Rose Mary Allen interviews woman in the 80s/90s
Since January 2024, “Sprekende geschiedenis” together with Extraordinary Professor of Culture, Community and History Rose- Mary Allen, the National Archives of Curaçao, the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision and DANS (the digital archive of the KNAW) have been carrying out the “Hidden Stories of the Caribbean” project.
One of the goals of this project is to digitize Rose Mary Allen’s oral history material from the 1980s and 1990s and make it suitable for reuse. In addition, we want to present (fragments) from the stories to a (young) audience.
At the moment the state of affairs is:
- All files/cassettes have been digitized by Patrick Martijn on behalf of Image & Sound.
- Through Imagine IC we have started a collaboration with “Dance me your story” (A co-creation of foundation Zichtbaar).
- Young people at different schools in Amsterdam, based on excerpts from the interviews and their own imagination, will work on making public presentations in different creative ways.
- On Curaçao, MBO teacher Clay Toppenberg will also work with young people to create texts, performances and film based on the fragments. The presentations will take place at school and at the Curaçao National Archives.
- With the help of many people fluent in Papiamentu, a speech recognition program Whisper is being trained to convert spoken texts into written ones. To this end, they are working with Rick Vink of the School of Datascience. This is useful for making transcriptions, but also for wider use.
- Together with Marta Dijkhoff, director of the National Language Institute Curaçao, ways to make the speech recognition software sustainable and accessible to a wider audience in Curaçao, Bonaire and Aruba are being examined.
As part of the Hidden Histories trajectory, The New Institute, together with the Fonds voor de Creatieve Industrie, is organizing a symposium on November 30. The project Storianan Skondi di Karibe is part of this trajectory and will participate in a panel. More information will follow soon!
This project is made possible in part by:
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Yüksel is recording an interview
Starting in the late 1960s, the first women from Turkey came to the Netherlands to build new lives here. What did those lives look like? We know very little about them. The exhibition “Je moest eens weten” and the eponymous publication by photographer and artist Çiğdem Yüksel, tell the stories of these women using the oral history method and show powerful images of women on motorcycles, in family settings, in factories and demonstrating: tough and inspiring, but also vulnerable and tender.
‘Sprekende geschiedenis’ made an important contribution to the book with the chapter “From Turkey to the Netherlands,” a historical context describing the arrival of the first generation of women starting in 1964. The book is available in no less than three languages: Dutch (Je moest eens weten) , English (If you only knew) and Turkish (Bir bilsen).
More information about the book ‘Je moest eens weten’ can be found here.
In addition, the exhibition is on view at the Fotomuseum Rotterdam until May 25, 2025.
Friday, Sept. 13 marked the opening of the traveling exhibition “Forty Women to Never Forget,” about the history of the Turkish and Moroccan women’s movement in the Netherlands, at emancipation center Vrouw en Vaart in Amsterdam.
The traveling exhibition brings to life the history of the HTKB (Hollanda Türkiye Kadinlar Birligi, founded in 1975) and the MVVN (Marokkaanse Vrouwen Vereniging Nederland, founded in 1982) in a collection of impressive video stories.
It was a beautiful day with engaging guest speakers who talked about the importance of preserving these stories for Dutch history, a voice game in which fragments of the stories of the women interviewed were reenacted, a tissue session with artist Rosa Smits, and of course the many beautiful and moving reactions to the exhibition.
This special project gives a voice to the women who have paved the way for many others over the past 47 years. Their strength and stories deserve to be heard and cherished,” Esmah Lahlah, Member of Parliament (PvdA/GL)
Foto: Saskia Moerbeek in gesprek met Esmah Lahlah, Tweede Kamerlid (PvdA/GL).
Photo: Theater based on excerpts from the stories of the women interviewed.
Afterwards, guest curator Karima Aissaoui was a guest on NOS’ radio program “Met het Oog op Morgen,” where she talked with Chris Kijne about the women who have worked for others in the shadow of ‘mainstream feminism’. The broadcast can be listened to here.
Photo: Textile art with photos of the women involved made by Nora Hendriks
The traveling exhibition can be seen at Emancipatiecentrum Vrouw en Vaart in Amsterdam through Oct. 7, and at Ru Paré, until Oct. 24. After that, the exhibition will also be on display in The Hague (St. Yasmin), Rotterdam (Dona Daria), Utrecht and Eindhoven. Keep an eye on this page for updates and exact locations.
Thanks to all the wonderful women who told their stories and, of course, everyone who participated in this wonderful project.
Want more information about this project? Then click here.
Photos by Marlise Steeman.
Last week we were invited to the kick-off of the project FeMig.Lab: Female Labor Migration in European History in Berlin. This initiative is organized by Minor – Projektkontor für Bildung und Forschung in cooperation with Humanity in Action Poland, the Ethnographic Museum of Istria, LVR Industrial Museums and the Center for the History of Migrants.
Over the next two years, this network will actively consider ways to make different perspectives of women migrants in Europe visible in museums, through scholarly research and within NGO projects, and develop a digital platform with biographical narratives of female labor migration in Europe.
As part of this European network, ”Sprekende geschiedenis” contributes as an expert in oral history and shares knowledge gained from the oral history project ”The History of the Turkish and Moroccan Women’s Movement in 40 Stories.”
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Curaçao has a lot of old audio material that is of value for the historiography of the island. Consider, for example, the oral history interviews Rose Mary Allen conducted in the 1980s and 1990s. This is important heritage, but unfortunately Papiamentu is not yet included in AI speech recognition software. This hinders people from quickly and efficiently transcribing audio recordings in Papiamentu and making the material accessible.
Together, we can solve this problem! We can train the software with the beautiful sounds of Papiamentu so that we can easily convert spoken texts Papiamentu into written texts. But for this we need your help.
The recordings take a maximum of 30 seconds and it can be done simply with a phone. We understand that your time is precious, but it won’t take much time. We will provide the lyrics, all you have to do is read aloud, record it and mail it to us.
The more people participate, the better we can train the programme. With your contribution, we will ensure an important development for the heritage of Curaçao and Papiamentu!
Want to join? Email us for more information and the texts at mila@sprekendegeschiedenis.nl
The call is also available for download in pdf-format. Sharing the call is appreciated.
Photo: ‘Curaçao, W.I., WILLEMSTAD, Entrance
Translated with DeepL.com
Memory in Movement: Pace, Connection & Introspection
28th–29th November 2024, University of Jyväskylä, Finland
This conference critically explores the concept of ‘movement’ in relation to oral history and memory studies. ‘Movement’ is defined broadly and inclusively: it can refer to social movements, physical movement, or movement across concrete or conceptual borders. It can be interpreted as the movements that have shaped oral history as a discipline, from its inception to today. Moreover, the memories oral historians study are constantly in motion, with the present framing people’s recollection and understanding of the past. In this conference ‘movement’ is therefore paired with the notion of ‘pace’, accentuating the importance of temporality for the study of oral history. We invite researchers and practitioners to approach their work from an introspective angle, examining how subjective experiences and social factors impact the speed at which oral history is conducted.
The ninth international symposium of the Finnish Oral History Network (FOHN) will focus on the themes of movement, pace, and introspection in oral history and memory studies research from a critical and exploratory perspective. The conference offers researchers an interdisciplinary setting in which to connect and present cutting-edge ideas. The conference’s keynote speakers are Lynn Abrams (University of Glasow), Daniele Salerno (Utrecht University), Kirsti Jõesalu (University of Tartu) and Samira Saramo (Migration Institute of Finland).
They wish to invite contributions involving methodological, analytical, and ethical questions, as well as case studies. Proposals may be submitted for individual papers or panels and can address, but are not limited to, the following themes and topics:
- Social movements and oral history.
- Does conceptualising researchers as activists challenge established oral history practices?
- The ways in which emotions can move the interviewer and/or responder.
- What ethical considerations must we account for when incorporating the study of emotions into oral history and memory studies?
- How does speed and timing influence how emotions are recorded, analysed, or internalized in our research processes?
- Physical movement, the body and oral history interviewing. For example, how might moving through memorable spaces evoke visceral reminiscences?
- Digital humanities and changes to how we collect, process, and analyse memories. Technology and how it shapes oral history into a reproducible, codable, and ‘fast’ process. How much time do we need to meaningfully connect with our research subjects?
- The pace at which change within oral history has occurred. What connects/distinguishes oral historians working across the decades?
- Has oral history ‘matured’ into a stable and agreed upon methodology?
Individual paper submissions require a title and a maximum 250-word abstract. Panel proposals should include a title and a 250-word description of the panel, and a title plus 250-word abstract for each individual paper (maximum five papers per panel). The conference language will be English.
To learn more and submit your proposal, please visit the conference website or alternatively email them at fohn2024@jyu.fi
OH-SMArt Symposium 2024
FAIR use of Artist Interviews for Conservators and Curators
In conclusion of its three year research project Oral History – Stories at the Museum around Artworks (OH-SMArt), the Conservation and Restoration department of the University of Amsterdam, together with SMBK Foundation for the Conservation of Contemporary Art, organises the OH-SMArt symposium on 28 and 29 November 2024.
Programme
Thursday 28 November 2024: Expert meeting
Friday 29 November 2024: SBMK day
Call for proposals
Interested parties are invited to submit proposals for presentation and publication in the context of the Symposium SBMK day: FAIR use of Artist Interviews for Conservators and Curators.
The symposium and expert meeting will focus especially on interoperability and reuse. Contributions are welcome concerning dissemination and lowering the threshold for reuse, in addition to linking data to deepen knowledge on artist’s practices and their artworks worldwide. We are interested in proposals from, but not exclusively, researchers, conservators, artists, curators, oral history data collection managers, experts in digital archiving and museum professionals who have research with spoken narratives addressing one or more of the following topics:
- Processing and depositing interview materials, including Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR), transcript correction tools, and other natural language processing tools.
- Addressing FAIR Principles with sensitive oral history material in light of data protection laws (GDPR).
- Findability of oral history archives on artworks and linking data collections.
- Accessibility of research outside of academia, to cultural heritage professionals, artists and students.
- Interviews conducted by non-native speakers or multi-lingual speakers, including improved accessibility.
- Interoperability, from issues of consent and preferred file types to linked open data and digital research tools for oral history.
- Reuse of interviews in conservation research, including interviews with all stakeholders around works of art and cultural heritage as well as conservation obstacles and their possible solutions.
- The development of tools for reflection that address the researcher’s role in the use and interpretation of oral history.
Proposals, for both the Expert Meeting and the SBMK day, specifically addressing FAIR Data and Open Science for various types of contributions are welcome in 300-500 words, if possible, in proofread English, alongside a separate file with the author(s) bio(s), 50-words each, named with a subject-based common denominator.
The UvA’s new research priority area Decolonial Futures is currently accepting proposals for Seed Funding. The RPA is looking for innovative and collaborative research projects, particularly those that align with the RPA’s main themes: Museums, archives & cultural practices; Migrations, mobility & borders; and Ecology, sustainability & climate change. Early career scholars and those working in historically colonised regions and contexts are particularly encouraged to submit proposals. The deadline for submissions is 15 March 2024.
MORE INFORMATION
The Oral History and Life Stories Network is one of the 27 networks of the ESSHC and brings together oral history and life story researchers and practitioners who explore memory, narratives, and history. Broadly, they want to encourage papers that explore methodological questions and challenges as well as the relationship between oral histories and the construction and analysis of life stories, both in terms of processes and outcomes.
This is a thematically open Call for Papers, but they would like to stimulate some topics that may attract broader interest:
- theoretical and methodological challenges of oral history today
- impact of the digitization process on doing oral history and the analysis; challenges of digitization (audio and video), e.g.
- transcript, keywording, archiving
- reuse of (archived) oral history materials
- reflections on legal issues and ethical questions in oral history
- themes of oral history today, e.g. whose memories are collected, analysed, and archived
- shared authority/sharing authority
- teaching oral history and supervision of oral history projects – experiences, challenges, concepts
- reflections on combining oral history and life story methods
- relations of oral history to other fields (e.g. social sciences, ethnology, memory studies, etc.)
The deadline for the required pre-registration and upload of a paper or session proposal at the ESSHC website is April 15, 2024.