Overview
Oral histories provide a direct route to the past through people’s memories and experiences, with opportunities to transcend lifetimes and recall generational narratives, providing valuable insights into local histories of place. Working with the National Trust you will explore how oral histories in combination with archives can be used to engage communities in Northern Ireland with the challenging and sometimes (in)tangible aspect of climate change, and its impacts on coastal communities.
About this opportunity
Background
To date there has been limited exploration in Northern Ireland of how oral histories, especially those connected to historic landscapes, places and buildings, can be used to engage coastal communities with climate action. Oral histories provide a direct route to the past through people’s memories and experiences, with opportunities to transcend lifetimes and recall generational narratives, providing valuable insights into local histories of place that are often missing or lost from traditional or formal historical narratives. When combined with sources like archival materials, newspapers, photographs and historic buildings, such accounts offer opportunities for local experiences and/or understandings of change to be recalled and explored. Whilst oral histories are a common and widely used approach in Environmental History, here we seek to extend their use, to explore how such knowledges can be integrated into climate adaptation and resilience planning within local coastal communities in Northern Ireland.
Aim and objectives
To explore the potential of oral histories as a tool in developing and inspiring local adaptation and resilience to climate change at National Trust sites in Northern Ireland.
- Identify existing collections of oral histories exploring accounts of place and environment in Northen Ireland
- Undertake targeted oral history collection.
- Examine how oral histories can be used to illicit engagement and action in Northern Ireland
- Critically identify how oral histories can be used to advocate for climate resilience and adaptation
Methods
It is anticipated that there will be three primary aspects to this research: i) Oral histories, ii) archival analysis and iii) community engagement. Specialist training is available in all aspects as part of the PhD. It is expected that this studentship will contribute to scholarly communities working in environmental history, archival studies, and landscape change and management. In a cultural, intellectual sense the work will afford important insights into how individuals and societies have been affected by, coped with and conceptualized environments and environmental change past, present and within different potential futures.
This project is offered as part of The AHRC-NERC Living Well with Water [LWwW] Doctoral Focal Award at the University’s of Hull and Liverpool, in partnership with National Trust, Royal Geographical Society (with IBG) and Tate Liverpool. By applying for one of our fully funded interdisciplinary doctoral awards you will explore the relationship between water, culture and community in coastal regions and become part of a new generation of researchers shaping solutions to urgent human and planetary health challenges.
You will participate in our innovative doctoral training programme, undertake a placement with one of our partner organisations, and learn research skills transferable to a variety of future careers. https://www.hull.ac.uk/study/postgraduate-research/funded-opportunities/living-well-with-water