ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses interview practices that surface family stories and routines with a system that finds and ties them together in the storyline as meaningful and interesting to current and even future generations. The chapter demonstrates the system by starting with a scenario from a family history and backtracking to the Narrative Data Management System (NDMS tm ) explained in Chapter 13, with an example in this chapter. After reviewing successful interview tenets from noted oral historians, the approaches of academic researchers, journalists, and an oral history consultant add some approaches that make sense for interviewing within families and their associates. These considerations build on the practices of shared authority, preparation for and follow-up to interviews, and for the interviews themselves that apply to working within families and the realities of family dynamics. The chapter includes examples of preparing and conducting four types of interviews, which may be employed with the same person or for different people depending on purpose and circumstance. Historical context, fact-checking, and progress reviews by a family-empowered review team are discussed. Interview templates are embedded in the chapter.
