Each summer in New York City, CCOH sponsors an annual Summer Institute, which brings together oral historians, scholars, activists, and others for two weeks of advanced training in the theory and practice of oral history. Participants work with world-class instructors, network with oral historians from around the world and go to exhibits in New York City. Each year we focus on a different theme.
The Columbia Center for Oral History is proud to announce its 2012 Summer Institute, “What is Remembered: Life Story Approaches in Human Rights Contexts,” to be held June 4-15, 2012 at Columbia University in New York City. Sessions will explore the methodological and theoretical implications of doing life story research with individuals who have suffered human rights abuses and other forms of discrimination. The institute will focus on the role of oral history in documenting such histories, but also in interpreting the strategies of resistance and survival of creative individuals and communities that have lived through difficult times.General themes of the institute will include: the challenges of doing fieldwork in post-conflict societies, including remembrance of personal violence; the uses of oral sources in expressing emotion and facilitating constructive actions; and the uses of informal and official forms of life histories in addressing the tensions between individual and collective remembering. The Institute will also include practical workshops in digital storytelling, interviewing and editing.The deadline to apply for CCOH’s summer institute is March 15, 2012. Full details on the institute, and application process is available here.