Oral History Resources

The websites and other materials below offer access to a rich collection of resources and models for creating and learning from oral histories. In addition to providing a wide range of sample oral histories, these sites include guidelines for doing oral history interviews, sample permissions forms, journals, articles on new projects, and trends in oral history.

These e-books are products of the University of Kansas Hall Center for the Humanities "The Shifting Borders of Race and Identity: A Research and Teaching Project on the Native American and African American Experience." Their publication is supported by a grant from the Ford Foundation. Of Two Spirits: American Indian and African American Oral Histories, edited by Mike Tosee and Carmaletta M. Williams, features forty newly recorded oral Histories. For essays on various aspects of Afro-Native history, culture and society, see The First and the Forced: Essays on the Native American and African American Experience, edited by James N. Leiker, Kim Warren, and Barbara Watkins.

African Americans in the 1865 Kansas State Census (Douglas County)

Baylor University Institute for Oral History

Brown v. Topeka Board of Education Oral History Collection: Finding Aid
Here's the information that will give you access to the African American newspapers on Newbank for Black History Month:

The Historical Society has partnered with Newsbank, Inc. to digitize the content of 68 titles of African American newspapers published in Kansas. These titles will be available *for free* during the month of February—Black History Month. These newspapers can be accessed at http://infoweb.newsbank.com <http://infoweb.newsbank.com/>. The user nam is kansashistorical and the password is blacknewspapers_feb2013.

When you first get to the Newsbank web site, click on America's Historical Newspapers under Archive of Americana. When you get to the search page, type "African American" in the search box. When the results page appears, click on the "Newspaper titles" tab and scroll down to the Kansas section.

We hope you enjoy access to these important historical resources.
State Archives Division
Kansas Historical Society

Columbia University Oral History Research Office

Ideas for Organizing an Oral History Project "'Tell Me Your Life Story and Sign This Form': Methods and Ethics of Oral History Collection" - Ailecia Ruscin and Sherrie Tucker

Indiana University Center for the Study of History and Memory

Keep the Heritage Alive!, McLean County, Illinois, Black History Project. This ambitious project includes transcripts of eighty interviews conducted over thirty years.

Library of Congress American Memory StoryCorps Project

Library of Congress American Memory Project— "Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project 1936-1938

National Museum of African American History and Culture
The "memories" on this new website offer a rich collection of resources. Several of these "memories" are from the Lawrence/Douglas County African American Oral History Project.

Oral History Online provides in-depth indexing to more than 2,700 collections of Oral History in English from around the world. (Available to University of Kansas students and staff.)

Oral history society

Selected Holdings in Oral History, Kenneth Spencer Research Library

Voices of Civil Rights

"Marla Jackson, Quilter" View Greg Hurd's interview with Marla Jackson on River City Weekly.
Well-known Lawrence quilter Marla Jackson creates story quilts that complement the rich oral histories of African Americans.

A Century in Quilts: Telling Stories
The finest American quilts of the 20th century are works of great beauty; striking design, extraordinary handwork, spectacular piecing. But beyond their appearance, these quilts tell our stories and at the same time, preserve these histories for future generations. Quiltmakers have always used this medium as a means to serve intense artistic or personal expressions. Quilts hold memories, moments, and lives.

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