In October 2013, the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program was recognized by the Oral History Association with the Stetson Kennedy Vox Populi (“Voice of the People”) Award for outstanding achievement in using oral history to create a more humane and just world.
Teaching partner Falana McDaniels, of the McComb Legacies Project at McComb High School in Mississippi, was also awarded the Martha Ross Teaching Award.
The Stetson Kennedy Vox Populi (“Voice of the People”) annual award is presented each year at the OHA annual meeting, and honors individuals and organizations who use oral history as a means of furthering social justice as well as those collecting oral histories of social justice advocates. Named in honor of Stetson Kennedy, a pioneer oral historian whose work has been an important tool for advocacy on behalf of human rights, the Vox Populi Award was created to recognize work that has made a difference in the world, while advancing our sense of the power of oral history in the process.
SPOHP was awarded the Vox Populi award for a broad array of outreach and research initiatives, including public history programs, our community-based workshops, and SPOHP’s podcast series exploring the perspectives of organizers, anti-war veterans, immigrant activists, and reformers. SPOHP preserves the personal narratives of previously marginalized communities such as Seminole, Cherokee, Creek, and Lumbee Indians in the southeastern United States, and also promotes the experiences working people in the South, including organizers of Mississippi’s civil rights movement, laborers in the citrus industry, physical plant operatives, water management engineers, nurses, teachers, and active members of various labor unions in Right-to-Work Florida.
The award is co-sponsored by the Stetson Kennedy Foundation, a non-profit foundation dedicated to human rights, racial and social justice, environmental stewardship, and the preservation and growth of folk culture.