Article
ID: CBB081742583

The Challenge of Oral History to Environmental History (2020)

unapi
Historians of science, modern History of science, as a discipline Participation Historical method Environmental history Oral history

Oral history has much to offer environmental history, yet the possibilities and promises of oral history remain underutilised in environmental history and environmental studies more broadly. Through a reflection on work in environmental history and associated disciplines, this paper presents a case for the strength and versatility of oral history as a key source for environmental history, while reflecting on questions of its reliability and scope. We identify three major insights provided by environmental oral history: into environmental knowledge, practices and power. We argue that, rather than being a weakness, the (inter)subjective and experiential dimensions of oral accounts provide a rich source for situating and interrogating environmental practices, meanings, and power relations. Oral history, moreover, provides a counterweight to a reliance on colonial archives and top-down environmental accounts, and can facilitate a renewal - and deepening - of the radical roots of environmental history. Furthermore, as a research practice, oral history is a promising means of expanding the participatory and grassroots engagement of environmental history. By decentring environmental expertise and eroding the boundaries (both fictive and real) of environmental knowledge production, oral environmental histories can provide key interventions in pursuit of a more just, sustainable world.

...More
Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB081742583/

Similar Citations

Article Hu, Zonggang; (2011)
Tong Te-Kong and Oral History of Science Works (/isis/citation/CBB001221317/)

Article Paul Merchant; (2019)
What Oral Historians and Historians of Science Can Learn from Each Other (/isis/citation/CBB829034696/)

Article Wang, Yangzong; (2011)
The Chinese Way in Science and the Oral History of Modern Science in China (/isis/citation/CBB001221315/)

Article Duan, Lian; (2011)
Museums of Natural Science and Technology and Oral History (/isis/citation/CBB001221318/)

Article Ian Hesketh; (2016)
Counterfactuals and history: Contingency and convergence in histories of science and life (/isis/citation/CBB385183310/)

Article Stephen J. Weininger; (2022)
“The Poor Sister:” Coming to Grips with Recent and Contemporary Chemistry (/isis/citation/CBB175973451/)

Article Peter J. T. Morris; Jeffrey I. Seeman; (2022)
The Importance of Plurality and Mutual Respect in the Practice of the History of Chemistry (/isis/citation/CBB375881495/)

Article Hallvard J. Fossheim; (2019)
Past responsibility: History and the ethics of research on ethnic groups (/isis/citation/CBB562849198/)

Article Daniela K. Helbig; (2019)
Life without Toothache: Hans Blumenberg's Zettelkasten and History of Science as Theoretical Attitude (/isis/citation/CBB837512068/)

Article Eric F. Luckey; (2020)
The Psychologist's Biographer: Writing Lives in the History of Psychology (/isis/citation/CBB629029968/)

Article Joachim L. Dagg; (2019)
Motives and merits of counterfactual histories of science (/isis/citation/CBB710171767/)

Article Ana Simões; Antonio Sánchez; (2020-12-01)
Introduction: The Fabulous 1930s in the History of Science and Technology (/isis/citation/CBB183695658/)

Book Michel Blay; (2017)
Critique of the History of Science (/isis/citation/CBB122907818/)

Article David Larsson Heidenblad; (2018)
Mapping a New History of the Ecological Turn: The Circulation of Environmental Knowledge in Sweden 1967 (/isis/citation/CBB264729520/)

Article Mark J. McLaughlin; (2023)
Forests as Laboratories: The Intersections of the Histories of Forests, the Environment, and Science (/isis/citation/CBB551873673/)

Article Roberts, Strother E.; (2012)
Changes in the Genre: A Brief Survey of Early Mid-Atlantic Environmental Histories (/isis/citation/CBB001200342/)

Article Eram Alam; (2023)
Citing the Unsaid (/isis/citation/CBB450051595/)

Article Amrah Salomón J.; (2023)
Drawing on the Difuentes (/isis/citation/CBB948678567/)

Article Wang, Chunfa; (2011)
Origin, Progress, and Significance of the Project for Collecting Historic Data of Scientists' Academic Life (/isis/citation/CBB001221325/)

Article Comfort, Nathaniel; (2011)
When Your Sources Talk Back: Toward a Multimodal Approach to Scientific Biography (/isis/citation/CBB001220956/)

Authors & Contributors
Blay, Michel
Comfort, Nathaniel C.
Duan, Lian
Fossheim, Hallvard
Helbig, Daniela Katharina
Hesketh, Ian
Journals
Chinese Journal for the History of Science and Technology
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences
Bulletin for the History of Chemistry
Historical Studies in the Natural Sciences
British Journal for the History of Science
Environment and History
Publishers
CNRS
Concepts
Historical method
History of science, as a discipline
Historians of science, modern
Oral history
Historiography
Biographies
People
Blumenberg, Hans
Bowler, Peter J.
McClintock, Barbara
Radick, Gregory
Tong, Te-Kong
Time Periods
21st century
20th century, late
20th century
20th century, early
Places
China
United States
India
Canada
Sweden
Institutions
Science History Institute (SHI)
Comments

Be the first to comment!

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}

Log in or register to comment

Creative Commons License REST API