Do you maintain oral histories, your own or your family?

"And ultimately, our family was related to every crowned head of Europe, but they decided to leave for the New Wold anyway."

I have no oral history with my family. We're a strictly anal klan.

I maintain a log of all the oral I have provided in my history. Does that count?

Do any of you have any recordings of your parents or grandparents that you made before they died?

I've got the stories from the elders. Need to write them down before I stoke out. Ugh.

Why do you feel you need to write them down?

A genealogy forum would be the best place to ask these questions. Just google genealogy or genealogy forum.

Cause they were oral to my ears.

R8 please feel free to ask your genealogy questions in a genealogy forum. This is about oral history. Since you are not familiar with the term, some Studs Terkel might be a good introduction. (That's a writer not a pron star so go to your local library not to pornhub.)

R10 Sorry, I thought you said you wanted to collect oral history from your relatives before they died. This is very much a part of genealogy or family history. Don't know why you think this forum is the best place for such a question, judging by some of the answers you got. I was just trying to be helpful.

R8 r11 Oral history is about memories and culture, not just creating a family tree on genealogy dot com.

And why do you think DL is not an appropriate forum for my question or topic? This place is filled with amazing personal and family stories.

Sure there are the Deficients bitchin' on here too, mostly knee jerk insecurities I think. But one does not pay attention to them, much less let them deter one from posting a grown up discussion. And sure, many worthy subjects do not catch fire on here while a lot of unworthy ones do!

There are oral history departments and projects in universities, libraries and museums if you prefer interaction on a more dignified forum. I can direct you to some if you like but google is your friend.

The point is.... Well, we haven't reached the point yet. And may never here if I'm hearing you correctly. So I'll stop here.

[quote]How do you do it? Where do you store the recordings?

Well, I thought that since collecting oral histories is something that genealogists do, they could intelligently answer these questions from personal experience.

R8 Maybe. The fields are related. All social sciences are.

Maybe there's a genealogist or an oral historian on here too. Or a historian for that matter, even though neither you nor I may be any of those. And there are other forums too no doubt. Some even better and professional.

Why you think this is an inappropriate forum for this topic is what beats me.

[quote]Why you think this is an inappropriate forum for this topic is what beats me.

Have you received one helpful reply from anyone else? I truly hope that someone gives you the reply you were hoping for.

I just keep the fat little tramp's performances on VHS tapes in the Pageant Room

in a cardboard box behind the displays of all my crowns and sashes

OP, regarless of how you maintain the oral histories, my advice would be to follow the old Nike slogan and "Just Do It!" One of my aunts knew that I had heart-to-hearts with my grandmother and she'd tell me things she didn't tell the other grandchildren (or even her own children). My aunt asked me to record her, but I got cold feet because I thought it would make my grandmother uncomfortable. By assuming that and not asking her permission to record her, and opportunity was lost. So just go for it and you can get help archiving them digitally.

*regardless

Yes r17 the memories are priceless even if they are important only to us.