Theme: “Oral history and the dialogue between history and memory”
Date: 19-20 January 2015
Venue: Goethe Institut, Max Mueller Bhavan, Mumbai
Memory has never been viewed as a reliable research tool. On the contrary memory remains fragile, often given to subjectivity and misrepresentation. But the strength of viewing memory “in conversation” with history is precisely the point where the art of representation gets disqualified as valuable research findings. The written form of representation is far more misleading than the spoken, for it can be wiped clean from both the memory and the official paperwork.
Oral narratives build up a space for a dialogue between the written history and the unwritten fragments of history present in the human memories. Such a dialogue often leads to bring forth an alternate narrative of the history. Oral history as dialogue is asking for clarity of purpose, with the guarantee that misrepresentation can be rectified.
OHAI through this conference hoped to carry forward the notion of “dialogue” rather than the time-tested, and yet slightly jaded interview method of asking questions and waiting for standardised responses. The Conference hoped to problematise inter-subjectivity by using the dynamics of co-authoring a text that includes “dialogue” between mainstream/marginal as well as reactionary/radical. The idea was to highlight the multidimensional nature of recalling and retrieving memorable aspects of history, which ranges from the art of commemorating events to probing into what remains unsung and forgotten.
The Conference was visualised as a meeting ground for differences that are too slippery for easy reconciliation. There are multiple methods and variations of dialogue, such as interface, negotiations and hybridity. Orality as speech brings in the art of transforming the spoken into multiple forms of recording and transcribing. The political canvas wherein these exchanges takes place, are ridden with problems of interpretation. Speech is more often than not, surrounded by conflict of interest. Therefore, dialogue does not offer solutions to heated arguments. Nor does it claim to be the singular point of reference. If anything, dialogue keeps future negotiations intact, and amenable for revisiting an argument. The conference provided opportunity for both podium and panel presentations for introducing and discussing these multiple issues in the field of oral history – theoretical as well as technical.
Sub-themes for the conference:
- Memory, oral traditions and historical reconstruction
- Lest we forget: erasing / recalling memories of trauma
- Re-reading history and re-telling stories
- The commemorative aspects of OH
- The dynamics of compensation, rehabilitation and retrieving memories
- The body as the site of contestation and protest
- The gendered nature of recall
- Institutional history and the role their archives play
- Oral History of urban spaces
- The communities of memory