We are pleased to kick off our Oral History Summer School video series with this first interview between Michelle O'Brien and Suzanne Snider, discussing the NYC Trans Oral History Project, March 31, 2020.

In this interview, Michelle discusses how NYCTOHP has addressed outreach, compensation, transcription, the project's mission and more. Michelle also discusses the COVID-related death of Lorena Borjas.

More about Lorena Borjas

Listen to the Interview with Lorena in Spanish

Oral History Summer School was established in Hudson, New York, in 2012, as an immersive training program to help students from varied fields––writers, social workers, radio producers, artists, teachers, human rights workers––make use of oral history as an ethical interview practice in their lives and work (Read More: What is Oral History?)

Spanning the realms of scholarship, advocacy, media-making, and art, OHSS is a hands-on program, which means that students conduct interviews, design projects, produce radio documentary, and archive their recordings while learning the theoretical underpinnings of the field. We also offer advanced training in the form of focused workshops including those on memory loss, mixed ability interviewing, oral history-based documentary film, ethnomusicology, family history, and trauma.