Professor to Conduct Trainings for Oral History Project at Fayetteville Public Library

The Fayetteville Public Library is participating in the Library of Congress Veteran Oral History project by facilitating interviews with veterans that will be recorded and submitted to the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress.

The library’s role will be to offer trainings — conducted by Lori Holyfield, associate professor of sociology in the J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Arkansas —  for interviewers, providing space for interviews and providing equipment. The interviews can be either video or audio.

The library needs 10-15 volunteers who would be interested in conducting the interviews. They will be trained by Holyfield on active listening, how to probe, and repoire building. The interviewers will be given a lot of direction and a script as a guide.

The training sessions for volunteers to be trained to conduct interviews are scheduled for 1 p.m. Saturday, May 5, and 6 p.m. Wednesday, May 9. The duration of the program will be from June 1 to early August. The interviews would be individually scheduled this summer based on time availability of the volunteers and the interviewees. Please contact Margaret Burdette at 856-7104 if interested in this exciting project.