Comma 2002.1-2: Dora Schwarzstein, Oral History Around the World: Present and Future Perspectives
Oral history is accepted as a valued historical source. In the academic context the original objective of oral history, to collect testimonies from important individuals in society, remains, but it has been extended to include the documenting sectors of society previously not heard or recorded. Oral history is also used by communities and institutions that want to preserve their identities, and it is central in new concepts for presenting history to general, non-academic audiences. Oral history is expanding throughout the world and is used for a variety of purposes: as a tool for subjugated minorities to reclaim their history and for the preservation of a record of traumatic experiences and testimonies of victims and perpetrators of human rights violations, for political denunciation, and as a road to democratization and freedom. There are issues under debate respecting the role of the interviewer in the production of oral history and subjectivism in the accounts of subjects of interviews, and issues related to memory and the relationship between history and memory. There are theoretical and methodological and technical problems facing archivists in respect to oral history; they should determine what should be created, what should be selected and establish standards and criteria. Oral history will be of primary important in the democratization and popularization of archives in the future.