Secretary of Oral History Workgroup of Iranian Society of History:

Oral history Can Be Used For Sustainable Development of the Country

Shima Donyadar Rostami
Translated by Ruhollah Golmoradi

2019-2-19

In a conversation with correspondent of Iranian Oral History Website, Faezeh Tavakoli stated, "The Iranian History's oral history workgroup has planned a series of sessions on field of oral history studies, which has a cross-cultural nature, and sessions of "the link between oral history and cultural history", "the link between oral history and social history" and "the link between oral history and Political Science" were held.
The secretary of Iranian Society of History's oral history workshop continued, "My goal is to publish a book on "Oral History and Interdisciplinary Studies "after the book of "Oral History: Theoretical, Methodological Issues (Basics)" which was published by Sooreh Mehr Publication.

Referring to the fact that theoretical basics of oral history in Iran are very weak, she added: "oral history is often regarded as an approach and method, but I intend to study oral history as a scientific discipline. As in University of Columbia, oral history has presented as an academic discipline and students study until Ph.D., I hope that one day in our country, academic centers introduce oral history as a university discipline.

According to Tavakoli, we are poor in theoretical foundations of oral history. Oral history scholars now pragmatically and operationally use interview tool. We are going to deepen this operational approach to advance in discourse analysis and narrative analysis. In areas of the imposed war, there are many achievements from various memories of political people and classes of people that we can turn these recorded memories of oral history into meta-analysis.

Emphasizing that meta-analysis of oral history in the current period (four decades after Islamic Revolution) is very important, she remarked, "Events and incidents of the country during this period require a re-exploring, and oral history can probe in these areas. 

The secretary of oral history workgroup of Iran Society of History continued, "On the other hand, recording oral history of Iranian industries is highly important. I know carpet industry after oil industry as Iran's most important industry. At the time of Pahlavi, among Iran population which was more than 30 million, 10 million people involved in the industry. Discussion of oral history of industries in cities should be enforced through oral history workgroups, and in particular Resistance (sustainability) Office of Hozeh Honari.

Referring to the words of Oil Minister Engineer Zanganeh, she said, "We do not have oil resources for more than 100 years and our gas resources will be ended by the next 300 years; while the artist's people are main wealth of the country and the carpet industry could be restored again. Unfortunately, we are so weak in this field that we are contending with rivals such as India and China in international level. The fact is that oral history of more than one thousand year old carpet industry that was formed  have not been recorded, which was formed with by hands of Iranian women. Women in underground hallways, in storeroom and in extremely difficult conditions, created magnificent carpets and manifested the industry; as Iran is known in the world with its most beautiful ancient industry that is "carpet". It is important to re-exploring this area of ​​industry in order to revive it. Therefore, oral history has no limitation in terms of object.

Tavakoli emphasized, "I believe that even if we consider it in terms of employment, if a huge building to be given to oral history practitioners, they can employ several million unemployed people through "oral history"; because oral history has a very valuable place and is one of the most important historical documents and resources. If old coins and jugs are referred as a viable document in history, now with regarding technology, we are dealing with humans as living documents and verbal documents that can be used in all areas for transforming organizations, education, environment etc. Therefore, oral history can be used for sustainable development of the country. To create a linkage between generations, we need to make the link through oral history.

Tavakoli remarked about necessity of recording oral history in organizations, "Iranian Society of History's Oral History Workgroup approved a project (later it approved in the cabinet) that all organizations form a department as oral history. We can have oral history practitioners as many as people who have ability to record achievements based on their taste. For example, oral history of varzeš-e bāstānī (ancient sport) is also being recorded.

Stating that official agency of oral history in the country is now NLAI, which has done many efforts in this field, she said, "We have to pass field of mere oral history and enter from subject to object; that is, we must address it in a subject-oriented and systematic way, and open angles in historical fields, not just to align works of oral history in library. Motives and outcomes of oral history should be systematically extracted.