Dr. Mhairi-Jean Ross (also see Scotland)
2025 was an incredibly busy year for me as I embarked on my first year post-PhD working in a range of participatory research roles that draw on oral histories and creative methods. I’ve enjoyed working alongside my new friends and colleagues in the Oral History Society and learning more about the exciting range of oral history work happening in my local area, Yorkshire.
Changing Realities: Participatory Oral Histories with Low-Income Parents (University of York)
As a Research Associate on Professor Ruth Patrick’s ‘Changing Realities’ project, I have been working with a participatory research panel of over 200 low-income parents from across the UK, using diarising methods and ‘Big Questions’ to capture oral histories of lived experiences of poverty and social security. This longitudinal participatory project employs creative qualitative methods to ensure parents’ voices directly shape policy development. As a member of the steering group working with IPPR, JRF, CPAG, and cabinet ministers, I have contributed to co-producing evidence for the UK government’s child poverty strategy. This work exemplifies how oral history methods can be scaled to inform national policy while maintaining ethical, participatory principles that centre lived experience expertise and ensure communities retain agency over how their stories are used for social change.
Sam Smith
I’ve had a busy oral history year being involved with several projects, and in my roles as an OHS trainer and becoming the RAN coordinator in April.
Archiving oral history in palliative care interviews
I spent the first half of the year as a Research Fellow, preparing oral history in palliative care interviews to be archived in the University of Sheffield Library’s Special Collections, and I have now deposited over 280 interviews. They are available to researchers on request and have attracted a lot of interest already. I also took over the voluntary lead role of managing the oral history in palliative care service from Michelle Winslow, who retired in May.
Peak Tracks – Hope Valley Line Sound Installation
Following on from receiving a DYCP award from the Arts Council I completed a project about the Hope Valley trainline through the Peak District, which culminated in a spatial sound installation at Sheffield Museums as part of Sensoria Festival of music and film. The installation included oral history clips from people who live and work along the line, with field recordings and improvised music, all of which I produced. The audio was locative, set to a 41-minute film of the drivers view from the train. It was a great success and had nearly 800 visitors within 3 days. The full oral history interviews are due to deposited at Derbyshire Records Office and the music is planned to be released on a limited run of vinyl by a local record label this year.
Up our Road Project, North Lincolnshire Museums
After being introduced by RA Julia Letts, I was asked by North Lincolnshire Museums to record 10 life story interviews for the ‘Up Our Road’ project which celebrates and documents community champions with a story of migration and connection to Oswald and Frodingham Road in Scunthorpe. The project is still in progress and outputs will include an exhibition which opens in May 26.
Piccadilly Radio Archive
After successfully applying for the post, I have been working for RA David Govier, recording life story interviews with people connected to Piccadilly Radio in Manchester. I have nearly finished conducting interviews for the project now and thoroughly enjoyed hearing people’s stories and memories. A highlight being interviewing BBC radio DJ Mark Radcliffe about the Manchester music scene of the late 70s and 80s.
Talks
During 2025, I have presented at several events about working in oral history in palliative care including the EMOHA family history event, the RAN annual event and the international Oral History Association conference in Krakow.
OHS Training
I have trained several groups during 2025 with highlights from my region including the People, Pride and Progress LGBTQIA+ project at the National Railway Museum in York, Doncaster Music Icons, the 1in12 anarchists club oral history project, as part of Bradford City of Culture, and the Radical GPs Primary Care project in Sheffield.
Kate Valentine
In 2025, I worked on several oral history and reminiscence projects with my company Digital Drama in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and south London.
We started the year running reminiscence sessions focusing on the 80th anniversary of VE Day and hosted a tea party for members of Age UK Merton in the café at Canons House & Grounds. The event was part of our VE Day, Memories of Peace project, which continued into the autumn 2025 with workshops, talks and a pop-up exhibition based on previously collected oral histories about memories of WW2, which toured libraries around Merton. The project was supported by the National Lottery Community Fund, and we found this experience of applying and keeping records much easier than a National Lottery Heritage Fund award, though the financial limit of what you can apply for is more restrictive.
We applied for and won a commission from English Heritage to undertake oral history training for volunteers of Gainsborough Old Hall in Lincolnshire, which an imposing Tudor mansion in the middle of the town that has had multiple uses as a private home and civic centre. We did this training both in person and online, offering mentoring to pairs of volunteers as they prepared for their first oral history recordings following their training. Further to this, myself and my colleague Alison Ramsey, travelled further afield to capture the oral histories of people who could remember the Old Hall before it was run by English Heritage, but who had moved away from the local area.
Again, with English Heritage, I had approached the York Cold War Bunker team to suggest doing an audio installation of a drama adapted from the Government’s 1983 government transition to war gaming exercise, WINTEX-CIMEX. This exercise involved senior civil servants playing the parts of ministers to test how they would deal with an escalating state of national emergency when faced with the threat of nuclear war. The scripts of these exercises are kept by The National Archives.
Kevin Booth of English Heritage was very keen on the idea as it tied in with the events they were planning to mark the 100thanniversary of the Royal Observer Corps, whose volunteers ran the York Bunker during the Cold War. English Heritage applied to the National Lottery Heritage Fund to support a series of events, including a panel event for York Festival of Ideas and an immersive audio experience, both of which Digital Drama produced along with recording 12 new oral histories with previous members of ROC. The project is called Forewarned is Forearmed and the 6-part audio drama of WINTEX is currently being produced and will be available to listen to in the spring of 2026 via English Heritage and The National Archives website.
Michelle Winslow
Palliative care oral history, Sheffield
A long-standing palliative care oral history project in Sheffield’s Northern General Hospital, initiated by Michelle Winslow, University of Sheffield, came to an end in May 2025 when Michelle left the university. Due to the popularity of the project it was reinstated alongside Sheffield NHS Trust and with Sam Smith continues working with people in receipt of palliative care services. Oral histories are intended for participants and family and with agreement they are archived with the university’s Special Collections Library. The collection of over 350 recordings dating back to 2007 is available for teaching and research. In 2025, an undergraduate student, Thomas Hounsell, drew on the archive for research and produced an in-house publication History Matters.
Nightlight Lullabies, Derby
Nightlight Lullabies by Murmuration Arts, explored the experience of parenting and how we soothe our babies to sleep. The project, funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund and Arts Council England, involved oral history collaboration with Derbian parents, including the involvement of deaf communities through collaborations with the Royal School for the Deaf, D-Youth Hub, and Action Deafness. The project was exhibited at Derby Museum in Autumn 2025.
