About the Journal

Aims and Scope

The journal aims to fill a gap in the Italian publishing scene, where journals dedicated to the world of archives mainly refer to 'written' archives, and wants to represent a virtual meeting place between the academic world, public and private institutions, foundations and associations. In the past, there have been journals dedicated to oral archives (e.g. ‘Fonti orali’, directed by Luisa Passerini from 1981 to 1984 and by Daniele Jalla from 1985 to 1987), but what is lacking today is an interdisciplinary point of reference that unites different fields of knowledge and, above all, brings together different actors. There is also a lack of a publishing venue that could enhance the archival work of organising and cataloguing oral sources. An often time-consuming and resource-intensive task, taking care of one's sound documents is instead a fundamental step to guarantee the transmission and dissemination of their contents, as well as the replicability of studies on them. The journal aims to put the spotlight on this activity usually carried out behind the scenes by all scholars of orality and voice, in the firm belief that a well-structured oral archive should be considered a product of research.

The journal seeks to provide a forum for bringing together a wide range of people working with oral sources as researchers, archivists, librarians, documentalists or ministerial actors involved in this field.

The aim of O(ral)Ar(chives) journal is to publish original papers concerned with oral archives from different perspectives, including research on linguistics, ethnomusicology, archiving and oral history. Moreover, OAr hosts overlay papers of oral archives: authors are asked to submit to a peer-review process both a presentation paper and the actual related archival effort. Through this procedure, OAr considers the latter as a scholarly contribution on a par with other article types.

The topics covered by the journal comprehend, but are not limited to:

the life cycle of the archives:

the production of oral sources, e.g., data collection, fieldwork methods, language documentation, construction of oral archives; development of metadata schemes;
the curation of oral sources,i.e., papers presenting oral archives (the so called ‘overlay archive/data papers’);
the preservation of oral sources, e.g., methods for long-term preservation; maintenance of already existing oral archives; digitalization processes;
the use and reuse of oral sources, e.g., research based on historical archives; recounts of oral archive material re-use for the sake of, e.g., temporary exhibitions, territorial promotion, etc.;

cross-cutting dimensions of all the aforementioned phases:

speech transcription, e.g., methodological and theoretical aspects of transcription;
technological tools, e.g., presentations of novel software or hardware and benchmarks of new recording tools or speech processing technologies;
legal issues, e.g., accessibility and anonymity of data, data protection and copyright issues;
ethical aspects: e.g., giving back to the community; benefits of research for the community; interviewer-interviewee relationship.

Moreover, OAr will also host a “News” section in which information about novel initiatives concerning oral archives will be briefly presented for the sake of keeping the research community up to date. Finally, the journal will also offer an expanded, up to date bibliography through a collaborative group library. The journal aims at becoming a wider repository for literature and relevant sources which will constitute a reference for oral archives research.

Journal Sections & Criteria for acceptance

The journal publishes articles belonging to a very broad spectrum of disciplines, including - but not limited to - linguistics, archival sciences, cultural anthropology, oral history, ethnomusicology, sociology, psychology, law, and speech technology. OAr hosts two main sections also inspired to the lines of work leading to the constitution of the Vademecum per il trattamento delle fonti orali (Roma: Ministero della Cultura, Direzione Generale Archivi, 2023):

The life cycle of the archives. This section concerns all the main phases of an oral archive lifecycle. While oral data production, conservation and use/reuse deal contain both theoretical and experimental thematic contributions, oral data curation is devoted to hosting oral archive overlay papers together with relevant coordinates for the access to the curated materials.
- Oral data production. This subsection welcomes theoretical and experimental papers on oral data collection strategies and oral archive constitution methodology.