Oral Stories
At Culture House, the preservation of Somali spoken accounts is a key focus for us. We record the oral stories of our community members, archive them for safekeeping and provide online access to ensure generations to come can hear them. We want to amplify the voices of our interviewees beyond their immediate community to the wider community across the world who share a keen interest in Somali heritage and culture.
Our team is undertaking training from the Oral History Society to capture the stories of our community members to the highest possible standard. The Oral Histories Society identifies that “Unless we collect and preserve people’s memories then they can be lost. Spoken accounts can:
- fill gaps in historical evidence and secure history at risk
- bring new perspectives and challenge our view of the past
- give voice to those people excluded from traditional historical records
- document traditions and stories passed down from generation to generation
- record the changing and enduring culture of a place or community, or shifts in everyday practices
- contribute to the preservation of customs, dialects and ways of speaking
We have a wide range of topics and interviews of varying lengths; Search for a topic that interests you or look through the highlights of our collection.
