Scripts, memory, war, and disaster

I seem to be the only one posting on this Uni blog, but I don’t want to dominate things. Let me start by encouraging others to post comments on previous posts and to make posts of their own, of any variety and any length. I and others would like to hear what you’re doing, thinking, reading, and watching over the summer. I’ve been posting a lot because being basically alone in Canada, I don’t have people to bounce ideas off of, so I especially encourage you to respond to my posts and tell me what you think. (Note: you don’t have to log in to post a comment.)

Last week, I spent most of my time in the archives reading oral histories of the Halifax Explosion. In the mid and late 1980s, Janet Kitz, the most prolific of the local historians of the disaster, conducted 177 interviews of survivors–at that point, mostly old women who were younger than 25 or so at the time. I was reading these to get a sense of what people and organizations mobilized to provide aid, relief, comfort, and support in the immediate aftermath of the disaster.

I ran into some problems of memory, and this is where I hope fellow Unis can help me, since oral histories and its problems touch on questions of neurology, psychology, ethnography, and narratology. I am eager and sincere in my request for comments and help, so please read past the jump and let me know what you think.