A soldier who fought in World War II reccounts his experience to the reporter. Oral history research, though valuable, faces a number of key disputes.

Research on oral history has broad development prospects but also faces a number of key disputes. Given the fact that interviewees often have different memories of the same historical event, interpreting history through their accounts can be misleading. Nonetheless, oral history’s value can be realized by finding ways to increase the credibility of oral accounts.

Value

“Oral accounts of different groups have their own distinctive historical value,” said Xu Guoli, a professor from the School of Humanities at Shanghai University of Finance and Economics. Xu contends that social elites have a comprehensive and in-depth understanding of history, while popular understanding of history tends to be scattered and specific. Oral accounts from elite groups and the populace complement each other to paint a full historical picture.

Yang Xiangyin, dean of the Institute of Oral History at Wenzhou University, argued that in the 1950s and 1960s, oral history in the US valued oral accounts of the social elites, whereas in Great Britain during the same period, pioneers in oral history research focused on the oral testimony of ordinary people and disenfranchised groups. In contrast to the Western models, interviews with both social elites and ordinary people have been research objects since the discipline came to China in the late 1970s and early 1980s, laying a solid foundation for the further development of oral history.

Zuo Yuhe, a research fellow from the Institute of Modern Chinese History at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said that interviews of different social groups provide more perspectives through which researchers can approach historical facts. He contended that social elites, mostly decision makers and leaders, know more about the bigger picture, while the general public, who were participants in particular historical events, knows the details more clearly. Every individual has their specific viewpoint that adds diversity and richness to research materials. Neither the memory of elites nor that of the populace is superior to the other.

Credibility

While researching the academic value of oral history, differences in how social elites and the general public view history should be discreetly dealt with. Xu said it is reasonable that there might be contradictions in elite and popular memories. Researchers should impartially integrate the two kinds of memory using standardized academic principles when doing research.

Zuo emphasized the interaction between interviewers and interviewees. He suggested that though contradictions in memories are inevitable, the more their narratives approach reality, the more the findings of researchers will be accurate. Therefore, interviewees should maintain the utmost level of honesty and be responsible for their oral accounts. Details should not be over emphasized, and when it comes to vague details, omission is better than misinterpretation. Interviewers ought to build trust with subjects so that the parties involved are willing to tell them more about what happened.

Yang pointed out that oral history blends personal and public memories. Interviewees of different ages, genders, nationalities, beliefs, educational backgrounds and economic and social status can offer different historical experiences, acknowledgement and delivery. In practice, memories from all sectors of society should be examined in order to enrich and diversify materials for oral history research.

Methods

Today, credibility is the major problem in oral history research. Zhang Lianhong, a professor from Nanjing Normal University, pointed out that in order to increase the credibility of oral history, researchers should draw on two perspectives. For one thing, interviewers should be more professional. Also, a third person perspective should be emphasized. The stances, identities and biases of the interviewees should be carefully examined before reaching conclusions.

Xu said that interviewers should receive professional training in interviewing as well as sorting out and applying historical materials. They should adhere to academic norms to ensure that oral accounts from the interviewees are primary and intact. Based on this, researchers should use the research method of “textual criticism” to assess the credibility of the oral accounts by comparison with historical literature and archives. In addition, researchers must have abundant academic and life experience in order to better interpret those accounts and avoid being distracted by non-related materials.

Yang said that foreign scholars have developed a guide to test the credibility of oral historical accounts. For example, oral historians draw samples, a sociological research method to ensure that the interviewees are typical of certain targeted groups. Apart from interviewing different participants in the same historical events, holding conversations with the same participant several times can also clarify the contradictions found in oral accounts and thereby increase their credibility.