Oral History Progress

Reflecting back to the last couple of weeks before the end of the semester, before thanksgiving break Shandra, Alex and I agreed on our parts of the project. I had an interview that I recorded using my iphone with the Robeldo family that I emailed to both Shandra and Alex. However, due to the file being too large to send over through my phone signal, it was not until the following week that I was informed that they did not received it. This caused some delay in our mutual decision to go over the interview to try to really break down the dates, names, and addresses that were left a bit unclear in the first written report of the interview. After Shandra received and confirmed getting the interview, we both came up with a brief summary of the family history and compared notes. Alex volunteered to get the scrapbook and we agreed to get started on creating the book during our following class day. Overall, I remember really enjoying my experience that far with the project. I had never given a formal interview before and actually found it a lot harder then I had imagined. I wanted to give equal time to both Mr. and Mrs. Robeldo but found it a little difficult to redirect the question to one when one of them jumped in with their thoughts about the subject. Naturally I appreciated the enthusiasm  I felt from both of them but found myself unprepared to separate their answers in the word document I had created. If I had the opportunity to do it again, I would have made a clear outline for one person and other one for the other instead of jumbling it all together and trying to clear it up afterwards. I also wished I had better understanding of what kinds of questions to ask. Before I interview them, I researched to types of questions to ask and organized a series of question that I thought followed a locally sequence and allowed for an open ended response. However, I found that these open ended response often lead to information that I would later seek and so at times my questions appeared to be redundant. The experience of interviewing however is far more useful then information I could have gathered through research and feel I've gain some insight on how to better approach interviewees. For me, it was really useful to talk to them in person instead of over the phone or through another source of communication before as cliche as it sounds, it really makes it more personal and rewarding. I was able to enter the home of this family and see how they lived for myself. I got to walk through their neighborhood and had an encounter with the people boarding at a bus stop. I got to see the process of gentrification before our scheduled class trip and it really made the project more real. Gentrification really is happening. As I walked to their house, I remember seeings what appeared to be government housing and noticed the racial demographics, and was literally shocked as I walked a block away and saw young white people coming out of juan in a million.The current integration between the new and the old residents is was very visible.