The history of
\nthe last 100 years can also be discovered through oral history, which is based
\non the memories and recollections of eye-witnesses interviewed and recorded on
\ntape or on a digital format. Between 1945 and 1989, the practice of oral
\nhistory was deeply corrupted by the ideological pressure exerted by the
\ncommunist regime, as was the case with the science of history in general. After
\n1989, under its first manager Eugen Preda, Radio Romania made it its goal to
\ncapture recent memory. So the foundations of the oral history archive were laid
\nin March 1993. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The historian
\nand journalist Mariana Conovici was entrusted with creating the team of
\nhistorians who established the archive. They conducted interviews about wars,
\ncommunism and fascism, daily life and the science of history. In an oral
\nhistory interview, she recalled the beginnings of the oral history archive of
\nthe public radio:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Eugen Preda,
\nthe director of the station at the time, who was a historian and had a PhD in
\nhistory, was abreast with everything that was going on in the world in the
\nfield of historiography. He had taken part in the International Congress of
\nHistorians in 1980 hosted by Bucharest, where they had discussed the subject of
\noral history. So he had a clear idea about what it meant and its value. A
\nmeeting was held in Sinaia in 1992 with international participation, and he
\nattended that as well, and it became a challenge to create the voice archive.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The book by the
\nBritish historian and sociologist Paul Thomson called The Voice of the Past
\nprovided the guidelines based on which the bibliography was established.
\nMariana Conovici said that after 1989, once this method of discovering the past
\nbecame allowed, she began to understand the world, her profession and herself
\nmuch better:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
For me, freedom
\nmeant having access to a history different from the conservative discourse I
\nhad learnt and read about. I was now discovering that history had more nuance,
\nthat what I had learnt and sometimes got good grades in school for was not
\ntrue. It was an immersion in real history, getting close to the people and
\ntheir stories. For me it was wonderful also because, by having access to the
\nlives of the people I was interviewing, I was understanding my world better, I
\nwas understanding myself better, in the sense that I was realising what my
\nplace was more clearly. More precisely, I was comparing myself to them and not
\nalways to my advantage.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Mariana Conovici
\nand her team made up of Octavian Silivestru, Silvia Iliescu, Virginia C\u0103lin and
\nLavinia Iva\u0219cu managed to combine oral history with radio journalism:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
An oral history
\ninterview performs a historical investigation. Its goal is to study, to
\nresearch, but this direction we didn’t pursue. We never had the time, nor,
\nperhaps, the inclination. But we did something else which I think is important:
\nwe shared with our listeners, through weekly broadcasts, what we received from
\nour interviewees. Oral history always has a civic dimension. We fulfilled this
\nrole through our radio shows. I always insisted on these shows. It was very
\nimportant. I sometimes wondered if Romanian society was actually ready for
\nthose things. I don’t know whether it was or not, but in any case, if ten
\npeople were able to relate and sympathise with the people speaking from the
\nheart about their lives, it would have been enough.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Lived history was what Romanian and foreign
\nlisteners wanted from journalists in their letters. And it was something the
\njournalists made an effort to deliver:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Oral history
\ninterviews don’t necessarily bring rich historical information, they provide
\ndetails, the atmosphere, emotion. It’s unbelievable how strong the message sent
\nby the interviewee can be. I remember a 20-minute interview with a woman who
\nhad been taken, at the end of the war, when she wasn’t yet 14. A large group of
\nyoung people were taken by the Germans and taken to Austria to work. She was
\nstill a child when that happened. She told me how she arrived in Vienna, how
\nscared she was, how there was a bombardment and she was in a field, and hid
\nfrom the bombs under a tree. The fear and the drama of this 14-year-old child
\nexpressed some of the horrors of the war.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Radio Romania’s
\noral history archive turned 30. And the archive of the Oral History Centre is
\nbecoming more and more valuable with time. <\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Radio Romania’s Oral History Centre celebrates its 30th anniversary.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":75325,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41141],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-131638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-history-show"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n