Recording oral histories in rural Uganda
In a village in Uganda, Penn students set up their cameras under trees, shaded from the sun and the heat, ready for the interviews they had prepared for throughout the fall semester. The students would, over the course of 10 days, record extensive interviews with members of local communities, creating a lasting historical record.
The project was part of a Penn Global Seminar, Global Jewish Communities, studying emergent Jewish communities across the globe. They focused on the century-old Abayudaya—the name means “People of Judah” or simply “Jewish” in the local language Luganda—and its recent rebirth within the context of modern Ugandan history.