2024 Oral History Association Annual Meeting

Join us for an upbeat mix of showing and telling. This plenary will focus on Cincinnati's historic African American neighborhood, the West End. We will begin with an interactive "how-to" session with the local story-centric non-profit, A Picture's Worth, then lead into our panel with a brief historical sketch of the neighborhood and its partial destruction. The session will conclude with a roundtable discussion from three oral history practitioners working with the last generation of African Americans to have lived in the lower part of the West End before it was destroyed. These resilient elders saw their homes, churches, schools, and entire neighborhood demolished, weathered displacement, and reestablished themselves in new neighborhoods throughout the city. The three projects presented will show us how they are preserving and sharing their stories.