Workshops

The SOHP offers workshops on oral history practice and research and public storytelling. If you are based in the region (the North Carolina Triangle or within a few hours drive) and would like to host one or more of our SOHP field scholars in your classroom, library, community center, or event space, please reach out to our team at sohp@unc.edu. Zoom workshop sessions are also available for groups based outside of North Carolina. Workshops typically last between 1-2 hours.

Recent workshop hosts include:

  • Wayne County Public Libraries workshop series across branches (October 2023)
  • Green Hope High School (October 2023)
  • Carolina Public Humanities Zietlow Civic Engagement Fellows (October 2023)
  • NCCU “Purpose, Persistence, and Power: Pioneering African American Women and their Fight for Racial Justice in North Carolina and Beyond” oral history project (September 2023)
  • Durham Public Library, LibraryFest Community Oral Histories (April 2023)
  • UNC-CH Health and Humanities Lab, “Forever Chemicals in North Carolina: A Story Archive” oral history project (April 2023)
  • Duke University Bass Connections Program, “Collecting Oral Histories of Environmental Racism and Injustice” (November 2023)
  • Warren County Community Center, Community Oral Histories (April 2022)
  • UNC School of Medicine, “Oral History as Research” (October 2021)
  • Triangle Nonprofit and Volunteer Leadership Center, “Oral History Week” (August 2021)

Workshops

Oral History: A Practice and a Source

This workshop introduces participants to the basics of oral history, from planning an oral history project to writing questions to conducting an interview. It clarifies the differences between oral history and other forms of interviewing, and provides an introduction to the SOHP interview collection, along with some tips on how to navigate it for research, storytelling projects, and listening events.

Public Storytelling & Oral History

This workshop offers participants a chance to explore the ways that oral history can be used to support public storytelling projects—from exhibitions, to podcasts, to walking tours. SOHP facilitators introduce participants to the basics of public storytelling, including identifying an audience, choosing a storytelling format, and setting goals based on project strengths. It then provides an introduction to oral history and provides tools for assessing whether and how oral history can best support a storytelling project. Our ability to offer this workshop is based on the availability of our field scholars.

For more information, please contact us at sohp@unc.edu.