NYC Covid-19 Oral History, Narrative, and Memory Project - Incite at Columbia University

Active Project

NYC Covid-19 Oral History, Narrative, and Memory Project

  • Led by Columbia Center for Oral History Research
  • Team
    • Peter Bearman Project Director
    • Nyssa Chow Co-Director
    • Mary Marshall Clark Co-Director
    • Ryan Hagen Co-Director
    • Denise Milstein Co-Director
    • Amy Starecheski Co-Director
    • Maurice Ivy Dowell Former Project Coordinator
  • Funding National Science Foundation Board of Trustees of the American Assembly
  • Contact covid19archive@gmail.com

Starting in March 2020, our team of sociologists, oral historians, and anthropologists at Incite and the Columbia Center for Oral History Research began building an archive documenting New York City’s experience of the pandemic.

New York City was the early epicenter of this pandemic in the United States because of its international connections and the local density of its social life. Our archive focuses on New York—a city of neighborhoods—to illuminate and document the social structure of the pandemic.

We’ve noticed that in this crisis people’s perceptions and understandings change daily, sometimes hourly. This is why we started interviewing as soon as we could, in March 2020. Our work builds on our experience developing the September 11, 2001 Oral History Narrative and Memory Project, and combines sociology and oral history to create a rich, composite picture of the struggle against Covid-19 as it evolved over the years that followed.

For this project, we conducted video interviews with narrators as many as three times over the course of 18 months. The voices from these interviews were enriched by written diaries chronicling daily life during the pandemic and survey data helping us understand more about our participants and their social lives.

“The archive bulges with revelations, anecdotes, anxieties, blind spots, big ideas and weird ideas.”

New York Times Magazine

This crisis highlighted structural fault-lines in our society as well as the strength and resilience of our communities, even as our society transforms in ways we do not yet understand. That’s why it was so important for those navigating the post-COVID future to hear the voices of those who lived through this period. Researchers, health workers and advocates, historians, artists, and policymakers will learn from listening to and watching New Yorkers talk about how we made it through this extended crisis.

0
Coverage of the project in NYT Magazine by Jon Mooallem.
0
0
0
00
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

FAQ

  • If you want to learn more about doing oral history in this period, we’ve compiled some resources.

  • The NYC Covid-19 Oral History, Narrative, and Memory Project collection will be publicly available through the Oral History Archives at Columbia in late 2024.

  • Artists, researchers, and others who would like to use the archive for non-commercial purposes can request permission from the research team, subject to rules and procedures.

    Pleas submit a description of proposed use (up to 1000 words) to covid19archive@gmail.com.

Related Works

Related Projects

  • go to Tunisian Transition Oral History
    Tunisian Transition Oral History
    Documenting the transition to democracy in Tunisia from the perspective of prominent transition leaders in the technical government and in civil society. Funded by Columbia University's Office of the President
  • go to Carnegie Corporation of New York Oral History
    Carnegie Corporation of New York Oral History
    Documenting the growth of American philanthropy through the institutional memories of a leading grant-making organization. In partnership with Carnegie Corporation of New York
  • go to Aryeh Neier Oral History
    Aryeh Neier Oral History
    Exploring the life, influence, and legacy of a prolific human rights activist. Funded by Open Society Foundations
  • go to Robert Rauschenberg Oral History
    Robert Rauschenberg Oral History
    Documenting the American avant-garde movement and the conditions that enabled it through the life and work of one of its most renowned artists. Funded by the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation