Sport and Oral History

A recent conference in the UK caught my eye (and ears). The Sport and Oral History Conference was hosted by the University of Huddersfield last month. There was quite a bit of Australian content, with particular regard to rugby league football. Greg Mallory spoke about his oral history project concerning the Brisbane Rugby League. Charles Little presented his findings on supporters' memories of South Sydney, and Simon Foster talked about the 'Indomitable' British Lions' tour of Australia in 1946.

All these presentations can be downloaded or streamed as .wma files.

Other highlights include a feature on the Gaelic Athletic Association Oral History Project coordinated by Boston College, and Up and Under, the rugby league oral history project undertaken at the University of Huddersfield.

Let's Go to the Video

There's an awesome amount of video footage out there for the sports historian on YouTube and on other sites accessible from a Google video search. Some videos are posted legally by copyright owners, but a lot of videos are posted illegally. For example, there has much controversy recently over all the footage of English Premier League goals that is linked from 101 Great Goals. Many TV networks - and especially pay TV networks - are not pleased to have their content accessible in this way.



Some of my favourite historic sporting footage is from the Mitchell and Kenyon collection that was discovered in a pharmacy's tea chests in the UK in 2001! English sports historian Tony Collins delivered a fascinating presentation on rugby league films in this collection last year at the Centenary Conference of Rugby League in Australia. Check out the 1901 Northern Union (i.e. rugby league) clash between Oldham and Swinton as an example. The Mitchell and Kenyon collection is now part of the BFI National Archives, and collection footage may be viewed online and purchased on DVD.