African American Oral History Resources: Home
About
The Oklahoma Oral History Research Program works to document and make accessible the history of Oklahoma and OSU through oral history interviews.
By recording first-person perspectives of lived events, oral history is a research methodology utilized to document a complex and inclusive archive of experiences through an intentional recorded interview process which is made available for future generations.
The resources listed in this guide highlight the various projects and interviews in our archive that focus on African American history in Oklahoma, with topics ranging from school desegregation to the history of all-black towns in Oklahoma.
Using these sources...
If you click on any of these materials, you'll be taken directly to them. Each interview includes a transcript and an audio or video recording. For assistance accessing or citing our materials, please feel free to contact us at liboh@okstate.edu
Collections
- Boley, OklahomaThe Boley, Oklahoma Collection is a series of interviews focused on the community of the historic All-Black town of Boley including former students and teachers of the now closed school.
- Muskogee African American Heritage CollectionThe Muskogee African American Heritage Collection is a series of interviews focused on the Black community in Muskogee, Oklahoma, including former students of Manual Training High School.
- Stillwater's African American Heritage CollectionThe Stillwater’s African American Heritage Collection is a series of interviews focused on the Black community of Stillwater, Oklahoma, and in particular former students of Washington School.
- Vinita's Attucks SchoolThe Vinita’s Attucks School Collection is a series of interviews with former students of the school that served the African American community of Vinita, Oklahoma, until desegregation.
Current Projects
- To learn more, please contact the designated project lead.
- Oklahoma Activism in Education during the Civil Rights Movement
- The goal of Oklahoma Activism in Education during the Civil Rights Movement is to provide context surrounding the period of segregation in Oklahoma City as well as the events—both inside and outside of the classroom—that were involved in leading the desegregation efforts in the state. This project works to fill a gap in the literature, recognizing Oklahoma as a space for social change and the Oklahoma educators involved in radical activism during this time. Preserving these oral histories is an important piece that contributes to the history of Oklahoma and the U.S. in its totality. Project lead: Autumn Brown
- Art as Activism in North Tulsa Oral History Project
- It is imperative to make space to recognize the history and culture of activism in North Tulsa, as national attention fixates on Tulsa, Oklahoma during the commemorative year of the most horrific, racially-motivated tragedies in our country’s history, the Tulsa Race Massacre. The purpose of this oral history project is to create an archive of interviews from grassroots Tulsa activists advocating for change related to Tulsa’s Black community, focusing on artistic expression as forms of activism enacted in the North Tulsa community. Dominant definitions of activism include action enacted for institutional change, but activism for the sake of group survival is just as important, and exists in subtle ways throughout Black communities; our creativity is a way to document our existence on this earth. Project lead: Autumn Brown