This is an abstract of a paper to be held at the Oral History and Fieldwork symposium at the Finnish Literature Society, Helsinki, 2–3 December 2010. The theme of the symposium is dedicated to 'The (Re)use and Interpretation of Research Materials'.
Iivantiira village committee has received a small scholarship for the collection of local oral history material. The participatory undertaking in Iivantiira, Kuhmo, Finland (Lat/Lon: 64.4588/29.5320) led into a study of village households. The project leader started a study group on 3D modeling in order to describe house layout and construction details. Meanwhile he discovered that the same tools also could be used as interview aids.
This exploratory project is an attempt to create new methods for interview based research in oral history. The researcher uses aerial and conventional photographs in conjunction with 3D modeling, GPS navigation and laser measurements as a way of elaborating the interview process.
It is assumed that the approach can elaborate and strengthen the dialogue by giving projective stimulus for the respondent. The procedure could also function as a way of testing the reliability of geographical and architecture interview data with the help of maps and visual models.
The presentation is based on concrete case material from the study carried out in Iivantiira village. The intention is to stimulate discussion on the use value of the proposed data collection approaches. The demonstrations include Google SketchUp models of historical houses, GPS waypoints in the form of Google Earth placemarks and traces of roads and places of the past, as well as transcription excerpts.
— Philip Donner
Philip Donner: "Modeling our historical past: Iivantiiran Ypykkä revisited". Web article, published at http://www.znak.fi/user/pdonner/ypykka/.
Philip Donner: Iivantiiran vanhoja taloja hiilipiirustuksina [Carbon drawings of old houses in Iivantiira village]. Web article, published at http://www.iivantiira.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=483.
The www site 'Iivantiira 3D', which is published as a Google site at http://sites.google.com/site/iivantiira3d/, contains study material of the 3D modeling study group.