Ambar Johnson (2022)

Ambar Johnson (she/hers) is an urban and transportation planner, media producer, and creative composer with oscillating origins along the east coast. 

Her philosophy that time travel and transportation are one of the same orients her thinking and approaches to people, projects, and perspectives. She comes to OHMA to layer and weave urban planning, oral history, and nature to move people — sonically, physically, emotionally, and temporally.

Ambar’s project involves documenting her favorite past time: road trips (regardless of mode) as a vehicle for storytelling. She plans to tell an oral history of I-95 as a timeline and roadmap about what this place means (or place/meant coined by Amiri Bakara) to flora, fauna, and families (including her owns) across generations and geographies I-95 spans. By bridging (oral) history and transportation she hopes to do three things:

 1) delicately unravel something that impacts us all — how we get around 

2) to restore continuity in families histories and 

3) ensure processes and plans in the planning realm are rooted in rich, regenerative practices and histories.

In a world that rushes to move quickly across time, space, and schedules, Ambar aims to use her time in OHMA to travel slowly and listen closely to the people and environments around her. 

She received a B.S. in History, Technology, and Society from the Georgia Institute of Technology and is a Public Voices Fellow of the OpEd Project and the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication. https://www.ambarjohnson.com/

Renka Aiba (2023)

Renka Aiba has been seeking to intersect fashion journalism with oral history from the perspectives of material culture and its diversity in modern society.

Grew up in Tokyo, Japan, one of the biggest cities in the world stuffed with people, she find her curiosity on the streets where numerous lives are crossing and producing cultures; for example, non-standard words, vigorous daily activities, interaction through fashion, and murmur that is unintentionally spoken.

After working as a street interviewer for a fashion web magazine in 2019, she developed an interest in the influence of fashion culture on the relationships between society and people. In 2020, when she was in her second year of Keio University, she joined an oral history seminar and started an oral history project to collect personal stories of fashion and expression in the modern society of individualism and consumerism. Her graduation project compiled 30 narratives that are collected in her 3 years of research.

As she changes her research location from Tokyo to New York, she is currently exploring editorial and creative output for her continuous project in narratives in the field of fashion.

Yu Cui (2022)

Yu Cui, TV news anchor, journalist, PR consultant, and now, oral historian; variety made his day.

Made in Dalian, designed in Beijing, he was raised in a household where a pair of wise businesspeople cultivated him to be both ambitious and generous. He fights to make this world a better place.

He reads, films, paints, writes. Last month, one post of his on Weibo has 650 thousand views.

Ask him to “carpe diem” together, lifestyle is Yu’s field of expertise. He became the youngest team leader in Ruder Finn Communication Group (Beijing) when 23 years old, offering strategic consulting to global brands, including TISSOT, IWC SCHAFFHAUSEN, MONTBLANC, TENCENT, BENTLEY, New World China, and Sino-Ocean Group. Since always, he lives, instead of making a living.

Gym rat, advanced open water diver, Krav Maga learner; jogger, hiker, climber, home cook & foodie. Yu enjoys athletic activities and healthy cuisine.

He acquires much motivation from problem solving, he likes to be challenged, and win. So, he came to Columbia University.

He sees this world as his oyster, exploring it physically and mentally. He loves travelling, while listening to stories, myths, and legends, like an Ancient Greek bard does. His voice is the epic of his odyssey, and he speaks for the voiceless.

Humanity is the theme of Yu’s lifelong pursuit of studies. He will approach and interpret this complexed society through his independent perspective. As an oral historian, he is going to empower the powerless and uplift the downtrodden.

Yu also is known as Killian, find him via:

YouTube/Bilibili/Weibo/WeChatOfficial/RED @ByKliian

Instagram/Facebook @Killian.tsui

Keren Piao (2020)

Keren Piao graduated from Zhejiang University (Class of 2019) with double degree of History and Japanese Language and literature. Her motivation in east Asian culture and history was originally triggered by her Korean Chinese background. Some of her research interests include ethnic Korean immigrant culture and history, East Asian Buddhism studies and ethnic minorities in China. 

Keren’s path to oral history budded during her undergraduate when she was engaged in an oral history project of a rural clan rooted in Zhejiang. The fieldwork comprises with local belief of Zhejiang Province and immigrant history of local clan. Through re-collecting local pedigree and chorography, she found how the moral value in text recordings was reflected in physical relics like shrines and inscriptions. During interviewing left-behind elderly folks, she was able to take a glimpse of the trace of immigrant history of local clan. 

Illuminated by how personal narratives echo the weight of individual as witness of history, Keren was thrilled to join 2020 cohort of OHMA. She is looking forward to diving deeper into historical conversation with ethnic Korean immigrants after the Korean War. 

Roberto Carrillo (2020)

My name is Roberto Carrillo but everyone calls me Robert. I live in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Sunset Park where people from countries such as Mexico, Guatemala and China have called it home. My exposure to the different cultures in Sunset Park sparked my interest in photography, capturing the everyday lives and scenery of the world around me has taken me to Japan a number of times during my time as an Undergraduate in Brooklyn College. Oral history has played a vital part through my life as I heard my parent's experience of immigrating to the United States in search of a better future as well as similar anecdotes from neighbors, friends, and other members of my family.

At the time I didn't interpret their experiences as oral history because I was unaware of oral history as a concept but that changed when I took a Vietnam War class in Brooklyn College. Over the span of five years, I was able to strengthen my understanding of oral history by conducting projects of my own such as manuscripting an autobiography of a Vietnam War veteran, founding the Brooklyn College Listen project along with some professors, and being a research assistant for the Brooklyn College Haitian Studies Institute by using elements of oral history such as audio and visual recording, and transcribing. 

It is no secret the New York is made out of two distinct cities, the research I hope to partake involves recording the experiences of residents living in communities of color such as Sunset Park and distinguish any economic, social, and political factor that may put them at a disadvantage from someone living in a neighborhood such as Park Slope or Bay Ridge and the obstacles the residents overcome on a daily basis. This is the idea I have for my project but I still have to work on a couple of factors such as census data from the past decade. I feel excited as well as grateful for being able to partake in the Oral History Program. I look forward to hearing the ideas from my fellow cohorts and professors.

Rattana Bounsouaysana (2019)

Rattana’s focus revolves around her Lao-American identity and culture and explores ways to give agency to the Lao diaspora and educating the public at large. She believes there should be more representation of the community so others can understand such things as the immigrant and refugee experience to Lao food culture and music. Her interest also lies in cultural studies and the arts. In her free time, she enjoys exploring the city, going to art exhibitions, live music events, finding new foods, and is always looking for her next travel destination.

Rattana has her Master of Arts in Oral History at Columbia University, her certification from the TESOL Certificate Program at Teachers College, Columbia University, and her Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology from the University of Texas at Austin.

Lindsay Szper (2022)

Lindsay Szper is a linguist and a language teacher. She’s fluent in English, Spanish and French, conversational in American Sign Language, and a beginner in several other languages. She has a BA in Spanish, French and Cross-Cultural Studies, a national certification in English/Spanish healthcare interpreting, and a Certificate in Teaching English. Her professional experience is in language teaching, conflict mediation, translation/interpreting, legal case investigation, and interview-based research and writing,

In July, 2021 Lindsay co-founded Culture Without Borders Language Collective, a community school that teaches world languages through friendship. She's currently developing a conversation-focused language-learning program based on materials co-produced for her OHMA thesis. Learn what we're up to at CWB (and join our language-learning community!) at CWBcollective.com

Ru-Jün Zhou (2020)

 Ru-Jün has over two decades of experience in non-profit and philanthropic sectors, playing roles where she could build platforms for untold stories in underserved communities. She has spearheaded projects in Asia and the US that empowered participants to explore and express their stories through photography, creative writing, movement, and film. In parallel, she has become a student of somatic contemplative traditions. She has learned through years of meditation and dyad practice that, in our modern world, we have largely forgotten how to be with one another—how to be present and listen simply, with an open and awakening heart. This recognition points to a primal truth that is being equally uncovered by modern cognitive science and psychology: to flourish as a human, one must feel heard and seen.

Through work and later the OHMA program, Ru-Jün sees how an interview setting could be a powerful modality for meeting this deep human need to be seen and heard. In a space that is open, attentive, and shorn of judgments, a natural, compassionate, and accurate response arises. In this "attended third space," where two embodied humans meet in openness, communication becomes clear and effortless. A story can be told, and the "life force" of that story can truly sing. 

She is known for her ability to think creatively, fostering innovative perspectives, and thrives in the synoptical integration process, integrating diverse ideas, theories, and practices to create a holistic approach. She often navigates this journey independently while now seeking to join forces with the like-minded for collaboration. For her, practicing oral history transcends the acts of recording and transcribing; it is a practice of generosity and humility, engaging in an embodied way of listening that is beyond orality. She views this practice as a way to metabolize experiences and interweave the strands of individual and collective wisdom that form the rich tapestry of our shared human experience.

Yuying Wu (2022)

Hailing from Shenzhen, China, Yuying Wu is a dynamic multimedia content creator and storyteller, bringing a rich background to her narrative pursuits. Yuying holds dual Bachelor's degrees in Communications and Economics from UCLA, where her passion for storytelling took shape. Immersed in video storytelling during her UCLA years, she contributed to the school newspaper Daily Bruin and participated in community-based documentary projects, addressing issues like homelessness in Westwood and the roles of women in college sports teams. Her professional journey includes impactful internships at tech giants Tencent and OPPO, shaping her skills in digital marketing and social media operations. Proficient in crafting content strategies for social media platforms, Yuying aims to bridge the realms of multimedia content creation and oral history. Throughout her pursuit of a master's at Columbia University, she aspires to leverage this intersection to communicate impactful stories on a broader scale, exploring the dynamic interplay between personal narratives and broader social science disciplines. As an oral history fellow, she has worked for the Institute for Diversity and Civic Life to curate oral history series on social media, enhancing public engagement of the organization in the Texas community. For her thesis, Yuying engages in art-based research, using it to study the pandemic era and curate a website (https://yuyingwu.cargo.site/) that preserves the oral history and artwork explored in her work. Driven by an unwavering enthusiasm for storytelling, Yuying endeavors to contribute meaningful insights to the realms of history and society through the potent fusion of multimedia content and oral history.

Chunming Zheng (2022)

Chunming Zheng (She/Her/Hers) is an oral historian and interdisciplinary artist born and raised in Beijing, China. 

Throughout her OHMA journey, Chunming experimented combining oral history with various art mediums, including VR, exhibition, documentary, nonfiction writing, poetry, and dance. She was a student-artist-in-residency at Movement Lab, Barnard College, where her exhibition Eye to ‘I’: An Oral History In Virtual Reality first launched. 

Before joining OHMA, she was the Oral History and Archive Fellow at NYU Shanghai, interviewing and documenting the origins of the first Sino-US university’s establishment, contributing to the documentary "Beginning of Legacy: NYU Shanghai Oral History." 

Outside of work, Chunming loves performing, meditating, and exploring the world with her body and mind. 

Solby Lim (2022)

Solby Lim 임솔비 is a Korean/American storyteller and researcher currently based out of New York, NY. Solby graduated magna cum laude from Barnard College with a degree in History and Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, where she completed a thesis on internationalism as forms of political and cultural intimacies for northern Korea (DPRK) during the 1960s. Her thesis drew upon various archives of political cartoons, expressions of art, and literature found in DPRK and US-based print publications, including the Black Panther Party's community newspaper and radical Asian American magazine Gidra, that were published at the time. Solby worked as a student editor and intern for the Barnard's Communications department, pitching and writing profile stories and campus news starting her sophomore year. She previously interned for W. W. Norton & Co. and GLAAD's Media Institute where she wrote for the organization's blog and gathered research for GLAAD's annual Media Reference guide and for the 2020 and 2022 Olympic Games. 

Some of her interests lie in radical imaginings of archives, Asian/American history, internationalist art and culture, Korean protest and reunification art, histories of beauty, and multimedia expression as storytelling.

Solby's passion for exploring transnational cultural histories is grounded in her experiences as a third culture kid, having been a Korean raised in Massachusetts, Abu Dhabi, Hong Kong, and Shanghai as a teenager. She finds kinship as an Asian/American and part of the Korean diaspora, both communities she hopes to honor through her studies and work. Solby continues to explore Asian diasporic politics and culture as well as forge new possibilities for archiving Asian/American and other marginalized histories in her work. 

Kyung-Hee Kang (2021)

Kyung Hee (first name, pronounced Kee-young-hee, she/her) Kang was born and raised in South Korea. She comes to OHMA from a filmmaking/visual storytelling background. Kyung Hee’s films have included Korean children from under-resourced communities who learn to use digital technology to express themselves, Kyrgyz children who were forcefully converted from their religion, and Nepali children’s resilience after earthquakes. Her films have aimed to disseminate the stories of person of color, persons with disabilities, and women’s voices. In her work, she has collaborated with both international and national non-profit organizations as well as local communities. She constantly seeks to learn from the people and communities she comes in contact with throughout the storytelling process.

Since 2019, Kyung Hee has been developing a documentary called The Appropriate Recovery. The film explores the psychological and societal impact of the Gyeongbu Expressway’s construction on local communities. Having been personally affected by the history of the expressway, Kyung Hee intends to tell the (hi)story of herself, her family, and her country. Thus, oral history will be a primary method for creating the film. Oral historians shed light onto the shadows of the roads that connect us, assuring we are all captured in the records of history.

Kyung Hee’s research interests include the societal stigma children from alternative families face and how collective memory is informed by social and political influences through oral history methodology. She looks forward to sharing experiences and learning from the cohort and faculty at OHMA while broadening self-understanding to ultimately engage more insightfully with others and the world. www.kangkyung.com 

Pengyuan Hu (2021)

Pengyuan comes to OHMA with a passion for literature and writing. She recently graduated with Summa Cum Laude in English from Tufts University, having decided that being a doctor may not be the most delightful thing in the world. 

Her name, Peng, comes from Xiaoyaoyou, one of the sacred texts in Daoism. According to the story, Peng is a leviathan that used to occupy the oceans and then one day soars into the sky by metamorphasizing into a bird. The origins of her name, told by Pengyuan's mother and later read from Xiaoyaoyou by Pengyuan herself, sparked her earliest interest in storytelling. 

Pengyuan's draw toward storytelling led her to fiction writing in college. Realizing what great influence and beauty a story can bring, Pengyuan is excited to pursue different forms of narration and explore storytelling through audio/visual mediums during her time in OHMA. She aims to use oral history to counteract censorship and broaden the range of voices and types of narratives that can be heard in public. Pengyuan is also planning to study oral history as a research methodology to see how the past impact the present as well as the future to come. During the past year, Pengyuan has been working as an editor and videotographer for Hunan Daily. She is currently participating in an oral history project against domestic violence. Pengyuan is thrilled to join the OHMA 2021 cohort and receive further technical training in interview strategies.

Natalie Naranjo-Morett (2022)

Natalie Naranjo-Morett (she/her/ella) was born and raised in San Diego, California where she completed her Bachelor’s degree in history with an emphasis on Latin America at UC San Diego. She also has a double minor in anthropological-archaeology and psychology. Her parents immigrated from Tijuana, Mexico when Natalie was two years old, but her family continues to cross the border often to visit their extended family. Natalie grew up traveling throughout Mexico to vacation with her family and discovered a passion for history and learning about her culture from the local communities.

During her time in OHMA, Natalie was able to grow her skills in exhibit curation and discovered various ways she could provide a platform for Latin American native communities, specifically through collaboration. In past years, Natalie has interned at the San Diego Museum of Man, now known as the Museum of Us, where she was inspired to support Indigenous people in acknowledging and rewriting their history to better represent their culture and their community.

Ariel Urim Chung (2022)

Photo by Jayon Park at “You are (not) Invited”

Ariel Urim Chung (she/her) is a multidisciplinary artist working across performance, technology, and oral history with an aesthetic constructed through trauma studies, embodied research, and her identity as a Korean woman in diaspora. Currently she is a Visiting Scholar at NYU’s Asian/Pacific/American Institute and MAGIC Grantee at the Brown Institute for Media Innovation.

In her academic and artistic endeavors, Ariel aspires to strengthen solidarity within marginalized communities by creating safe spaces for difficult dialogues. In her previous research, she has focused on the relationship between performance and trauma culture to create a more conscious environment for trauma-sufferers and artists. 

Currently, Ariel is experimenting, merging her academic directions and artistic mediums to create something foreign to herself. Specifically, she is exploring hyper-imaginative sites for Asian and Asian-American children and parents to engage in conversation through oral history on food. She is a little scared. and excited.

Prior to OHMA, Ariel obtained her B.A. in Theatre with Honors and minor in Computer Science at Davidson College. Outside of work, she enjoys cooking, learning new recipes, and dancing! 

www.arielurimchung.com

Harpal Singh (2020)

Harpal Singh has worked as a journalist for over three decades in India and elsewhere. His latest twin-assignments were a regional satellite television news station, Day & Night News, Chandigarh, where he worked as the Editor, and its digital sibling, GoNews India, where he was Head of Operations.

He has had a long innings at India Today magazine where he started as a Trainee Journalist in 1989 and became its News Editor in 1997. He has been the Head of Forward Planning for NDTV, Systems Editor for ABNi (now CNBC), Night Editor for The Indian Express, Associate Executive Producer for Aaj Tak & Headlines Today (now India Today Television), Senior Executive Producer for NewsX and Program Editor for Al Jazeera English at Doha.

He completed his Honours in English from Delhi University's Rajdhani College in 1987 and a post-graduate programme in journalism from the Centre for Mass Media of the New Delhi YMCA the following year before entering the media.

He is a World Press Institute (WPI)-trained trainer on transparency reporting (Minnesota, 2005) and has regularly taught a variety of media subjects since 1996. He is widely travelled & considers news-gathering and creative writing his core competencies.

Harpal has taken up oral history to fulfil an abiding life goal: to create a credible and comprehensive digital repository on the Sikh Genocide of 1984 in which 2,733 persons were killed over three days in Delhi alone after the assassination of the then Indian Prime Minister, Mrs. Indira Gandhi, by her Sikh bodyguards. He is a victim and survivor of that pogrom. 

His interests, however, extend beyond his community and what it has endured. His touchstone for shining an illuminating light on a subject is the violation of human rights, impinging of personal liberties, discrimination, and peddling of hate anywhere in the world, from Kashmir in India to Kabul in Afghanistan to Aleppo in Syria to Rakhine in Myanmar to Caracas in Venezuela.

“I’m attempting to move away from writing the ‘first rough draft of history’ to learning to write the first rough draft of oral history,” he says. “It is a leap of faith, similar to my leap into journalism over three decades ago.”

Harpal is a radio buff, but ironically, he has never worked in that space because radio news is still a State monopoly in India.

Amalia Schwarzschild (2020)

Amalia Schwarzschild (she/they) is a Brooklyn native and recent Hampshire College alum (2020). Her academic focuses include and are not limited to Latin American Studies, Afro-Latin American studies and African American studies. 

While in her undergraduate studies, she completed a senior thesis devised of an ethnographic research project, fueled by questions and her interest in Afro-Mexican identity. For this thesis, Amalia traveled to Oaxaca, Mexico, and conducted an oral history in Spanish with an elder in the community. She is also a recipient of the 5 College Certificate in Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies. 

Overall, her interests include traveling, learning languages (like Spanish), engaging in conversations, black activism, black queer activism, and continuously pushing herself to learn more about how to challenge the colonial structures around her. 

Amalia is extremely excited to join the 2020 cohort, and can’t wait to see what is produced from the great minds coming together this year. 

Lisa R. Cohen (2019)

Lisa R. Cohen (who uses her middle initial because her name is so ubiquitous) is excited to be joining the the OHMA cohort as a part time Masters Candidate after 30 plus years as a full time network news producer, author, documentary filmmaker, adjunct professor and university administrator.

Currently, Lisa is the Director of Prizes administering the duPont-Columbia Awards at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. She taught reporting, video production, and long form narrative video classes there for over a decade, while also directing/producing documentaries; about a maximum security prison hospice staffed by the inmates for the OWN Doc Club, and about the inequities of cancer care in this country for HBO. She also authored a book about the historic disappearance of Etan Patz in 1979 that ushered in a profound change in child rearing in America. Previous to that she produced long form stories and documentaries at ABC and CBS News for over 20 years. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a dual degree in International Relations and French, neither of which she particularly made use of in her career, but realizes it was an invaluable lesson in developing critical thinking skills and the ability to speak with a guttural R.

She’s eager to learn more about the distinctions and commonalities between journalism and oral history, acquire new skills, and dive back in to helping others tell stories to create a deeper understanding of ourselves.

Meave Warnock Sheehan (2016)

During her time at OHMA, Meave Warnock Sheehan has curated an audio exhibit on a maritime history topic, using audio recordings and transcribed interviews from archived collections at the Brooklyn Historical Society and the Hoboken Historical Museum. Meave first learned about oral history in 2013 when she was enrolled in a master’s degree program in Liberal Studies.

Meave's previous jobs have been in local journalism, education, and government. In Summer 2019, she was selected for and attended a National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) workshop for educators to study the early railroad system in the U.S.

Recently, Meave joined the Hudson County (NJ) Genealogical and Historical Society and the Archivists Roundtable of Metropolitan New York. As the result of her beginning attempts to trace her genealogy, Meave has located the grave of her Civil War ancestor, a Union soldier who served in the 1st Maine Heavy Artillery Regiment.

Meave continues to learn about audio editing and archival practices and hopes to use solid audio skills, strong narrative choices and a highly developed appreciation for language to further ‘‘activate the archives.’’ Her research interests include local history, labor history, radio history, and podcasting.

Jennie Morrison (2019)

Jennie is a Midwesterner at heart, with a little bit of Pacific Northwest and New York influence. After growing up in Michigan and graduating from Kenyon College in Ohio with a BA in American Studies, she worked with children, youth, and families in public educational and non-profit settings in Seattle. Youth development and community engagement work challenged Jennie to think about how identity, power, privilege, and voice shape both individual and collective stories.

In 2017, Jennie relocated to NYC to attend Columbia School of Social Work in hopes of learning about the impacts of trauma in order to design more holistic and responsive youth programming. During her studies, she became increasingly interested in the concept of resilience on individual and community levels. The OHMA workshops and trainings around campus always caught her eye, and she is now excited to explore how oral history can support advocacy and facilitate systemic change efforts.

Jennie has several research interests that stem from her background in youth development, social work, and American Studies. In particular, she is eager to explore connections between the experiences of workers in the varying human services, child welfare, and public education fields within the United States, particularly given recent findings about burnout.