Além das versões: possibilidades da narrativa em entrevistas de história oral

The work with oral history consists of recording interviews which have historical and documental proprieties, with actors/actresses or witnesses of events, conjunctures, movements, institutions and ways of living along the contemporary history. One of its basic foundations is the narrative. An event or a situation lived by the interviewee can not be transmitted to any other person without being narrated. That means that it frames itself (meaning that it does become something) at the very moment of the interview. By telling his/her life experiences, the interviewee transforms what has been lived into language, selecting and organizing facts according to some determined meanings. This work of language in crystallising images (images which refer to, and mean again, life experience) is common in all narratives - and we do know that sometimes it is much more successful than others (just the way some oral history interviews are certainly more successful than others). However, perhaps we have not given yet all the attention needed to this work of language in the oral sources.

Immigration and memory

The town of Nova Friburgo, in Brazil, was founded in 1820 by swiss immigrants who, as often happens in the majority of migratory flows, crossed the ocean in search of better life conditions. The scope of this paper is to trail the path of a swiss immigrant called Marianne Joset Salusse and then follow on to investigate the mechanisms involved in elaborating family memory and public memory around this woman who would become a symbol of immigration to this town. Thus a series of interviews were held with her descendants, which were fundamental for the understanding of current representations and the main elements which constitute the collective memory around Marianne. Besides oral sources, we had recourse to written documents which allowed a retrieval of relevant information about her life. More than simply adding information, written sources allowed for a more profound analysis of oral accounts, unravelling as well as unveiling selective procedures peculiar to memory construction (Pollak, 1989;1992).

Projeto para criação do Centro de Pesquisa e Documentação de História Oral e Ciências Sociais (Beira, Moçambique)

A presente dissertação tem como objetivo central propor a criação do Centro de Pesquisa e Documentação de História Oral e Ciencias Sociais na cidade da Beira, em Moçambique. Pretende-se, com o Centro, promover projetos que possibilitem a constituição de acervos de caráter histórico e documental, contribuindo, assim, para o desenvolvimento da pesquisa acadêmica e para a valorização da história e da cultura Moçambicanas. O Centro terá como principal ferramenta metodológica de pesquisa a história oral. O acervo a ser constituído no contexto de distintos projetos resultará, portanto, de entrevistas gravadas com atores de diferentes extratos sociais, todos eles participantes diretos de eventos relevantes da história recente de Moçambique. Essas entrevistas deverão estar disponíveis, no Centro, juntamente com outros tipos de fontes, coletadas e organizadas com o objetivo de constituir um centro de referência sobre a história contemporanea do país. Toda a atividade do Centro será acompanhada de projetos de qualificação de equipes. Neste sentido, o Centro terá de lidar com dois importantes campos: a pesquisa, produção, preservação e difusão de fontes para a história contemporânea; e o apoio didático-pedagógico aos diversos níveis do processo de aprendizagem.