BERE ISLAND is set to host a Storytelling Festival over the weekend of Saturday May 18th and Sunday May 19th which will feature storytelling sessions and oral history workshops, enabling people to document both their own family stories.
The storytelling festival is organised by Bere Island Projects Group and funded by the Irish Community Archive Network (iCAN). In 2023, Bere Island became one of 33 community groups to have an online archive with iCAN which was established by the National Museum of Ireland, and through their partnership with iCAN the group are working to digitise a number of island heritage collections, and record the island’s oral history.
The weekend starts on the Saturday with workshops in oral history by leading oral historian Dr Angela Maye Banbury who has recorded the oral history of Achill island and the Irish in Hell’s Kitchen in New York, and has also supported Bere Island in their own oral history project. Angela will open the festival with a workshop on the power of oral history and how communities and families can record their own stories. Saturday afternoon will feature stories from Bere Island’s oral history project.
On Sunday morning there will be a workshop on how stories can be recorded using a smartphone, and on Sunday afternoon, renowned Beara storyteller Teddy Black will recount stories from the Beara peninsula. Growing up in Castletownbere, Teddy was immersed in people gathering in neighbouring houses, known as a ‘rambling house’ where people would pass on stories and songs.
Bernie Orpen, project co-ordinator with Bere Island Projects Group said the group were looking forward to the event and hoped it would continue to encourage people to share their own stories.
‘In a world that seems overrun with technology, listening to someone tell a story brings us back to a different era, and through our ongoing project to record the oral history of Bere Island, we have realised the importance of preserving these stories for future generations. We’re grateful to the Irish Community Archive for their ongoing support and for funding this festival, and we are delighted that both Teddy and Dr Angela will be participating in the festival,’ she said.
The Bere Island Storytelling Festival will take place in the Lecture Theatre at Rerrin. For further information see www.bereisland.net or contact 027 75099. The Bere Island Oral history collection can be found on www.bereisland.heritagecork.org
