Oral History, or, Making a Podcast
Oral history methodology aligns well with queer theory, as both are interested in the partial, the fluid, and the ongoing (1). Oral sources are unstable, incomplete, and unfinished. The fullness of a conversation, of tone and vocal color, cannot be fully captured in a transcript. At its best, oral history aims to be non-extractive and collaborative, attentive to researcher positionality and the complex movements of power in the interview and beyond. Finally, oral histories work as sources of both evidence and interpretation. All these traits have appealed to researchers in queer history and historiography; oral history methodologies provide structured ways to create intentional archives of presence.
Consent is essential to oral history and to the study of digital fandom. Much of the fandom life of actual play podcasts plays out on public digital platforms—for Friends at the Table, that’s currently Twitter, Discord, and Tumblr. Despite the public nature of such interactions, they are not made public with the intention of becoming subjects of academic discourse. By using oral history, I’m purposefully avoiding looking at technically-public-but-not-really things like tweets and Tumblr posts. Fandom also occurs in conversation—my own thinking about actual play podcasts and Friends at the Table has not flourished in isolation but in conversation with others in the fandom. At the times of our casual conversations, neither I nor the people I’ve spoken with intended for our conversations to become material for academic work. Oral history provides a framework for having such conversations within clear boundaries of use. While my thinking is still indebted to their insights, in conducting oral history interviews, I make clear the limits of my research and my broader fandom interaction.
Oral history also provides a much broader scope of the fandom and show than my own analysis alone. I am a white queer person writing about a show that is hosted by a Black man (though the other cast members are white) and features many characters of color. As the work of Rebecca Wanzo makes clear, fan studies has long been a space where whiteness goes uninterrogated, even as queer and/or female fans are centered. A queer study of Friends at the Table and its fandom cannot only be a study of queerness, but of race, class, and ability—themes that the show addresses and that recur in online discussions of actual play podcasts. My view of fandom is partial not only because of my positionality and specific life experience but because of technological affordances. On social media, I see what the algorithm shows me. Discussions happen beyond my notice or before my time. Oral history allows me to collect stories from people across the fandom and view them together. Still, oral history is a necessarily partial methodology; my aim is not to uncover the story of the Friends at the Table fandom, but to uplift a selection of stories shared with me, pulling together a patchwork of actual play podcast fandom experience.
By building an oral history collection, I aim to mirror the actual play podcast I’m studying. Oral history focuses on the act of telling and the experience of the individual in their community. This attention to the act of telling parallels the reflexivity of actual play podcasts, which call attention to the very acts of telling stories and the experiences of those involved. Much as in queer game studies, Friends at the Table and other actual play podcasts demonstrate that critical media work does not happen solely in academia or formal learning spaces, but as a fannish practice and way of being in the world. Reflexivity is central to actual play podcasts and can occur on many levels—not everyone is talking about ivory-tower queer theory, but most are thinking through why they do things as they do them.
And honestly, it’s kind of like making a podcast.
Finch: What was I saying, though, about, um… yeah where like people instead of just be—maybe in another show or another time people go write fanfic, and now it feels like people all still go write fanfic but also then go make a podcast.
Nico: Yeah. I feel like that's a new niche is, let's make a podcast about it.
Finch: (overlapping) Let’s make a podcast about it!
Nico: Like I said, me and Ben made one episode of an Eragon podcast. Me, Altair, and Maayan made a Yugioh podcast, like people like, you say something and make a podcast about it, let's go. And people will listen to it!
Finch: That's the weirdest thing, I’m like, “people would listen to this—” yeah well, I still want to do a Friends at the Table re-watch podcast.
Nico: That would be fun, I feel like Peel the Onion could have been turned into a podcast. If you ever want to do a Friends at the Table analysis podcasts, let me know.
Finch: Oh hell yeah, I would be so down. Yeah well, I guess is this a podcast. Did we make a podcast?
Nico: I think we made a podcast.
Finch: Is my thesis just podcasts?
Nico: Your thesis is a podcast.
Finch: Shit. I mean, part of that was intentional, where I’m like, “I want to oral history because of the parallels with podcast.” Anyway.
Nico: Yeah, you could release this as a podcast.
Finch: Perhaps, perhaps…
I hope you enjoy listening.
1. Kevin P. Murphy, Jennifer L. Pierce, and Jason Ruiz, “What Makes Queer Oral History Different,” The Oral History Review 43, no. 1 (April 1, 2016): 1–24, https://doi.org/10.1093/ohr/ohw022; Nan Alamilla Boyd and Horacio N. Roque Ramirez, eds., Bodies of Evidence: The Practice of Queer Oral History, Oxford Oral History Series (Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2012).