E CONNELL

Oral History Interview

StoryCorps URL: https://archive.storycorps.org/interviews/fys-interview-about-the-theme-of-pandemics-with-abbey-mcbrayer-by-elijah-connell/

Student Reflection

I learned that a lot of planning is involved for conducting an oral history interview. The most challenging aspect was finding someone to interview. The most enjoyable part was watching the interviewee’s eyes light up when I was interviewing them and they got to put their story out there.

I learned that people go through a lot more stress than I had originally thought.

Actually conducting an oral history interview felt somewhat strange but I grew to enjoy it a decent bit as I saw a bit more of a person that I already thought was pretty cool. Seeing the humanity in people is a pretty cool experience, but seeing it in the people you already admire is even better.

Suggestions for improvement: I would recommend emphasizing the use of more diverse topics as pandemics and protests can be fairly narrow.

When talking to a future student I would probably emphasize the need for several-steps-ahead sort of planning. This assignment is worth a large portion of the grade thus requires tedious care and planning to be sure it goes right