The Buford Highway Oral History Project
We Love BuHi’s “In Whose Hearts Is A Highway” is a multi-year Oral History Project in partnership with Georgia State University’s Special Collections and Archives Department. This qualitative research project in the form of in-depth interviews was established in order to help Georgia communities better understand the opinions, motivations, and histories of Buford Highway residents.
Oral History is a “field of study and a method of gathering, preserving and interpreting the voices and memories of people, communities, and participants in past events” (Oral History Association). This field of study is the most ancient type of historical inquiry and existed before the written word. At the same time, its contemporary form is used by historians, anthropologists, ethnographers, and sociologists in their research, who now incorporate digital technologies of the 21st century as well. Methodologies include focus-groups and in-depth interviews with open-ended questions. This research initiative is key to the creation of historical accountability and paramount for archival preservation.
In Whose Heart is a Highway investigates individual stories on community heritage and identities, providing a more comprehensive understanding of the past, an inventory of current needs, challenges, and strengths, and most importantly, a desire to generate a shared vision for the future to guide change and development in the Buford Highway area.
To accomplish this, We Love BuHi, Inc. and its partner organizations collect first-person oral histories from immigrants, refugees, and their descendants, who arrived in or were raised in and around the Buford Highway Corridor from 1950 through the present. These histories (qualitative data) are collected through in-depth interviews which are recorded and permanently archived at the Library of Georgia State University, Special Collections and Archives Department. The end goal of this multi-year research project is a collection of 125 to 150 oral history interviews, comprised of materials that may include audio recordings, text transcriptions, and related photos and documents.
