The News of Month; September 2020

The Record of Well-Educated Individuals Life-Experience in the Form of Oral History

Compiled by: Iranian Oral History Website
Translated by: Fazel Shirzad

2020-9-29

Note: According to the Iranian Oral History website, "the News of Month" is the title of a series of reports on this website. These reports take a look at news related to the subject of the website is written and virtual media. In the following, you will read news from the month of Shahrivar 1399[1].

► On August 25th, the news of the death of Ruhollah Hosseinian who was the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Documentation Center, and died by Coronavirus, made headlines in many historical news agencies and specialized websites. According to his deputy for oral history at the Islamic Revolutionary Documentation Center, Hosseinian rescued the historiography of the revolution from exile, and from the day he entered the documentation center, he said that the Imam's command in the field of historiography should be taken into account. The result of his efforts is more than 1400 books in the field of revolutionary historiography.

►General Ghasemi, Advisor to the Minister and Head of Coordination of Veterans Affairs of the Ministry of Sports and Youth, said that compiling the oral history of sports and youth during the 8 years of sacred defense was one of our important programs this year. We could compile and prepare this history by conducting interviews with your veterans according to the circular issued by the first vice president.

►The book "Sands and Epics", the oral history of "Mohammad Ershadi", one of the commanders of the sacred defense era of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province, has been published with the support of the General Directorate of Preservation of Relics and Dissemination of the Values of the Sacred Defense of this province, and is available for those interested in the culture of self-sacrifice and martyrdom.

►The instruction was prepared for conducting an oral history interview of the Research Institute of the National Archives and Library of Iran were compiled to record the life-experience with Corona days, some well-educated individuals', people of science, and culture. Based on this instruction, how to conduct interviews and advance the process with well-educated individuals and people of science and culture was determined and provided to those involved in this field.

►The book "In the Color of Patience", the sixth volume of the collection of the oral history of Imam Musa Sadr Institute and the collection of memoirs and narrations of Fatemeh Sadr, sister of Imam Musa Sadr, and the wife of Seyyed Mohammad Baqir Sadr was published. This book has been compiled by Fatemeh Naghavi and includes 3 chapters entitled "Meeting in Tehran; Father's house", "Meeting in Najaf; Living together" and "Events and Incidents."

►The meeting of activists in the field of publishing the culture of self-sacrifice and martyrdom was held in the Radio Martyrs Building with the focus on the production of illustrated books and oral history. Some officials attended in there including Deputy of National Media Voice, Deputy Minister of Culture and Public Relations of the Army Political Ideological Organization, Head of the Organization for Preservation and Dissemination of Sacred Defense Values od Army, Head of the Organization for the Publication of Works and Values of Women's Participation in Sacred Defense, and Director General of Documents and Publications of the Martyr Foundation and Director of Iran Voice.

►Parnian Voice is expressing the oral history of radio for the audience, introducing the greats of radio and broadcasting their works, broadcasting lasting historical and audible works of radio, expressing the memories of old radio programs, which are also displayed visually in the Iran Voice application. This program will be broadcast on Fridays at 10 pm for 4 hours, performed, and produced by Saeed Tavakol.

►The Director General of Preservation of Relics and Dissemination of the Values of the Sacred Defense in Lorestan said that we used the capacity of volunteer students to collect and compile the oral history and works related to clerics, who were present on the fronts, with the cooperation of the representative of the Supreme Leader in Hazrat Abolfazl (PBUH) Corps of the province.

► The head of the Media and Cyberspace Center of the Seminaries also said that we were trying to produce the oral history of the seminaries with the help of the professors and elders of the seminary so that it would be a source of goodness and blessings for students and other sections of society.

►The governor of Isfahan said: "All executive bodies are required to collect documents and compile a history of eight years of sacred defense throughout the country and interview with at least 20% of veterans to record and compile their oral history."

►In an interview with Mizan News Agency, Seyyed Qassem Yahseni spoke about the content of the book "Resistance in Susangard" and said that this book showed a glimpse of the praiseworthy bravery of the people of Susangard and Dasht-e-Azadegan against Saddam's demonic forces. This book was the oral memoirs of Ali Balshi, a member of the Susangard Revolutionary Guards Command Council at the beginning of the revolution.

►Tehran Independent Theater has announced its new programs in which Sadr al-Din Zahid, actor, director, and well-known member of the theater workshop will be one of the hosts for the Oral History of Iranian Theater meeting in the Independent Theater of Cafe Bam on Fridays. In these meetings, which is held with students and enthusiasts, Zahid talks about his professional experiences in the theater of the 40s and 50s of solar years.

►Qasem Fattahi, referring to the publication of the book "Oral History of the Significant Martyrs of the Islamic Revolution in Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari" by the Culture and Resistance Studies Unit of the Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari Islamic Revolution Art Center, said that this book was about the biographies of three martyrs of the province who have been martyred during the struggles of the Islamic Revolution: Martyr "Ali Mohammad Moradi Sibaki", martyr "Seyed Abbas Salehi Ghahfarkhi" and martyr "Ghorban Ali Davoodi Farsani".

►The book "Baba Rajab", the fourth book in the oral history of heroic women, including the memoirs of Touba Zarandi, the wife of martyr Rajab Mohammadzadeh, has recently been published in 240 pages and 1000 copies at a cost of 29,000 Toman[2] by Setareha Publishing.

►The monthly "Oral History", that its eight issues have already been published; In its latest issues, it intends to publish oral history research with a scientific and research approach. The latest issue of this journal, edited by Morteza Nouraei, will be published based on interviews, with a focus on absorbing and publishing research and technical texts. in addition to modeling, the ground for the development and scientific institutionalization of oral history in the country is to be smoother in the new approach of this journal to extend the scope of oral history with public interest towards the generalization of history.

►Surah Mehr Publications has recently published two books, "Footprints of the Fog" and "It was 5 o'clock" focusing on the oral history of the defense of the shrine and the years of the sacred defense, and set them to the market. "Footprints of the Fog" contains Ali Poorshokuhi’s oral memories of the Syrian war, which took place in the country from 2015 to 2107. The book "It was 5 o'clock" also includes the memoirs of Hussein Saami, one of the freedmen and veterans of the sacred defense era. Hossein Ali Ehsani has collected and compiled the memoirs of these veterans, who was from Semnan, in 6 chapters.

►Shahram Mirab Aghdam, the director of the documentary series on the oral history of "Iranian Cinema", said about the production process of this project: "This collection is being produced by the Surah Documentary Center in seven chapters; the initial recording and editing of three chapters has been completed so far, and we are sounding, correcting and recording the speech of the text. He clarified: The first chapter has a brief look at the pre-revolutionary cinema until the middle of 1983; the second chapter examines from 1983 to 1993, and in the third chapter we deal with the years 1993 to 1997."

► Colonel Amir Abbas Armand, Director General of Preservation of Relics and Dissemination of the Values of the Sacred Defense of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad, announced the publication of a book entitled "Booty Boots", on the oral history of Colonel Ali Mardan Rustad, one of the commanders of the Sacred Defense era in this province, and said: "This book has been published by Abolhassan Naserpour in 475 pages." He also announced the publication of the book "From Fayyazieh to Loan" and stated that this book was the oral history of Colonel Seyyed Asad Mousavi, one of the warriors of the holy defense era of this province, which was written in 276 pages by Seyyed Ali Hosseini and published by the Foundation for the Preservation of Relics and Dissemination of the Values of the Sacred Defense has been published. "Proud Palms" is another book that general Asmand announced the publication of it and said that this book was the oral history of Colonel Fereydoun Bahadori, one of the glorious warriors of the sacred defense of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad, which has been written in 184 pages by Hamid Reza Safaei Nasrabad.

►The head of the Socio-Cultural Research Institute of the Ministry of Science, Research and Technology, emphasizing the attention of the National Archives and Library of Iran for recording the experience of well-educated Individuals' life-experience with Corona days, stated that recording the well-educated individuals' life-experience orally can interact with the educational system of the country and bring this life-experience in the textbook.

►The Director General of Preservation of Relics and Publication of the Values of the Sacred Defense of South Khorasan stated that 10 books on the oral history of the sacred defense of South Khorasan would be unveiled during the sacred defense week.

►Referring to the program of collecting and compiling the oral history of three hundred IRGC commanders in the sacred defense, Adviser to the Commander-in-Chief of the IRGC and Head of the Sacred Defense Documents and Research Center said that 115 of them have been compiled.

► A new website has recently been launched to publish the oral history of Muslim life in Brooklyn, USA. This website, entitled "Muslims in Brooklyn", is owned by the Brooklyn Historical Society and has published dozens of oral histories of Muslim life, and according to Zahir Ali, the project coordinator, everyone can enter into this website and access the narrations quoted from Muslims.