A Tale Worth Telling
How to create an oral, written or video life history
Today, more and more of us are interested in memorializing the life histories of family members, our own life stories and those of our friends. Why - Perhaps it is the availability of leisure time that prior generations lacked or maybe it is the amazing rapidity of change that leaves us to wonder what the realities of previous generations were really like. But whatever the reasons, it is undeniable that setting down our stories or those of our parents, grandparents or others in written, audio and film formats has become an endeavor of widespread interest.
This article will describe how to organize a life history, how to develop your own story and how to interview or assist a family member or friend in telling theirs. A list of available resources is provided in the appendix.
What medium do you want to work in
Your first step is to choose what medium you want to work in. In general, there are four options.
1.The traditional means, which is to compile photos into an album. As an alternative, photos can be made into a DVD movie using inexpensive software programs such as Imovie for a Mac (Apple).
2.Providing a written autobiographical account of your life or of those events or time periods that you want to focus on.
3.Dictating into a recording device and leaving an oral account; and, lastly,
4.Having your story videotaped and transcribed onto a DVD (Photos and other video can be included as part of the DVD movie).
Organizing your story
Your second step is often the hardest. Figuring out how to narrow the scope of the story so it doesn’t become an overwhelming chore. One way to get going is to break the story down into chapters. For example, one chapter might focus on family life - raising kids and the story of how you met your spouse. Other chapters could deal with work, hobbies and interests such as sports and travel, the military, volunteer activities, adventures and/or unique experiences.
Once the broad themes are identified, then for each chapter, making an outline or list of the events or recollections that you want to cover will often make it easier to get started. And, since in many instances, these stories are undertaken for the benefit of others such as children and grandchildren, relatives and organizations, finding out what they want to hear about will help to provide a focus.
Interviewing
An interviewer must provide the focus for the person being interviewed. If you know the person well, then getting to the meat of things will often be fairly easy. And, getting the story by way of an interview will often help to enhance it, since many individuals who tell their own stories unassisted can be quite modest about their own achievements or backgrounds and thus reluctant to go into the depth and detail about incidents and accomplishments that the future audience would want to know about.
If an interviewer doesn’t know the interviewee or who doesn’t know the person well, then several preliminary conversations are advisable since getting to know the person enables you to frame questions so that an interesting story can be revealed.
Ideally, questions should be open ended – For example, What was behind your decision to come west, rather when did you first get to California.
Resources
1.Many universities conduct oral history projects – Check with nearby colleges and universities. For example, UCLA provides a two session oral history training course. Contact them at: oral-history@library.ucla.edu. 310-206-2454 and 310-825-4932.
2.Organizations that can help you get started:
a.Association of Personal Historians – Personalhistorians.org
-
b. Family Oral History using digital tools – Familyoralhistory.us
-
c. Genealogy studies - Ancestry.com
3.Computers with built in cameras – I Movie on a Mac, for example, enable self-videotaping.
-
4.Professional videographers, photographers and biographers – Check the local yellow pages and internet for local professionals.
Contact as at:
.