In the introduction to the Summers and Saugatuck-Douglas collection in the GVSU Special Collections and Archives video, we discussed how to locate oral histories within the special collection. In this video, we will discuss how to use oral histories to meet your research goals. To do this, we must first briefly cover what an oral history is and why it is important. An oral history is an oral retelling of events by someone who directly experienced them.
This allows individuals to tell their own stories in their own words. Many, but not all, oral histories are recorded via the interview process, where participants are asked a series of questions that pull out specific aspects of their personal histories. Others are less structured.
When used in combination with other types of materials, oral histories can provide depth and dimension to events that are otherwise depicted in the collection. For example, The oral history of Neil Atherton that was collected for the project provides a personal account of being a gay man in a small town. This provides a personal experience of the way gay life existed that is documented throughout the collection in various ways.
There are two ways to access each oral history in the Stories of Summer collection. The first is through the full-length audio recording of the interview, which can be listened into the archive. The second option is to skim or read the transcripts of the videos. Both options allow you to observe the oral history, but many individuals choose to read through the transcripts before listening to the audio or without listening to the audio at all.
Although this is effective at gleaning information from the oral history, it is important to consider that there are differences in things like tone and speaking style that may not be detectable through the transcript alone. To combat this, it may be helpful to identify aspects of the transcript that are particularly interesting and then go back and listen to those parts of the recording to account for anything missed in the transcript alone, although this process is not mandatory. Like with any source, there are several questions you should ask yourself as you look through and analyze oral histories. It is first important to consider why the particular oral history was created? What topics are being described in the oral history?
And what does the particular individual's story tell us about those topics? What can you tell about the person being interviewed based on their answers to the questions? Does the interview have mostly personal relevance or does it speak to a particular historical or social conversation in the region?
The interactions between the interviewer and the person being interviewed may also provide specific information in the oral history. Other, more specific questions may also be beneficial to ask based on the interview at hand. To apply these questions to an oral history to demonstrate how to create an argument using an oral history, let us look at the interview of Neil Atherton, which was referenced earlier.
atherton was not originally from the saugatuck douglas region or even from michigan more broadly but he moved to the area in the early eighties when he and his partner jim yonro began to run hoopty scooty the oral history goes over many subjects in its thirty seven minute run time including theft of business property creative advertising his time with the store and his experiences as a gay man in the area Let's look at that last topic specifically. On the screen, there is a lengthy quote from the interview about why Atherton and his partner moved to the area and how they maneuvered life in an area that was becoming increasingly known for its LGBT scene. In the quote, he describes that he did not feel as if he was minoritized because of his gay identity. Instead, he always felt like a part of the community. This could suggest that the Saugatuck-Douglas area was not only queer-friendly in its tourist destination, but the locals were relatively queer-friendly as well.
However, despite this, he describes an experience with a woman who was less friendly. He describes the experience of microaggression that he faced from a neighbor who he said, quote, had a difficult time with us being there. This illustrates that although much of the town was affirming and kind, the area was not completely divorced of homophobia.
In this way, the oral history speaks to the ways in which the region, although generally queer positive, was not universally so. based on these observations and other observations throughout the oral history we can construct an argument about how life was for gay residents of saugatuck douglas these elements could be confirmed by other pieces of the ephemera or objects like tickets and playbills that were meant to be impermanent in their use to paint a rich picture of the realities of gay life in a gay tourist area for more information about the stories of summer collection Please visit the other videos in the Stories of Summer Collection video series.