PROJECT SUMMARY Intellectual merit The authors propose to create an oral history archive of human genetics, consisting ultimately of at least 100 interview transcripts with human geneticists ranging in age from 45 to 90 years and based in the U.S. and Canada. This proposal focuses on human geneticists whose principal training has been in the sciences and whose research has been scientific. A related proposal focused on clinical researchers and medical doctors has been funded by NIH. The current project aims to collect memories that span the second half of the 20th century. Using a structured but open-ended interview format, the authors will conduct interviews covering a subjects entire life. Subjects have been chosen in consultation with more than 40 scientists, clinicians, ethicists, historians, and sociologists to represent the fields many sub-disciplines. They include both pioneers and minor figures. Because many figures from the 1950s and 1960s are now elderly, part of the projects merit lies in gathering data that if not collected now will be permanently lost. The project will, however, cover the entire second half of the twentieth century. It will focus on collecting four types of memories: craft knowledge, including laboratory methods, instruments, reagents, and experimental strategies; social networks that have structured the field; the complex and shifting relations between physicians and scientists; and motivations for pursuing particular lines of research. Aware that oral history archives are often lovingly assembled and then languish, the PIs have developed an intelligent archive. The intelligent archive adds the expertise of the historian to the interview process by revealing content and meaning in the data. There are at least five ways to do this: 1) coding the transcripts, using the techniques of grounded theory and qualitative data analysis, to facilitate search and comparison across interviews; 2) cross-referencing across interviews passages that discuss similar events or ideas; 3) annotating transcripts with biographical data, explications of jargon, and links to research articles or lab notebooks; 4) writing contextual essays that delineate themes from the history of human genetics; and 5) developing graphical representations (timelines, networks, genealogies, etc.), to illustrate the fields history. Most digital archives have few ports of entry, which are hard-coded into the website, either by oral author or by a theme chosen by the archivists or web designer. The intelligent archive will have dozens of entry ports, which can be built into infinitely extensible queries, making it a uniquely flexible resource. The broader impact of human genetics is evident daily in the media coverage of genetic screening, cloning, and bioinformatics. Preserving the memories and reflections of the researchers who helped create modern human genetics will inform analysis of some of the most pressing social issues of our time. Combining the ancient valuation of oral traditions with modern oral-history theory, data-mining, and qualitative data analysis will yield a large, web-based collection searchable by any combination of biographical, geographical, or conceptual queries. It will be powerful enough to permit scholars to ask questions, sufficiently detailed for scientists and physicians to learn about their field, and easy to use for students. The authors hope that this may be a prototype for the next generation of online archives. Other products of this project will include scholarly books and articles on the history of human genetics, methodological papers, and video interviews with the subjects distributed on DVD for use in the classroom.
