Oral History Commons^™

Humanizing The Enslaved Of Fort Monroe’S Arc Of Freedom, William R. Kelly Jr.

Journal of Contemporary Archival Studies

Fort Monroe, located in Hampton, Virginia, was a United States Army post until its deactivation in 2011. President Barack Obama proclaimed Fort Monroe a national monument due to its complex history, including its ties to slavery and emancipation. This paper outlines an ongoing research project designed to identify and humanize both the enslaved who helped build the fort and those who were declared as contraband there during the American Civil War. Housed in the National Archives and Records Administration in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the United States Army Engineer Records from 1819 to 1866 is the main area of focus for this …

Post-Partition Sikh Immigrant Experiences In The United States, Athamjit Singh Dhaddey

History

The project titled, "Post-Partition Sikh Immigrant Experiences in the United States," begins to explore the different factors that contributed to the migration of Sikhs to the United States. Beginning during the first decade of the 1900s, Sikhs began to migrate to the United States for a variety of reasons. It wasn't until the partition of India and Pakistan in 1947 that we began to see these numbers increase dramatically. The main primary sources in this paper are oral histories from three of those immigrants during that time. With their stories, we are able to dive deeper into the different experiences …

Recollection And Social Status, Edward Brennan

Books/Book chapters

Television sets appeared in homes across the world during the 1950s and 1960s. Early audiences were researched in terms of ratings and so on, but the perceptions and experiences of early television viewers went unrecorded. There are no ready-made, bottom–up companion pieces to top–down institutional histories. In the absence of such work, life- story research offers one of our best means of attempting to capture the experiences of early viewers. This chapter offers an argument about the nature of memory. It argues that personal recollection, in memory interviews and other contexts, is practical; that people announce their pasts in a …

North Of Ourselves: Identity And Place In Jim Wayne Miller’S Poetry, Micah Mccrotty

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Jim Wayne Miller’s poetry examines how human history and topography join to create place. His work often incorporates images of land and ecology; it deliberately questions the delineation between place and self. This thesis explores how Miller presents images of water to describe the relationship between inhabitants and their location, both with the positive image of the spring and the negative image of the flood. Additionally, this thesis examines how the Brier, Miller’s most prominent persona character, grieves his separation from home and ultimately finds healing and reunification of the self through his return to the hills. In his poetry, …

Dance Of Exile: The Sakharoffs’ Visual Performances In Montevideo (1935–1948), Pablo Munoz Ponzo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis explores the life-work chronology of the dancers and choreographers Clotilde von Derp (whose surname then was Sakharoff) and Alexander Sakharoff, who were exiled in Montevideo, Uruguay, and Buenos Aires, Argentina, between 1941 and 1948. During their stay in the Rio de la Plata region, the Sakharoffs stirred up the art scene by performing extremely detailed dances with great attention to costume design. This thesis begins with a review of the reception of the dancers’ performances by the artistic and cultural circles in Montevideo, arguing that the Sakharoffs’ “queer” trajectory resonated with the Uruguayan artistic community, influencing the creation …

The Forgotten Comrades: Leftist Women, Palestinians, And The Jordanian Communist Party, 1936–1957, Fadi H. Kafeety

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The Middle East in the 1950s was the site of major contestation for popular support and power. In Jordan, a militant anti-imperialist movement emerged with a platform centered around expelling British forces and abrogating the Anglo-Jordanian treaty. In the struggle between monarchism and republicanism, the Jordanian Communist Party and Ba’ath Party were the catalyzing anti-imperial forces in the first decade of Jordan’s nominal independence. Despite having a militant core of feminists within their ranks, women of the Jordanian Communist Party—who were instrumental in politicizing and radicalizing the first phase of the Jordanian Women’s Movement—have been systematically erased from this critical …

Becoming Legible: The Racial Making Of The Negro Mascogo/Black Seminole People In The Coahuila–Texas Borderland, Rocío Gil Martínez De Escobar

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This historical ethnography analyzes the making of the Negro Mascogo/Black Seminole people as part of the production of the Coahuila-Texas borderland. In the quest to become legible to improve their living conditions and maintain a sense of dignity, Negros Mascogos/Black Seminoles use history and racialization as tools of negotiation between themselves and the two nation-states where they live: Mexico and the United States. I analyze the Negro Mascogo/Black Seminole people as a case of racialization that illustrates the ongoing mechanisms of settler colonialism (dispossession, exploitation, and elimination via genocide or assimilation), as they play out in specific socio-historical contexts.

The …

Morals And Martial Arts: A Woman's Place Of Empowerment Through Judo, Sydney Wall

Senior Honors Projects

This study explores the experiences of women within the world of judo, a combat sport derived from ancient samurai hand-to-hand combat techniques. Although judo was founded as a sport in the 1880s, there was no women’s section until 1923 and, even then, women were barred from competition out of concern for its impact on their ability to have children. It would not be until 1992 that women’s judo became a part of the Olympic program. These limitations on women’s participation have simultaneously resulted from and contributed to the association of judo with notions of masculinity. Despite almost thirty years of …

“We Were Just Trying To, You Know, Survive”: Coming Of Age As A Displaced Person And Narrative, Eli Megibben

Undergraduate Theses

“Home” is a personal construct that shapes who we are. It is not a physical place, but rather an experience tied to a place. How are people to respond, then, when the socio-political institutions that rule the land that they call home say “you’re not allowed to exist because of who you are and where you come from”? In this project, I investigate the effects that physical displacement (by way of war and violent conflict) have on an individual’s identity through the analysis of narratives composed by individuals who were displaced by the Holocaust, the Bosnian war, and the current …

Interview No. 1718, Alicia Sarmiento Ramirez

Combined Interviews

Alicia Sarmiento Ramirez was born in El Paso Texas, on May 11, 1946, and she recently applied for the renewal of her passport and her birth certificate said that she was born in Smelter Town, Texas because at that time it used to be separate from El Paso it was like a separate county. Her father used to be a supervisor on an American Melter called ASARCO, and her mother was a housekeeper and she had 3 sisters and her mom took care of them. Her dad worked since 1945 at ASARCO as a supervisor, he got the position because …

Two Poems: Stop Time Before; Forsaken Ones, Ánh-Hoa Thị Nguyễn

Journal of Southeast Asian American Education and Advancement

This creative work features two poems: Stop Time Before; Forsaken Ones

Sage, Johnna Ossie

Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection

Sage explored her highly religious upbringing and relationship with her family. She is of Greek descent and her Greek-American culture played a large role in shaping her identity. Her parents rejected her during her young adulthood due to her sexuality and Sage discussed the impact that the ostracization had on her development. Her positive experience with being a part of a long-term, loving lesbian relationship was one that she frequently came back to during the course of the interview. On top of relationships and religion, Sage also examined her experiences undergoing workplace harassment and feeling unwelcome and unsafe in many …

Written And Oral Histories Of The Chicano Movement At New Mexico Highlands University, 1968-1970, Julianna C. Wiggins

Spanish and Portuguese ETDs

This thesis presents spoken, written, and drawn histories produced before the Chicano Movement at New Mexico Highlands University in November 1970 and the discourses which have followed in the movement’s wake fifty years later. This qualitative study explores the campus climate at NMHU using the student newspaper Highlands Candle. Its contents from 1968 until 1971 are contrasted with the multiple voices of a generation which adopted the term Chicano as a racial identifier into the NMHU vernacular. Social factors including the formation of student-of-color groups and the return of veterans from the Vietnam War appear to change the student …

Interview No. 1720, Ismael Ortega

Combined Interviews

His name is Ismael Ortega he was born on July 7, 1946, and raised in El Paso where he attended school, he went to El Paso High for High School. His mother was a servant for George Dickenson and lived at his house where she worked. He started working in ASARCO when he was 25 years old in the year 1974 on the month of July. He worked at the plant because he wanted to have a good future for his family, and they had good benefits, so he decided to work there. His first job at ASARCO was at …

Interview No. 1716, Anastacio Zavala

Combined Interviews

Anastacio Zavala was born in El Paso Texas, he used to live in an area called Francis. His father was a liver and he used to have a horse and they used to ride it. He started working at ASARCO on June 30, 1965, at the age of mid-30s, he started working because of the death of his neighbor, and they called him and he needed to have a high school diploma and he was able to work there. His first job was in the department and he was going to be transferred but someone had an accident and he …

Interview No. 1712, Jaime Archuleta

Combined Interviews

Jaime Archuleta was born in the lower valley in El Paso (Ysleta), but he grew up in Sunland Park, New Mexico. His mom used to stay home and take care of them, while his dad worked as a carpenter all over the southwest.

Jaime started working at Asarco in 1993 when he was about 38 years old. He wanted to work in Asarco because he left a job in Arizona where he worked on a copper smelter so his experiences helped him to get into Asarco. When he first started there he worked as a maintenance mechanic. He worked there …

Nick Martin's Communism, Dylan Bagley, Matthew Kenwood

Cold War Lives

This project examines the life and career of Hungarian-born athlete Nick Martin. It explores the opportunities available to Martin via his success as an Olympic athlete.

Communism, Post-Communism, Sport, And Patriotism In 1980s-1990s Hungary, Sarah Johns, Morgana Olbrich

Cold War Lives

We will argue that Communism left long lasting effects on the ways in which patriotism was perceived and executed through labor. Specifically we will look into the ways in which laborers, namely athletes, both intentionally and unintentionally used their work to gain privileges.

How Politics Can Shape Sports And The Athletes Who Perform: A Case Study Of Hungarian Gymnastics During The Cold War, Julia Adams, Corinne Cichowicz

Cold War Lives

The purpose of the project is to juxtapose how politics and government structure shape the world of sports, as well as the progress of individual sports, with the isolation of athletes from the political realities of their respective nations. We assert that contemporary politics is directly reflected in the sports community through the way athletes interact and the ways other nations perceive athletes’ treatment. We argue that around the Hungarian Revolution, Eastern countries like Hungary attempted to perform their strength by giving privileges that allowed athletes to excel while western nations like the United States focused on fostering their savior …

Ossie, Johnna Conference Paper “Querying The Past: Intergenerational Conversations And Queer Community”, Johnna Ossie

Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection

Paper from a presentation given by Johnna Ossie (University of Southern Maine, Class of 2019)

Talking Bodies: fourth biennial interdisciplinary, international conference

Institute of Gender Studies at the University of Chester, England

April 10 - 13, 2019.

Citation

Please cite as: Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer+ Collection, Jean Byers Sampson Center for Diversity in Maine, University of Southern Maine Libraries.

For more information about the Querying the Past: Maine LGBTQ Oral History Project, please contact Dr. Wendy Chapkis.