Amerykańscy archiwiści o oral history – przegląd tematyki tekstów publikowanych w drugiej połowie XX wieku na łamach „American Archivist”

Abstract

In its first part, the article consists of a detailed discussion on eighteen texts on oral history published in the second half of the 20th century in the leading American archival journal „The American Archivist”. The second part are conclusions concerning the presence of the subject of oral history in archival discourse in the United States in the latter half of the 20th century. In the analyzed texts a lot of space has been given to the character of oral history interviews as historical sources. Especially, the question of reliability of oral history has been raised, as well as ways of guaranteeing it (e.g. through a proper description). Moreover, in many cases these texts attempt to persuade their readers to use oral history in their research. Also, it may be noticed, that at some point the understanding of oral history as historical source changes – an audio or video recording of the interview becomes a source itself, and not notes made while carrying it out or its transcription. Also relations between oral history and traditional (paper) records are an important issue in discussions of the American authors. The analysis of the articles also indicates that the authors were interested more in issues of the historical nature, than of the archival one. Those latter are mostly providing access to oral history materials. But also the question of the role of archives and archivists in recording oral history is touched. Discussion on the issue of storing oral history is not present at all.