Oral History Workshop with Getting Word

Oral history is one of the many tools that historians at Monticello use to tell an honest and full history.

Participants will gain practical guidance and tools on how they might engage in oral history in their own communities and families, documenting stories, memories, and traditions.

Presentations will take place at 11:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m.

Recommended for ages 16+

Oral History at Monticello and the Getting Word Project

Thomas Jefferson was notorious for his detailed record-keeping, and the wealth of knowledge imparted by his surviving ledgers, farm books, and letters situate Monticello among the best documented plantations in the world.

However, these records fail to document the perspectives of the vast majority of people who lived and labored on the mountaintop. The enslaved community at Monticello, like most other enslaved communities at the time, were forbidden from reading and writing, stopping them from recording their lives as Jefferson did. In addition, their legal status as property prevented them from passing down other kinds of objects, like family heirlooms or material goods. However, oral history (or oral tradition), endured as a way to pass down knowledge from generation to generation, transcending the institution of slavery.

Getting Word African American Oral History Project is a research department at Monticello founded in 1993 to record and preserve the family histories of the over 610 people enslaved by Jefferson throughout his lifetime. The stories shared by generations of descendants have indelibly shaped scholarship and interpretation at Monticello, and play a critical role in Monticello's work to share an honest and full history of the United States.