Oral history: an innovative method for environmental communication?

by Silvia Musso



For last 5 years The Historic New Orleans Collection (THNOC), research center dedicated to the study and preservation of the history and culture of New Orleans and the Gulf South region of the United States, has been working to a wide oral history project to document the consequences of Hurricane Katrina’s environmental disaster in Louisiana.

This environmental disaster was also one of the largest media events in American history. But the information showed some deficiencies. Oral historian and coordinator of the project Mark Cave claims that: «Journalists from all over the world descended on New Orleans and often limited to blame the first responding agencies for the botched response to the disaster».

The result was a closure of the agencies that decided not to speak to the media in order to minimize bad public relations. In this context, characterized, on one hand, by a media overexposure and, on the other, by a communication gap, THNOC intervened with an ambitious oral history project based on the collections of direct evidences and of interviews of first agencies’ personnel. This project can be seen as the result of an environmental communication of the post disaster that is not just a sad report of what happened, but a way to give answers, to help and to communicate risk situations.

Thanks to over than 600 interviews of the personnel of New Orleans Fire Department, Disaster Medical Assistance Team and Louisiana department of Wildlife and Fisheries, to make some examples, «this project – Mr. Cave stresses – can do much to prevent these gaps from occurring and can provide a blueprint for future oral history work and the work of journalists. First responding agencies provide the largest pool of potential reliable interviewees. A systematic attempt to record the narratives of their members while memories of events are still relatively clear provides an efficient method of casting a wide net over a historical event like Katrina. Such a project can do much to make an institution relevant and responsive to the needs of its community post-disaster, and offers to the oral historian a unique role, and responsibility in this environment».

The project developed alongside 2 lines: an extensive oral history program focused on recording the experiences of first responders and a citywide photo documentary project intended to capture the the chaos left in Katrina’s wake. Selections from these projects form the core of Katrina + 5. Other items on exhibit include historical maps and documents exploring the history of tidal flooding and storm surge in New Orleans over the course of the past two centuries and a multimedia station featuring an interactive timeline. Slide shows from six of the oral histories featured in the exhibition can be seen on our You Tube channel, THNOCVIDEO.

All these aspects that help to furnish a faceted framework of the history of the natural catastrophe that hit the unprepared New Orleans, shows how it is possible to use the methodology of oral history for an analysis of an environmental disaster. The project is a report of Katrina starting from its formation to arrive to the social and environmental consequences.

Thinking of the possible applications of oral history in environmental communication could be very interesting to focus on memory of disasters, to learn from all that happened before, during and after the storm and to give significance of every human life.

For now we leave the question open, hoping to recall it again. What is sure is that THNOC, aware of the importance of historical memory and sensitive to environmental issues, is working to a new project “All things both great and small”, to document the impact of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill on the wildlife of southeastern Louisiana throughput the interviews to people involved in the wildlife rescue operations.