Oral History - guide to resources: Ireland

Calum Iain Maclean was a Scottish folklorist, collector, ethnographer and author. The Calum Maclean Collection Online Catalogue provides access in digital format to over 13,000 manuscript pages of transcriptions of mainly Scottish Gaelic folklore (primarily folktales as well as other materials) from his fieldwork. Its database is password protected and researchers must apply directly through the site for access. Maclean’s entire collections are held between the National Folklore Archive, University College Dublin and the School of Scottish Studies, University of Edinburgh.

Topics: Anthropology & Folklore

Keywords: ethnology; folktales; Gaelic; songs; stories

This website provides online access to selected audio recordings of the Cork Folklore Project. Interview extracts can be accessed through an interactive map of the Cork area or are searchable by topic.

Topics: Anthropology & Folklore; Arts & Culture; People; Work

Keywords: agriculture; community; death; games; music; sport

This oral history project was commissioned to commemorate the 125th Anniversary of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA). Oral history interviews were conducted with Irish people about their experiences of the GAA and its impact on their lives. A number of these interviews are available to read and listen to on the project website.

Topic: Arts & Culture; People

Keywords: family; migration; religion; sport; women

This website provides access to transcriptions of interviews conducted with elderly residents of the Glens abut their early memories of the area.

Topics: Anthropology & Culture; Arts & Culture; Education; People; War & Conflict; Work

Keywords: agriculture; childhood; community; sport; WWI; WWII

From 2001 to 2002, the Irish Centre for Migration Studies at the National University of Ireland in Cork conducted 11 life narrative interviews with recent immigrants to Ireland. Traditionally a country of emigration, the economic boom during the 1990s encouraged a wave of immigration into Ireland in the latter years of the decade. This project sought to record the experiences of some of these immigrants within their individual and collective life stories. The complete audio recording of six interviews with individuals from Nigeria and the Phillipines are currently available to listen to online.

Topics: People

Keywords: migration; refugees

The Leeds Archive of Vernacular Culture (LAVC) comprises the multi-media archives of the Survey of English Dialects (SED) that ran from the 1950s to early 1960s and the University of Leeds’s Institute of Dialect and Folk Life Studies (IDFLS) that operated 1964-1983. it includes, among many other formats, audio recordings of informants from most Survey localities as well as Over 800 audio recordings made by the Institute relating to dialect and folk life across the UK and abroad.

Topics: Anthropology & Folklore

Keywords: community; craft; dance; language; music; politics; songs

The National Folklore Collection's Audio & Video materials feature some 12,000 hours of audio recordings, including a large collection of early audio formats such as wax cylinders, acetate disks, wire-tape and magnetic-tape recordings. The interviews recorded cover many aspects of Irish folklore, folk music, ethnology and oral history, and were collected, for the most part, by professional fieldworkers. The recordings are in English and in Irish, with other languages, such as Breton, Manx and Scottish Gaelic, also represented. 329 hours of audio have been digitised via the Dúchas project.

Topics: Anthropology & Folklore

Keywords: customs; folktales; music; songs

A collaborative oral history project from Queen Mary University of London, Trinity College Dublin, and Dundalk Institute of Technology, which aimed to collect 100 interviews recording the memories and views of key figures in the Irish peace process since the 1960s. The decision was taken to embargo these interviews for up to 40 years in order to encourage frankness. The project website does provide an extensive list of links to previously conducted interviews regarding the peace process under the Layers of Meaning Online Directory section.

Topics: Politics & Government; War & Conflict

Keywords: art; community; education; politics; sport; union; women

This project, launched in 2000, represents the oral history strand of a research initiative entitled 'Women and Irish Society' run by University College Cork. The project interviewed women about their experiences of paid work, family life and schooling in the Munster counties of Cork, Kerry and Limerick during the period from 1936 to 1960. The project sought to explore how women in Munster experienced or reacted to prevailing social, cultural and legal definitions of women as home-based workers. The audio recordings of 41 individual interviews are currently available to read online, and short audio clips of the interviews are also arranged by category.

Topics: People; Work

Keywords: education; family; gender; women

YouTube provides access to a large quantity of resources, both oral history interviews and information videos on the conduct and practice of oral history. Some organisations, archives and oral history projects have their own YouTube channels.

Topics: Anthropology & Folklore; Arts & Culture; Education; People; Politics & Government; Science & Medicine; War & Conflict; Work

Keywords: portal