---

Because oral history interviews are personal interactions between human beings, they rarely conform to a methodological ideal. These reflections from oral historians provide honest and rigorous analyses of actual oral history practice that address the complexities of a human-centered methodology.

---

Foreword; Steven High Introduction: Toward an Ethnography of Practice; Anna Sheftel and Stacey Zembrzycki PART I: REFLECTIONS ON A LIFETIME OF LISTENING Section Introduction: Henry Greenspan 1. From California to Kufr Nameh and Back: Reflections on Forty Years of Feminist Oral History; Sherna Berger Gluck 2. "On" and "Off" the Record in Shifting Times and Circumstances; Julie Cruikshank and Tatiana Argounova 3. Politics and Praxis in Canadian Working-Class Oral History; Joan Sangster PART II: ENCOUNTERS IN VULNERABILITY, FAMILIARITY, AND FRIENDSHIP Section Introduction: Hourig Attarian 4. The Vulnerable Listener; Martha Norkunas 5. Listen and Learn: Familiarity and Feeling in the Oral History Interview; Alan Wong 6. Going Places: Helping Youth with Refugee Experiences Take Their Stories Public; Elizabeth Miller 7. Not Just Another Interviewee: Befriending a Holocaust Survivor; Stacey Zembrzycki PART III: THE INTERSECTION OF ETHICS AND POLITICS Section Introduction: Leyla Neyzi 8. I Can Hear Lois Now: Corrections to My Story of the Internment of Japanese Canadians - "For the Record"; Pamela Sugiman 9. Third Parties in ´Third Spaces´: Reflecting on the Role of the Translator in Oral History Interviews with Iraqi Diasporic Women; Nadia Jones-Gailani 10. "If you told me you wanted to talk about the ´60s, I wouldn´t have called you back": Reflections on Collective Memory and the Practice of Oral History; Nancy Janovicek 11. The Ethical Murk of Using Testimony in Oral Historical Research in South Africa; Monica Eileen Patterson PART IV: CONSIDERING SILENCE Section Introduction: Erin Jessee 12. Toward an Ethics of Silence? Negotiating Off-the-Record Events and Identity in Oral History; Alexander Freund 13. The Heart of Activism in Colombia: Reflections on Activism and Oral History Research in a Conflict Area; Luis van Isschot 14. "I don´t fancy history very much": Reflections on Interviewee Recruitment and Refusal in Bosnia-Herzegovina; Anna Sheftel Afterword; Alessandro Portelli

---

"By acknowledging the personal impact of doing oral history work, this valuable collection of reflections is a wonderful bridge among academic disciplines as well as for those of us who practice oral history outside of academia: all practitioners are important to include in these ethical and theoretical discussions." (Sady Sullivan, The Oral History Review, Vol. 44 (2), 2017)

´ the essays in this collection reflect on those sensitive, uncomfortable and sometimes daunting moments in interviews that are usually left unmentioned. They show that the required skills of openness and patience can be gained only through practice and conscious critical evaluation of what we learn in theory. I found the essays wise and constructive in presenting the political, ethical and personal challenges that researchers face in interactions with subjects of their studies.´ - LSE Review of Books Blog

---