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Subject:
Re: oral history
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Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Mon, 6 Oct 2008 17:31:32 -0400
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Tom Gilmore wrote:
 
> By the way, I find it amusing --and a bit scary-- that so many 
> people on
> this list have read the same emails and interpreted them 
> differently.  I
> don't think anyone said oral tradition or oral history was 
> without value.
> 
J. South wrote:

Oral history ain't worth the paper it's written on.

True, J. South didn't say "without value." Also his definition of "oral history" resembles what Peter Lysy calls "oral tradition." If one accepts David Lowenthal's useful distinction between "history" and "heritage," we can observe that oral tradition is generally a source of heritage, not history. As Lowenthal says, heritage thrives on error (see his 1996 book Possessed by the Past).

Doug Deal
History/SUNY Oswego 



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