OHA Biennial Conference 2022

Oral History in Troubling Times: Opportunities & Challenges

Presenters

Our conference features a broad range of presenters from throughout Australia and overseas. Profiles of some of our most prominent presenters are featured here. We will also be posting conference abstracts to this page when available.



Quick links - Conference 2022

View or download the conference program 2022 (PDF)

Mark Cave

Keynote speaker

Mark Cave is the Past President of the International Oral History Association, Senior Curator at The Historic New Orleans Collection, and co-editor of Listening on the Edge: Oral History in the Aftermath of Crisis (2014). His keynote is titled ‘Why Did This Happen? Making Meaningful Answers in the Aftermath of Crisis’. He will explore the limitations of the media in the aftermath of crisis and argue that oral history has an important role to play alongside journalism in creating explanations that not only help communities move beyond crisis but help them move beyond crisis in ways that make them stronger.

Kim Mahood

Plenary presenter

Kim Mahood is a writer, visual artist and consultant. She is the author of Craft for a Dry Lake (Random House 2000), and Position Doubtful – Mapping Landscape and Memory (Scribe 2016). Her essays have been published in art, literary and public affairs journals, and her artwork is held in state, territory and regional collections.

She has developed cross-cultural mapping projects with Aboriginal groups in Perth, the Kimberley, Central Australia, remote South Australia and western NSW. Her mapping work is designed to foster communication and understanding between traditional custodians of country and the non-Indigenous stakeholders with an interest in the same country.

Pre-conference workshops

Introducing oral history

Jill Cassidy is an Honorary Research Associate with the Queen Victoria Museum & Art Gallery. She is President of Oral History Tasmania and Vice President of Oral History Australia.

Interpreting memories

Alistair Thomson is Professor of History at Monash University and President of Oral History Australia.

Producing mobile–based audio walks from oral histories

Hamish Sewell is a former RN producer and the founder of the Soundtrails application.

Interviewing and the art of asking questions

Linda Hunt is a lecturer in media and communication at the University of Tasmania. Before joining UTAS, Linda was a broadcast journalist for ABC News and has reported, produced and presented news on radio and television.

Podcasting oral history

Greg Appel is a producer and director of social history documentaries for TV, radio and online. His diverse documentary work includes the ground-breaking series Long Way to the Top (ABC TV 2001) about Australian rock music and the popular radio series Greetings from…the Streets of Australia for ABC Radio National. He has won awards in Australia and South Africa. Participants will require a laptop or tablet, plus a mobile device or external microphone for recording.

Palawa and Pakana presenters, final plenary

Julie Gough

Dr Julie Gough is an artist and writer, and a curator at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery. Her Briggs-Johnson family have lived in the Latrobe region of North-West Tasmania since the 1840s, with Tebrikunna their Traditional Country in far north-eastern Tasmania. Gough’s research and art process involves uncovering and re-presenting often conflicting and subsumed histories, many referring to her family’s experiences as Tasmanian Aboriginal people. Gough completed a PhD, University of Tasmania (2001) and MA, Goldsmiths College, University of London (1998). Since 1994 Julie has exhibited in more than 130 exhibitions and her art is held in most state and national collections.

Theresa Sainty

Theresa Sainty is a Pakana woman from the north-east of Tasmania. She has worked extensively with the Tasmanian Department of Aboriginal Education Services where she co-developed and provided Aboriginal Cultural Awareness training and produced a number of curricula. She is also an Aboriginal Linguistic Consultant with the palawa kani Language Program, and is a Senior Indigenous Scholar at the University of Tasmania.

Zoe Rimmer

Zoe Rimmer is a Pakana (Tasmanian Aboriginal) curator, researcher and writer. Her PhD candidature at the University of Tasmania follows on from her work in the museum sector associated with repatriation, cultural revival and developing First Peoples museology. Zoe has recently started in the position of Indigenous Fellow, Academic Development, History and Heritage at UTAS.