Oral Histories
Our project fills a gap in Jewish Studies archives. This isÌıthe first major collecting initiative around JOC and willÌıprovide a basis for expanding CU’s collecting initiatives. This project will provide material for academic and community researchers to further explore the myriad stories of JOC. There are several archival institutions with robust Jewish oral history archives that exist in the U.S., the most notable and established being the New York Public Library’s Dorot Jewish Division’s American Jewish Committee Oral History Collection, which spans a collecting period of 25 years. Only a small percentage of these oral histories are available digitally and very few of them focus on the experiences of JOC. Archival collections containing material pertaining to JOC can be found in repositories throughout the U.S. They are scattered among a number of different institutions—most notably the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Temple University, Yeshiva University, American Jewish Historical Society, Benson Latin American Collection - University of Texas Austin, and University of Washington, Special Collections. However, there has never been a concerted effort to create a digital archive specifically focused on documenting and disseminating the myriad perspectives of individuals who identify as JOC.
Please check back here as we continue to build this important and exciting collection!