Voice of Witness is a non-profit organization that uses oral history to illuminate contemporary human rights crises in the U.S. and around the world through an oral history book series and an education program. Voice of Witness has published ten books that present narratives from survivors of human rights crises including: exonerated men and women; residents of New Orleans before, during, and after Hurricane Katrina; undocumented workers in the United States; and persons abducted and displaced as a result of the civil war in southern Sudan. The Voice of Witness Education Program brings these stories, and the issues they reflect, into high schools and impacted communities through oral history-based curricula and holistic educator support. By using personal narratives, the series seeks to empower witnesses and survivors, generate awareness about social injustices and human rights issues, and provide documentation for educators, advocates, and policymakers. The editors of Voice of Witness utilize interviews, primary source documents, and extensive fact checking to construct the stories presented in each book. Dave Eggers, Voice of Witness co-founder and author, describes the project as "a partnership between the people telling their stories and the people transmitting them to the reader." The Voice of Witness book series was founded in 2004 by author Dave Eggers and physician Lola Vollen, M.D.. Mimi Lok joined in 2008 as Executive Director & Executive Editor, and turned Voice of Witness into a 501 nonprofit. Voice of Witness is based in San Francisco, California.
Books
Surviving Justice: America's Wrongfully Convicted and Exonerated Voices from the Storm: The People of New Orleans on Hurricane Katrina and Its Aftermath Underground America: Narratives of Undocumented Lives En Las Sombras De Estados Unidos Out of Exile: The Abducted and Displaced People of Sudan Hope Deferred: Narratives of Zimbabwean Lives Nowhere to Be Home: Narratives from Survivors of Burma's Military Regime Patriot Acts: Narratives of Post-9/11 Injustice Inside This Place, Not of It: Narratives from Women's Prisons Throwing Stones at the Moon: Narratives from Colombians Displaced by Violence Refugee Hotel High-Rise Stories: Narratives from Chicago Public Housing Invisible Hands: Voices from the Global Economy
Reception
Critical reception for the Voice of Witness series has been positive. Publishers Weekly lauded Underground America as "no less than revelatory." The San Francisco Chronicle described Out of Exile as "ssential...an admirable project." Chronicle reviewer John Freeman wrote: "Many of those who do survive escape with nothing but their story, something this essential collection of oral testimony records and, in a realistic way, celebrates." In its review of Surviving Justice, Boston's Weekly Dig praised the series' use of oral history: “The nature of oral history... allows the exonerees’ stories to be poignant and indignant without the earnestness, false empathy or guilt that would normally poison such subject matter.” The New Orleans Times Picayune called Voices from the Storm a "powerful book" that "draws its strength from the real voices of real New Orleanians."
VOW in the classroom
Voice of Witness has developed core standard-aligned educational resources, including lesson plans for teaching Surviving Justice and Voices in the Storm in high school classrooms, and for instruction on oral history. According to the Voice of Witness web site, the series has been utilized in both college and high school classrooms around the country, including Balboa High School in San Francisco, California, Bentley School in the San Francisco Bay Area, CUNY, Brown University, Valley High School Louisville, KY, and San Francisco State University. Voice of Witness and the Facing History and Ourselves organization have established a partnership to bring the series to additional classrooms.
