National Museum of the American Indian
About Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian and repatriation.
Native American Heritage + Thanksgiving
A collection of resources to celebrate Native American Heritage month and Thanksgiving.
Thickening the Narrative: A Definition
Thickening the narrative, a term borrowed from Narrative Therapy, a discipline that centers the stories people tell about themselves, and facilitates seeking new stories when the old stories no longer serve them.
The Body Keeps the Score
A foundational text for how trauma is embodied, and an important work to help you write and elicit difficult stories.
Joyful Recollections of Trauma
Though any memoir could be considered documentary practice, this particular one was inspired by Scheer diving into his own archives (or collections). It's also hilarious and heartbreaking.
Twilight: Los Angeles 1992
A tour-de-force play and film by Anna Deveare Smith, born out of interviews with people who were involved with or part of the fabric of Los Angeles in the aftermath of the Rodney King riots.
Considering the Space-History of your Archive
A list of inspirations that consider space and land as a crucial part of the history and story that we tell.
Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do
A fascinating look at jobs and what great documentation and oral history can convey.
Southern Foodways Alliance
The Southern Foodways Alliance documents, studies, and explores the diverse food cultures of the changing American South.
Oral History Association
The Oral History Association is a membership and professional association with incredible articles and toolkits for those who want to conduct ethical and effective oral history interview.
Center for Oral History and Cultural Heritage
The Center for Oral History and Cultural Heritage has collected and preserved the stories of Mississippians from all walks of life. Housed at the University of Southern Mississippi.
American Folklife Center
American Folklife Center, a branch of the Library of Congress, is a respository of everyday folk life in America.
An Ethical Community-Embedded Artistic Practice
This article, Toolkit for Community-Embedded Artistic Practice by Lane Michael Stanley, offers a toolkit of questions to consider for those who seek to have a community-embedded artistic practice, based on his own experience in recovery housing and his time developing plays with unhoused people.
Archival Supplies Vendors
A list of trusted vendors for archival supplies such as photo boxes, negative sleeves, and folders.
Writing Alone and with Others
This book has a wealth of memoir writing exercises that can easily be adapted to writing about family and community histories. If your family/community responds better to writing prompts than an oral history interview, this book is an excellent resource to jog memories.
Pictures from Home, Larry Sultan
First published in 1992 to wide critical acclaim, Pictures From Home is Larry Sultan’s pendant to his parents. We often think about archives as something that gets saved, memorialized, put away to be discovered for other generations.
Institute for Oral History, Baylor University
The Institute for Oral History creates oral history memoirs by preserving a sound recording and transcript of interviews with individuals who are eyewitnesses to history. Excellent workshops and resources on the site.
Center for Documentary Studies, Duke University
Duke University’s Center for Documentary Studies (CDS) is dedicated to documentary expression and its role in creating a more just society. CDS teaches, produces and presents the documentary arts across a full range of media — photography, audio, film, writing, experimental and emerging media.
ReVisioning History Series
This series from Penguin Random House is an excellent addition into telling untold stories, revisioning the history that gets told in classrooms and to the general public.