By Elio Colavito and Alisha Stranges  

The Pussy Palace Oral History Project is fully underway, and with that, The ArQuives’ and LGBTQ History Digital Collaboratory’s oral historians encountered unique challenges due to the pandemic which has required us to conduct all interviews remotely. We wanted to share some insight about our oral-history-from-home process with some infographics! 

How to record oral histories during a pandemic: The Pussy Palace Oral History Project records all interviews via Zoom, but what happens if someone’s internet connection is unreliable, and we get incomplete audio? This is what we do to get reliable backup audio!

Ask narrators to download the REV Recorder app for Apple or Android. Have them place their phones on a stack of books in front of them. To avoid interruptions, ask narrators to put their phones on Airplane Mode then press record. Send us the audio recording via email, connected through the app!

Why we use REV: It’s incredibly user-friendly by reducing the amount of steps it takes to record and export files. It’s free and available for iPhone, Android, and web browser. The app is excellent at managing large audio files.