A Catholic College Newspaper as a Research Instrument in an Oral History Project

Abstract

A student produced and edited newspaper is necessarily a grassroots production, with an allvolunteer staff. Student produced newspapers can be a potential source of primary, historical information about student life on a college campus, providing useful insight and data about students’ perspectives and experiences while attending college. However a central problem of the print copies and printed or microfilmed back-files of these types of collections is the limited means for discovering data, and devising the best means in which to describe the contents. Saint Leo University is a Catholic University in the Southern United States, originally founded by Benedictine monks in 1889. It became a two year college in 1965, and the student newspaper printed its first column in 1967. The 1960s and 1970s were a time of social change in America and in the Catholic Church, which did not leave this community of faith unmoved nor unchanged. The role which the newspaper played during this time was unique, providing a voice for the students, faculty, and other community members, which assisted in informing its audience of events and issues while nurturing a faith-based community. The recently digitized collection of this newspaper preserves and makes available an exceptional collection of voices and perspectives from an earlier time in this institution’s history. This paper will discuss the digitized collection, its search features, and as it’s potential as a historical research tool in an institutional oral history project, as well as the intersection of information and religious perspectives made available for examination. Advances in the Study of Information and Religion 180 2 Advances in the Study of Information and Religion, Vol. 2 [2012], Art. 10 http://digitalcommons.kent.edu/asir/vol2/iss1/10 A CATHOLIC COLLEGE NEWSPAPER IN AN ORAL HISTORY PROJECT