By Kristine McCusker
We want to thank everyone who made the Oral History Association’s first virtual conference such a stunning success. We were grateful to the Program Committee, especially chairs Shanna Farrell and Kelly Navies, for organizing such a robust program. We also loved the virtual visit to Baltimore, thanks to the Local Arrangements chairs, Linda Shopes and Catherine Mayfield. Dan Kerr oversaw the entire process, and Allison Tracy-Taylor continued the Council’s strong support of these plans. Anna Kaplan was a tremendous help before, during and after the event, helping the Executive Office design and manage the conference, and the intrepid Faith Bagley made sure there were so few glitches in the execution of the conference.
As a follow-up to the conference, we are also reaching out to conference panelists to publish some of the conference sessions as a sort of virtual conference proceedings. This will be funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities CARES Act grant we received. Stay tuned for more information. In the meantime, did you miss a panel? If you registered for the conference, you can still access conference sessions through the Attendify app.
The obvious question, now, is what about next year? The answer is: we don’t know. There is still so much uncertainty because the situation with covid changes so rapidly. As we learn more, we will make sure to update the membership via the monthly News Blasts and via newsletters. Know that we are carefully watching the situation and planning strategically for any eventuality.
The end of the year is coming, so please update your memberships and help keep the OHA moving forward into 2021. Stay safe and best wishes for the end of the year.
