Minorities
Time: 2025-09-18 09:00 - 11:00
Location: Large Hall B at Auditorium Maximum
Chairman: Marek Szajda
Events within this Session
Roma Subaltern Memories
Type: session | Language: English
Time: 09:00 - 11:00
Abstract
Roma have lived through the European history but often receive a marginal position in historical accounts, even of the Holocaust (Porrajmos in romanì). Discriminated even today, they have a rich oral tradition (romanì is not a written language) to express their culture and to pass on their memories, including that of the Porrajmos and Resistance. But, due to deep-seated stigmatisation, their stories are quite unknown outside their own community. Even in the academic world, there is a strong tendency to assume that the Roma are unable to produce their own vision, perspective, or ideology. Using in particular www.porrajmos.it (virtual museum), I worked collecting, transcribing and interpreting the voices and memories (first and second generation) of Roma victims of Porrajmos and/or participants in the Resistance in various ways. It’s believed that presenting the Roma as a constantly discriminated group draws public attention to them. It’s not true: it rather consolidates the negative perceptions. Oral history research I conducted Listening to their own voices and using a fact-based study of their history helps to improve Roma position and shed new light their civic engagement. According to their narrative, many Roma were not only passive victims but also active architects of their own lives and of Italian freedom and democracy. I firmly believe that oral history helps to overcome prejudices against the Roma, improves progressive cultural recognition of people remained on the margins of historiographic narrative and fosters the full right to citizenship.
Speakers
Unheard Voices: Stories of LGBTI+ Clergy in the Methodist Church of Southern Africa
Type: session | Language: English
Time: 09:00 - 11:00
Abstract
In every age, potentially divisive controversies arise that the church has to deal with. Placed squarely before the church of today is the issue of sexual orientation and the ambiguous response to this question made by the church so far. In line with the sub theme of the IOHA conference “Lending our ears” this paper seeks to provide silenced and marginalised voices access to the public discourse by bringing to the centre the oral testimonies of queer people in the conversation of the church and same sex unions. This article, which details the personal stories of several Methodist clergy who identify variously as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and other (LGBTI+), gives us a chance to hear voices that up to now have been silenced. Some of it is not easy reading. There is pain, misunderstanding, rejection and fear. Perhaps meeting these queer clerics through their stories can promote further understanding and bring us, if not to one mind, then to a deepened level of respect for a view that may be different from our own.
Speakers
Globalization and Cultural Transformation: The Case of Gond Oral and Visual Narrative
Type: session | Language: English
Time: 09:00 - 11:00
Abstract
The Gond tribe of India has an age-old tradition of oral narration. Their glorious past has reverberated through oral narratives. However, the history flowing through these oral traditions has come under attack due to globalisation, modernity, and cultural assimilation. Subsequently, this resulted in the loss of their traditional cultural beliefs, religion, and code of conduct. In recent times, an interesting phenomenon has emerged: the Gonds have transferred their intangible cultural heritage of oral tradition into revived visual narratives, creating a tangible form. This phenomenon has not received significant attention in academic discourse, particularly from the inter-art perspective. The lack of academic representation of the tribe is one of the reasons among others. This study undertakes a close analysis of the tribe’s oral and visual narratives to examine the interplay between these two art forms from an academic point of view. It incorporates methods of content analysis and discourse analysis, along with a self-developed interdisciplinary methodology. This approach uses theories and concepts of various disciplines including visual studies, art history, linguistics, and cultural anthropology to draw a meaningful conclusion.
Speakers
Inclusive Histories: A Collaborative Approach to Malayalam Oral Histories
Type: session | Language: English
Time: 09:00 - 11:00
Abstract
This paper presents preliminary findings from a collaborative oral history project conducted in Kerala, India, by a team of five Malayali research assistants and myself, a Western researcher. Together we collected community oral histories across caste, religious, gender and tribal lines, with interviews conducted in Malayalam. The project was designed not only to document Malayali voices but also to examine the layered dynamics of collaboration, training, and shared authority in oral history practice.
To illustrate these dynamics, I highlight three examples that foreground distinct themes. In one case, a research assistant recorded the memories of her Muslim grandmother from a lower-caste background, revealing how kinship can shape the intimacy and authenticity of testimony. In another, a non-tribal interviewer conducted oral histories within a tribal community, raising questions about access, representation, and inter-community boundaries. A third set of interviews, conducted jointly by myself and Malayali collaborators, points to the challenges of translation, presence, and positionality when navigating between Western academia and local communities.
These examples open broader discussions about oral history’s role in postcolonial contexts: how colonial legacies continue to shape inequalities, and how collaborative methods can help reckon with those legacies and envision postcolonial futures. Finally, the project grapples with the challenges of multilingualism and dissemination, considering how to preserve the authenticity of Malayalam oral histories while making them accessible to both local and global audiences.
Speakers
Toward a More Inclusive State History: The Latino Oklahoma Oral History Project
Type: session | Language: English
Time: 09:00 - 11:00
Abstract
In 2020, the census revealed that in Oklahoma, over 12% of the state’s population was Hispanic and that this ethnic category was the fastest growing in the state. The Oklahoma City school system reports that a majority of students are Latino; Guymon, a small town in the Oklahoma panhandle, is rapidly approaching a Hispanic majority; and, some of the state’s key economic sectors such as natural gas, meat processing, and agriculture, rely on Latinx labor. Numerous organizations based around a shared national identity, such as the Guatemaltecos in Oklahoma, proliferate and enrich the state’s diverse communities. Yet despite the historical and contemporary presence of Latinxs, these histories are ignored in narratives of Oklahoma’s history. The Latino Oklahoma Oral History Project, done in partnership with the award-winning Oklahoma Oral History Research Program aims to address this lack of representation and archival marginalization by offering a publicly accessible collection of oral histories from members of Oklahoma’s diverse Latinx community. The project, which began in 2019, is scheduled to be published online in Spring 2025. In this presentation, I will share the genesis of the project, present the online archive, and discuss how the project aims to provide current and future generations with more inclusive accounts of the state’s history. The presentation will focus on dissemination plans and efforts to 1) revise popular narratives of Oklahoma history; 2) contribute to broader literatures about Latinx history in the U.S. and thus use these local and individual stories to contribute to larger historical themes; and 3) utilize the archival space and possibilities of the project to support social justice work in Oklahoma and document present-day mobilizations in light of discriminatory state legislation and efforts to limit access to state resources.