Doing Oral History by Ritchie Donald A

Author:Ritchie, Donald A.
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2015-03-11T04:00:00+00:00

Fortunately, by the late 1960s Columbia had reversed this policy and has since been saving its tapes. Oral historians and archivists began to view both the sound recording and transcript as “primary” in their own mediums and to deem both worthy of preservation.24

Should sound recordings be preserved any differently than other documentation?

Although there are enough similarities in the preservation of paper and audio documentation to permit their storage together, sound recordings confront archivists with problems unique to their medium. Paper, particularly if low in acidity, can sit unattended for years without much damage, but sound recordings need constant care. Tape, if left unplayed for long periods undergoes a process by which the sound on one layer is imprinted on the next layer, a condition, called “print through,” or “voice over,” that creates an echo on the tape. Fungus can attack certain types of sound recordings, quickening their deterioration.

The digital revolution that began in the 1990s produced digital recorders with superior sound quality, permitted copying without loss of clarity, and facilitated digital editing and placing interviews on the Internet. But archivists could not be sure of the long-term preservation of digital recordings. The first digital audio tape (DAT) recorders were expensive and needed frequent repairs, making oral history projects reluctant to adopt them. Next came minidisk recorders, which had their own problems. In 2001 Apple introduced the iPod, and students promptly began using it to record interviews simply by attaching inexpensive microphones. Although veteran oral historians prefer more substantial recorders, there is little correlation between the size of the recorder and sound quality of the recording. Digital recordings can be transferred from the flash clip in the player to a computer server for storage and copies made on CDs or flash drives for research use.

The evolving technology that made it easier to do oral history also made its preservation more difficult. Older interviews were recorded on machines that no longer exist, outside of museums. One archives found a set of interviews done on an obsolete belt-type recorder from the 1950s, but unable to locate such a machine, even from its manufacturer, could not play back the tapes. Interviews on wax cylinders, wire recorders, belt recorders, and dictaphones have been copied onto reel-to-reel and cassette tape, and are now being digitized. Reel-to-reel recorders became harder to locate even if their tapes were in good condition (projects have found eBay a good place to look for obsolete equipment). The catalog of horrors was enough to suggest that oral history archives that are not regularly caring for their tapes and making transcripts were playing Russian roulette with their interviews.25

The International Association of Sound and Audiovisual Archives (IASA) has sought to alert both oral historians and paper-oriented archivists to the special needs of audiovisual documentation, particularly during the transition from analog to digital recordings. On a worldwide basis, it monitors new technological developments and publishes guides for best practices in preservation and cataloging—complicated by the fact that sound recordings invariably arrive at an archives with

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