Research Projects

Featured Project

Back Ways

Back Ways is a project of the Southern Oral History Program that works to understand the social experience of racial segregation in the rural South through oral history and archival research. Learn More

Recent Projects

Intergenerational, mixed gender group of African Americans and two white feminine-presenting people posing together in the woods for a group photo

Back Ways

Back Ways explored the rural South by following the paths southerners created to visit one another, to shop and trade, to reach homes and churches, and to avoid one another. ...
Two young Asian American girls are seated on the ground wearing elegant fuchsia shirts and bottoms that have a satin sheen. Each girl's hair is in a bun on top of their head, surrounded by a metallic band.

Southern Mix

In 2017, seeking to see more Asian and Asian American stories in Carolina’s oral history archives, UNC alumna Anna-Rhesa Versola founded Southern Mix, a project dedicated to collecting and preserving ...
A black and white photograph of a group of young people presenting as majority white and mixed gender, though majority masculine-or man-presenting, posing together outdoors behind a large white banner with dark lettering, reading: "The Southeastern Gay Conference"

The Story of Us

The Story of Us: Documenting and Preserving LGBTQIA Carolina History shares stories of LGBTQIA life at UNC-Chapel Hill. Envisioned and funded by our partners at the Carolina Pride Alum Network ...

Polio

The SOHP's Polio project seeks to understand, preserve, and amplify the experiences of people who were directly affected by the 20th century polio epidemic in the United States. The Covid-19 ...

The Civil Rights History Project

The Civil Rights History Project, mandated by an Act of Congress in 2009, is a joint undertaking of the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture and the ...

The Long Women’s Movement in the American South

"The Long Women's Movement in the American South" gathers interviews with women who found courageous and creative ways to fight for gender equality and against sexual discrimination in the South, ...

Stories to Save Lives

Stories to Save Lives: Health, Illness, and Medical Care in the South seeks to bring the powerful research methodology of oral history to bear on one of the critical issues ...

New Roots/Nuevas Raíces

The New Roots/Nuevas Raíces Initiative was developed with the Latino Migration Project in 2007. This growing collection of oral histories focuses on issues related to Latinx migration to North Carolina. Interviews are conducted ...

Media and the Movement

This project, funded by a $130,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, explored the media environment in North Carolina as shaped by local voices. We interviewed print journalists, ...

The Long Civil Rights Movement

The Long Civil Rights Movement initiative is a project intended to better understand how the South has been shaped by the Black and women's liberation movements, the Vietnam War, natural ...