National Day of Listening
I was going to post up something about the Black Friday madness (even picked out some music), but I heard something yesterday which I think is much more useful.
Talk of the Nation yesterday had on David Isay, director of the StoryCorps project – a project that seeks to record American oral history on a grand scale. The oral histories they record come from the famous and the not-so-famous – with the goal of letting people ask important questions of history from the people who mean something to them and letting those stories fill in a very large picture of the incredible richness of American life. Some StoryCorps stories are edited and broadcast on NPR (and are mostly riveting), but participants get a CD of the session and the Library of Congress is cataloging these works.
Isay and StoryCorps are working to launch a new day-after-Thanksgiving tradition – the National Day of Listening. They want to encourage us to sit down with someone whose story we think is important to us or to our families and get that story recorded. We are mostly surrounded by family and friends over this holiday and often the high point is when you get to the old stories and tales. Recording them makes sure that you can share them with people who can’t travel to be with you as well as with future generations. And pretty much all of us are surrounded by recording technology, so it isn’t as though this would be a major hurdle.
I like the idea of an alternate tradition to Black Friday, and I very much like the idea of getting the people you love the most to get their stories on record so that you have one more tapestry of family and friends to share.
So what do you think? Who would be the first person in your family whose story you’d want to record? Any burning questions you’d like to ask that person?
Tags: family
I’d interview my grandmothers and ask them about WWII and my family – and how life in Berlin was.
I know I’d never get answers to those questions – you just didn’t ask them – but i still would love to know and I would NOT judge anybody no matter whatthe answers.
My elders have all passed on, but we’ve done a lot of oral history with members of my community.
People lie so much… I’m not sure what the value of this will be.
My brother and I did some oral history of a sort when we were kids and somehow absconded with a tape recorder my mother used for her work. But we used it to pretend we were reporters on 60 Minutes or something crazy and asked questions of whatever adults would sit down and give us the time of day. Oddly, I still have those tapes and we’ve been trying to figure out how to get them digitizes, because there is likely good stuff there.
But people do lie, and sometimes that is on purpose and sometimes because memory does change. Still, though, I’d love to have a chance to speak to my great-grandfather who many people tell me I am very much like.
I was raised by my grandparents, and I’d give anything to have one more hour with them(…lies, and all…).
“Oddly, I still have those tapes and we’ve been trying to figure out how to get them digitizes, because there is likely good stuff there.”
Cassandra,
There are several ways to transfer cassettes to CD. Some are free:
http://www.webtechgeek.com/How-to-Burn-Copy-a-Cassette-or-LP-to-CDR.htm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mq5CSJ7LzrU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nYEhuhx20E&feature=fvw
I guess I put too many links in that last one (I’m in moderation*).
Anyway, Cassandra, just get a free download called Audacity. It can transfer your tapes to CD. All you need is an inexpensive audio cable, which you may already have.
* Or,I’m being censored for my conservative points of view.
HA!
fixed it for you Mis.
Thanks, Mis! I already have Audacity so this may be easier than I thought.
“I already have Audacity”
Indeed, you do.
Thanks, Mis! I already have Audacity so this may be easier than I thought.
In other words, you have the hope of Audacity.