How This Works

Oral History as Data (OHD) is a static web framework that will let you publish a collection of oral history/qualitative interviews online. This Learn-Static Lesson Template will help you as a class to build your own collection of interviews using OHD.

To do that, Instructors will follow these steps:

  1. Make a copy of the OHD GitHub Repository
  2. Edit a Config file to describe your project.
  3. Create a controlled vocabularly with your students
  4. Customize and Publish your site using GitHub Pages

To get started as an instructor, go to the For Instructors Section Overview Page.

And students will follow these steps:

  1. Transform your interview text into a spreadsheet
  2. Code sections of your transcripts by subject, using the controlled vocabularly created by the class
  3. Publish your transcript by your transcript’s CSV and a Markdown file describing your interview
  4. Engage with the class collection via presentation or critical essay

To get started as a student, go to the Prepare Your Transcript Section Overview Page.

At the end of the process you will have a fully baked website that publishes each of your transcripts and allows for users to search interviews by keyword or browse by the topics you define in your controlled vocabulary. The site will feature some spiffy visualizations to entice engagement.

Check Out the OHD Demo Site

About Oral History as Data

Oral History as Data was first built in 2018, coming out of work at the University of Idaho Library’s Center for Digital Inquiry and Learning (CD?L). The framework served as the foundation for several digital humanities projects, including Voices of Gay Rodeo, Idaho Queered, and CTRL+Shift.

The project is closely related to the CollectionBuilder project, and the current iteration was built on top of a CollectionBuilder-GH template.

Section Overview