News from the past: oral history at the V&A

Drawing on a recording undertaken as part of the V&A Oral History project with former Deputy Keeper Barbara Morris, this paper explores oral history as a research methodology that contributes to the meaning and understanding of the V&A through the personal stories of its curators. The paper draws on Morris' account of the discovery, in 1954, of the thefts of Museum Assistant John Nevin. Rather than seeing oral history as a simply a window on the past, the paper suggests how narratives function on several levels: as content, as biography and as thematically-oriented testimony.

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