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Our Mission

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The award-winning Samuel Proctor Oral History Program is the oral history program of the University of Florida. Since our founding in 1967, we have conducted over 8,000 interviews. More than 150,000 pages of transcribed material from these interviews may be found in the SPOHP archives and Digital Collections at the University of Florida.

Our mission statement is:  One Community, Many Voices.

Our mission is to gather, preserve, and promote living histories of individuals from all walks of life.

  • SPOHP teaches the craft and intellectual traditions of oral history through university seminars as well as through community-based workshops.
  • SPOHP teaches students, independent scholars, and community organizations how to bring history to life. 
  • SPOHP consults on an ongoing basis with local historians, civic leaders, and educators in Florida and beyond who are interested in initiating oral history projects in their towns and municipalities. 
  • SPOHP engages in the scholarly and educational life of the University of Florida, our state, and the world through public history programs, academic conferences, and scholarly collaborations.
  • SPOHP emphasizes that oral history is an interdisciplinary methodology that draws on ethnography, literature, social theory, and memory studies—among other academic fields. 
  • SPOHP facilitates rigorous collaborative research, civic engagement, digital technology, and other techniques that make history accessible, democratic, and fun. 
  • SPOHP guides students, scholars, and communities throughout the world in gathering, preserving, and promoting living history through academic publications, public programs, electronic media, and other forums to document the human condition.