Oral History for the Future: Preservation and Accessibility

Venue: Royal Historical Society of Victoria, 239 A’Beckett Street, Melbourne, 3000.

How to store and preserve oral history interviews so they’re accessible in 100 years.

3.5hr workshop presented in-person by Nicolette Snowden.

If you want to ensure your oral histories are likely to be accessible in 100 years or more, this is the workshop for you! This workshop is for anyone holding or creating oral history interviews outside of major libraries and archives, including community projects and local history societies. It is arranged in three parts.

First: Documentation of oral history interviews and collections (covering electronic file management; post-interview summaries; transcription (pros, cons and tools); timed summaries; translation; and metadata).

Second: Rights – moral, ethical and legal (covering:  informed consent, and why it’s important; gathering and recording consent; copyright; access and storage: now and into the future; editing interviews; and risk management involving sensitive topics, data security, privacy and legal considerations).

Third: Archive storage and accessibility (covering: places to keep your oral history collection nationally, state-based and locally; collection policies; how to approach a collecting institution; Victorian Collections options; and an archive checklist).

Combining expert advice, useful examples and resources, and group activities, this course was designed for Oral History Victoria by Way Back When Consulting Historians.

OHV gratefully acknowledges the Local History Grants Program and Public Record Office Victoria, supported by the Victorian Government through the Community Support Fund, for the funds to enable the development of the training materials.

Ticketing details to follow

Dr Nicolette Snowden is a historian and social science researcher specialising in oral history and natural disasters. She has undertaken interviews for the National Library of Australia and the State Library of Victoria. Nicolette’s PhD included oral history interviews that uncovered distinctive stories about the lives of women in a rural coal-mining community in Victoria. She has taught within the university sector for two decades in the fields of journalism, media and communications and delivers bespoke training on interviewing. Nicolette’s research work and interests include women’s history and environmental history.