Saving Our Stories with Dale Jarvis

This past Friday both the museum and I were so fortunate to participate in an oral history workshop led by Dale Jarvis called Saving Our Stories. The workshop was designed to seek out and educate people in the proper methods of oral history, as well as to give people the knowledge and the tools to conduct oral history interviews themselves. The room was packed, each person with a different motive for attending, all with the common goal of learning some tips and tricks from someone who's done an oral history project or two. After everyone introduced themselves, Dale wasted no time getting down to business.

If I learned anything in this workshop, it was that an oral history project is basically doomed from the start without a good, solid plan. And not just a basic idea of who to interview or what to ask, but a detailed, goal-oriented, focused plan. Dale outlined the importance of preliminary research, knowing the responsibilities of each member of a team (or knowing your own responsibilities if you're doing a solo project), how to preserve and edit interviews once they've been recorded, and how to actually record them and what equipment to use. In my mind now, these are all important facets of the overall plan that needs to be in place before you even start interviewing, so it was helpful to see Dale outline them in a way that truly showed how one can depend on the other.

He also talked about how important it is to have a flexible timetable, a budget and, when possible, to avail of funding opportunities. When Dale spoke of these things and of how important it is to expect the unexpected, it was obvious that he had done this countless times and that we had no reason not to believe everything he was saying. He didn't put together this workshop on what he thought it was like to do oral histories- he put together this workshop by using the knowledge and experience he's gained by doing this so many times.

The highlight of the workshop for me was when we got to see an oral history interview in action. Dave Lythgoe, who is a member of the board here at Admiralty House, graciously volunteered to be interviewed by Dale so that all of us in the workshop could see how he operates. He asked Dave about the history of Admiralty House and how he had been involved and once they got going, it was truly a joy to watch. It was so natural, Dale didn't speak over Dave, and he asked questions in the perfect way, to get a story and not just an answer, which is very important for an oral history interview. For example, if you wanted to know about raffles that used to happen in the basement of a church in a rural Newfoundland community in the 1980s, there's a good chance that if you ask "What can you tell me about the church raffles from the 80s?" instead of "Did you attend the church raffles in the 80s?" that you'll wind up with at least a short story, as opposed to the simple "yes" or "no" that you would get by asking the latter. The workshop really made me think about how important it is to do your research beforehand, and to formulate questions in the most open ended way possible because sometimes you've got to haul it out of someone. That sounds strenuous, but it's just that sometimes people don't know they have a story to tell until you ask them the right question.

Here's a picture of Dale interviewing Dave in the workshop.

It truly was lots of fun and I can't wait to put what I've learned to use!

Until next time,

Lauren