Intro: To capture the complexity of the coronavirus pandemic, and to honour the voices of the communities most impacted, journalists can draw upon some of the techniques practiced by oral history.

By Bel Thomps

Ted Kerr’s talk, titled “The Stories We Tell Impact the Action We Take”, focused on the nexus between AIDS/HIV and coronavirus. One of Kerr’s central points was that AIDS/HIV is often associated with white gay men living in cities like New York and Los Angeles. The reality, of course, was (and continues to be) broader and more complex than this. But this reality was not reflected in the stories mainstreamed during “the AIDS crisis.” As time passed, these stories crystallized into collective memory, and diverging narratives and voices slipped to the fringes. 

The lesson learned, Kerr said, is that the stories we tell have long term resonance. It’s important to record a cacophony of voices, clashing memories and contradictory opinions so that we have a more nuanced understanding of a crisis as it unfolds, and the ability to construct better practice and policy in its aftermath. This perspective is particularly relevant for journalists faced with the seismic challenge of covering the coronavirus pandemic. Not only are they tasked with helping the public understand this crisis in realtime, they are also writing the building blocks for posterity.

This is probably the biggest story that will unfold during a working journalist’s lifetime, fundamentally altering lives at a local, national and global scale. The difficulties in covering this story are countless. How do you accurately gauge what is happening without a precedent? How do you report such a sweeping yet complicated story? And how do you powerfully report on how the virus is shaping the lives of people when you’re probably stuck in your living room? 

Kerr’s talk implicitly showed how, in covering this pandemic, journalists can benefit by drawing upon some of the methods employed by oral history. The first approach that can be borrowed is the painstaking emphasis oral history places on treating interviewees with dignity, which has really shone through in the way all the speakers that have presented in this series have spoken about their work. This is not to say that journalists do not treat subjects with dignity; but sometimes, in the rush of deadlines or the pursuit of an angle, this can lose priority. Covering the pandemic means interviewing people in the throes of extreme uncertainty and trauma. The primacy oral history places upon trust-building and gaining informed consent could be a balm for journalists and their interviewees, and a useful tool for establishing mutual understanding.

Second is the unobtrusive, open style of questioning used in oral history interviews. To understand how coronavirus impacts lives, we need to know about those lives. Not just in periods of infection, or lockdown, but what they looked like before, how they became what they were, where they were on track to go in the future. What happened in a person's childhood? What struggles did they face before they became ill? What were their aspirations, and how have these changed, or been lost? Accessing this depth of information means allowing people to open up without too much direction. It means being careful that their voices aren’t drowned out by the desired narrative of the interviewer. 

The third method journalists can borrow from oral history is a compulsion to document, in detail and breadth, the stories of those who are overlooked by mainstream narratives. When the coronavirus pandemic emerged, some initially saw it as a great leveller  - a virus that could infect anyone, anywhere: from celebrities to politicians and even the Prince of England. In subsequent months, it has become increasingly clear that, although the virus doesn’t discriminate, our societies do. Coronavirus tends to filter down lines of social and economic stratification, disproportionately harming those who can’t work from home, or who live in cramped housing. In the US, communities of colour are dying from the virus in great numbers: increasingly, coronavirus is becoming a sharp reinforcer of inequality. 

To capture the true scale and impact of the pandemic, journalism needs to hold power to account. It also needs to make space for the voices of those whose families and communities have been most impacted, and whose voices are often absent from the public record.

Publications and individual journalists are acutely aware of this challenge. Some, such as Wired and the Washington Post, have even responded by launching oral histories of the pandemic. In the months ahead, it’s important that this drive to document a multitude of voices continues, and expands. Perhaps it will change the way some journalists practice their craft permanently. As Ted Kerr says:  “If we look at it too narrowly, we’ll only get narrow stories.”