Final lesson:

Critical Evaluation and Promotion of

Local and Oral History
Museums, Histroical Shrines,
Cultural Performances, Indigenous
Practices, Religious Rites and Rituals

CHARLENE T. TRILLES , LPT

 Title:
Local and Oral History as Fields of study

Local history- is the study of history in a

geographically bounded area such as a
region, a state, a country, a city, a town, a
village, or a neighborhood.
 Title:
Local and Oral History as Fields of study
Oral history- is a method of conducting
historical research through recorded
interviews between a narrator with
personal experience of historically
significant events and a well-informed
interviewer, with the goal of adding to the
historical record.
 Title:
Local and Oral History as Fields of study

• History is the study of life in society in the

past
• It is a field of study towards an inquiry into
what happened in the past, when it
happened, and how it happened.
• History thus helps us to understand the present-
day problems both at the national and
international level accurately and objectively.

• Local history and heritage studies are an integral

part of historical studies that point to pressing
local issues, events, socio-economic influences
and changes, patterns of relationships, or living
state of the local people in a particular
geographical area.
 LOCAL HISTORY:
Meaning, Scope, Importance, and Sources
Meaning
• Local history is the study of people,
places, factual events, cultural heritage,
genealogy, and folklore, to name a few of
local political units and particular
geographical area.
 LOCAL HISTORY:
Meaning, Scope, Importance, and Sources
Meaning
• factual events-The factual part of a
story is the part that really happened
the rest gets more outlandish every time
someone tells it.
 LOCAL HISTORY:
Meaning, Scope, Importance, and Sources
Meaning
• Cultural heritage- monuments, a group
of buildings and sites, museums that have a
diversity of values including symbolic,
historic, artistic, aesthetic, ethnological or
anthropological, scientific and social
significance.
 LOCAL HISTORY:
Meaning, Scope, Importance, and Sources
Meaning
• Genealogy- an account of the descent
of a person, family, or group from an
ancestor or from older forms.
 LOCAL HISTORY:
Meaning, Scope, Importance, and Sources
Meaning
• Folklore- traditional customs, tales,
sayings, dances, or art forms preserved
among a people
 LOCAL HISTORY:
Meaning, Scope, Importance, and Sources
Meaning
• Basic Geography- Geography is the study of
places and the relationships between people and
their environments
 LOCAL HISTORY:
Meaning, Scope, Importance, and Sources
Different Types of Geography
1. Human Geography.
2. Physical Geography.
3. Environmental Geography.
4. Cartography.
 LOCAL HISTORY:
Meaning, Scope, Importance, and Sources
Ethnography- a qualitative method for
collecting data often used in the social
and behavioral sciences. Data are
collected through observations and
interviews, which are then used to draw
conclusions about how societies and
individuals function.
 LOCAL HISTORY:
Meaning, Scope, Importance, and Sources

Biography- simply the story of a real

person's life.
Scope
• Landscape history: a single building (such as a castle,
an archaeological site, a church and graveyard, a
monument – or your school), a street
• Geo-political history: an area like a village or housing
estate, a whole town.
• Local culture, indigenous knowledge systems and
practices of a particular group in a geographical area,
folklore, myths, epic, and songs/music.
• Family history, life of a particular individual, etc.
Importance
• It gives us a holistic view about crucial and
controversial events that took place (or are taking
place) in our local communities and its effect vis-
à-vis to national affairs.
• It paves the way to clear understanding of
historical patterns and their connections with
each other that procures vivid view of history in
general.
• allows us to study national events within the
context of local communities
Sources
• Local environments e.g. google maps, street
signage, old post-boxes, signs, plaques, foot
scrapers and other forms of street furniture ,
building clues, monuments, landmarks, drawings,
paintings, photographs, house plans, building
plans, documents from local priests, land titles
from LGU or Registry of Deeds, eyewitnesses,
archaelogical crafts, school records, newspapers,
journals, letters etc.
Methodology
• Interview, content analysis for
documents, archival research,
archaeolgical excavations
ORAL HISTORY: Meaning, Scope, Importance,
and Sources
Meaning
• Oral history is the systematic collection of
living people’s testimony about their own
experiences. (Park, 2013)
• Oral history can be defined as the recording,
preservation and interpretation of historical
information, based on the personal experiences
and opinions of the speaker. (Centre for Urban
History-University of Leicester )
Scope
• Geo-political history: an area like a
village or housing estate, a whole town.
• Local culture, indigenous knowledge
systems and practices of a particular group
in a geographical area, folklore, myths,
music history, epic, etc.
• Family history, life of a particular
individual, etc
Importance

•  helps us understand how individuals and

communities experienced the forces of history.
•  teaches us what has changed and what has stayed
the same over time.
•  preserves for future generations a sound portrait of
who we are in the present and what we remember
about the past. (Baylor University Manual for Oral
History)
Sources
• Eyewitnesses, priests, tribal elders, members of a
particular group.

Methodology and Ethics

• Oral interview, recording (audio-video) but
needs informed consent, data transcription.
Museum in the Philippines

Rizal Shrine
 A stone’s throw from Calamba’s town plaza and
parish church stands the replica of the house
where Jose Rizal was born on 19 June 1861. The
seventh child and second son of Francisco
Mercado and Teodora Alonso, Rizal would
become a renowned political novelist and thinker;
skilled eye doctor; gifted artist and architect;
linguist and teacher; and a hero who lived and
died for his beloved country.
 two-storey stone and hardwood structure with narra floors,
and red tile roof, the Rizal home has a spacious parlor with
wide capiz shell windows, a library, dining room, three
bedrooms, a kitchen and pantry leading out to a balcony.
Located on the ground floor were the servants’ quarters,
workroom, and a storeroom for food supplies. The backyard
was planted with various fruit trees, which Rizal frequently
mentioned in his
writings: atis, santol, tampoy, makopa, plum, balimbing,
and kasuy. A small nipa hut served as the young Jose’s
hideaway
 Rizal fondly recalled his childhood home in Calamba,
longing for it ‘like a weary swallow’ while he was traveling in
Europe. Unfortunately, because of a land dispute with the
Dominican friars, the Rizal family was evicted from their
home in 1890 and the house soon after fell into disrepair
and was demolished. The present structure was
reconstructed in 1950 by National Artist Juan F. Nakpil from
funds donated by schoolchildren.
Culture in the Philippines

eating with bare hands

 Before the Spaniards conquered the Philippines in the 16th
century, natives used their hands to eat. It was only when the
Spaniards arrived on Philippine land that utensils were
introduced. Today, many Filipinos still eat with their bare
hands, not just because it was tradition hundreds of years ago,
but because many Filipino viands are best eaten sans
utensils. Grilled or fried meat with rice are best eaten with bare
hands.