Environmental Justice and Space, Place, & Identity

Sometimes the best way to understand racism and environmental injustice and to inspire action is to listen to people's stories, or to tell them yourself.

Obviously, you can just converse informally with people to build your own community. Sometimes, though, people want their stories to have further reach by sharing them more widely.

Sharing, Listening, and Recording

• StoryCorps: Record your own stories, or help others record theirs. 

• Southern Oral History Program: Two podcasts about doing oral histories of environmental racism: Environmental Racism and Oral History Part I and Part II

• Oral History and the Struggle for Environmental Equality by Emory University, Woodruff  Library Humanities Team

• Environmental Justice oral history collection, Bancroft Library, Univ. of California

Finding Examples to Stream

• Living on Earth, by Steve Curwood. Listen to "Public Radio's Environmental News Magazine," with archives since 1991. Use the site's search box to find audio on topics like "environmental justice," "lead," and "Flint."  

• Google Searches for Oral History

  • Search for "Oral History Portals"

  • Search for Asian-American Oral History

  • Search for Black or African American Oral History

  • Search for Latinx Oral History

• The wealth of non-Harvard Oral History Library Guides (a Google search) online provides many interesting places to explore.

Methods, Equipment, and Assistance

• Oral History Techniques by Barbara Truesdell. How to prepare for an interview. With a good bibliography at the end. 

• Ethics for Oral History from the Oral History Association. Get consent for recording, archiving, and sharing. 

• Harvard Library Media Lab (Harvard Affiliates Only)

  • Audio/Podcast How-To

  • Loaner Equipment and Tutorials (Sadly, no loans during COVID shutdown)

  • Media Lab Zoom Office Hours. Library experts to help you with using audio equipment and much more. 

• Sage Research Methods texts. (Harvard Affiliates Only). Search for keywords like "storytelling" to learn about certain academic approaches to storytelling. The page's search window brings you to many relevant chapters in handbooks. Here are some specific titles of full books:

  • Handbook of Narrative Inquiry: Mapping a Methodology

  • Inside Interviewing

  • The Life Story Interview

  • The SAGE Handbook of Interview Research

Academic Books and Articles

• "Environmental Oral History" by Danielle Endres. In Environmental Communication, 2007. (Harvard Affiliates Only.)

• Search HOLLIS for environmental oral history books and articles.

Studying Storytelling In-Depth--Undergraduate studies at Harvard:

• Explore storytelling, oral history, and performance in departments including:

• Anthropology (Library Resources in Social Anthropology)

• Folklore and Mythology (Library Resources)

• Theater, Dance, and Media (Library Resources)

• Explore environmental injustice in departments including:

• African and African American Studies (Library Resources)

• Environmental Science and Public Policy (Library Resources)

• Other Social Sciences