Title: Interviews and the Historiographical Issues of Oral Sources
Abstract: This chapter discusses the similarities and differences in the plurality of practices regarding the use of interviews by historians of economics – i.e., either the use of someone else's interviews as sources or the use of interviews conducted by the historian for her or his work. It draws on methodological and historiographical contributions from other disciplines where the use of interviews is more systematic to characterize the practices in our discipline and to sometimes suggest further or new developments. The characterizations of the use of interviews by historians of economics focus on three interrelated factors that impact the relation between the historian (potentially as an interviewer) and her or his sources (i.e., the interviewee): (1) the goals of the research project for which interviews are used, (2) the potentially perceived threats to scientific credit and legitimacy that history of contemporary science can trigger for some scientists and (3) the specificities of oral sources compared to more traditional written sources. Word count (without bibliography and appendix): 8249 1
Publication Year: 2017
Publication Date: 2017-01-01
Language: en
Type: preprint
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