The Oral History Association of Australia
The OHAA is a non-profit body formed in 1978 with Branches in all states. The aims of the Oral History Association of Australia are:.
- to promote ethical practice and methods of oral history
- to educate in the use of oral history methods
- to encourage discussions on all aspects of oral history
- to foster the preservation of oral history records
National conferences are held biennially which include discussions about oral history projects and issues such as ethics and copyright. The OHAA Journal is published annually.
OHAA NSW (Inc) welcomes applications for membership from those living in NSW and ACT.
Click here for details of Membership and Activities.
What is Oral History?
- Oral History is the recording of memories of people's unique life experiences. Often the only way to find out about the past is to ask someone who knows about it.
- Oral history creates a record or supplements existing ones. Through oral history the past comes alive. People can be much more interesting than documents.
- Oral history preserves the past for now and for the future.
The recording of oral history is a two-way process in which someone shares memories with an interviewer who has carefully planned an interview.
- Oral history preserves voices, accents and vocabularies of individuals
interviewed.
How may Oral History be used?
- for the life histories of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and other groups who may be poorly represented in written sources
- to trace the history of a local community
- for family history
- to encourage children to treat people as living history books, at the same time increasing understanding between generations
- for research purposes in tertiary education studies
- in corporate and institutional histories
- in museums to enliven displays
- in publications to capture reader's imaginations
- in radio, television and plays to promote authentic voices of the past.
Left to right: Louise Darmody, Cecilia Wellsmore, Mark Troha and Kerry Wellsmore at Honeyvale, their homestead in Paupong in the Snowy Mountains, NSW. The NSW Premiers Department commissioned Louise Darmody from Sound Memories to interview people who had experienced the Snowy Mountains bushfires of 2003. The fires caused extensive damage to an area more than twice the size of greater Sydney and lasted for over nine weeks. The documentary was undertaken to honour those involved in the fires as well as giving others a chance to learn from the stories of life-threatening experiences. Photo credit: Graeme Enders |
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