of oral history entails. Sommer and Quinlan also write of the differences between oral history and other historical practices and the proper procedures to both prepare for and conduct an oral history project. Some of the procedures written in the manual include how to secure adequate funding to pursue and complete an oral history project, the technology needed during the project’s interview process, the legality and laws present between the narrator(s) and interviewer(s), and other important information about oral history practices. What resonated with me throughout Sommer and Quinlan’s manual was the description of ethics in which historians and laypeople taking on oral history must follow, such as ensuring that no “defamatory” remarks are made about the narrators of an oral history interview[1]. I believe this statement both mitigates possible lawsuits against historians and promotes the open-mindedness that public historians should practice globally. Similarly, Sommer and Quinlan mention that oral history is often uncomfortable, especially when it involves the topic of race, gender, or social class. This discomfort is seen in one of the manual’s documented oral histories in which a Black woman was reluctant to speak to a White person about her formally enslaved family member and racial tension in the Midwest; her hesitancy changed when her White friend and interviewer acknowledged the discomfort she as a White person felt while conversing about racial history and her willingness to take in her friend’s history no matter how uncomfortable[2]. The oral history which ensued between these two women may have been difficult, but present historians can learn from this moment as we continue to break down our own social walls and learn to converse about racism: a deeply entrenched facet of contemporary American society.

In Sherri Tucker’s Queer Episodes in Music and Modern Identity, Tucker features the histories of female American musicians of the early 20th century who chose to disclose and/or keep secret certain realities of their sexuality. Tucker’s oral histories with the female musicians reveal that during the peak of their careers, 20th century female band members often kept their sexuality a secret due to the highly constrictive atmosphere of American society. Tucker also learns along her oral history journey that though many female band members did not disclose their sexuality, this strategy of silence was in the case of lesbian band members an effective and powerful one[3]. Tucker’s encounters with female musicians who refused to overtly disclose their sexuality was both a valuable lesson to her of the touchiness of certain topics while conducting oral history projects and a very enlightening history for me as a woman today. Living in the 21st century, though I may encounter resistance and disapproval for my sexual preferences, it would not marginalize me to the same extent that it would the women Tucker interviewed. The ability that I have to disclose my sexuality today and not have to worry about discrimination in the workforce and other aspects of my life is a contrast to the women in Tucker’s oral history project, and that fact is one that historians can take into account to calibrate historical change in America’s current environment.

[4]

Leon Fink also examines the topic of race in his text When Community Comes Homes to Roost: The Southern Milltown as Lost Cause while he denotes the tendencies of Cooleemee, North Carolina to mask historical inequalities and hardships with heritage and the town’s endeavor to undermine the existence of minorities in Cooleemee history. In this text, Fink writes of Lynn Wells Rumley and Jim Rumley, the founders of the Cooleemee Historical Association (CHA) who though claiming to uphold anti-racist ideology were known by both Black and White Cooleemee citizens to be racist. Denoting the Rumley’s racism, a Black Cooleemee resident named Bessie Wilson stated that she believed that Lynn Wells Rumley was not interested in incorporating any Blacks into CHA leadership positions, and that with Rumley’s blatant display of the Confederate flag at her historic site, she was surely a racist[5]. Bessie’s unrest of a White historian who is unwilling to collaborate with Black historians and her disgust at the display of the Confederate flag is a mindset which is prominent in many people today. I and other historians should consider that despite the change of century, people still want to rid American society of the Confederate flag and to have racial inclusiveness within historical sites. America still has a long journey until racial inclusiveness is accomplished, but with readings like Fink’s, we can try to understand why the historical connotations of emblems such as the Confederate flag create social unrest.

 

 


[1]Sommer, Barbara W., and Mary Kay Quinlan. The Oral History Manual. (Lanham, MD: Rowman et Littlefield), 2009, 26.

[2] Ibid., 65.

[3] Tucker, Sherrie. Queer Episodes in Music and Modern Identity, ed. Fuller, Sophie and Lloyd Whitesell.  (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press) 2002, 302.

[5] Fink, Leon. "When Community Comes Homes to Roost: The Southern Milltown as Lost Cause." Journal of Social History 40, no. 1 (2006): 119-45. Accessed September 15, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4491858.

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