Dr. Kitty Oliver Oral History Projects. Race and Change Consultant – Author, oral historian, and media producer Kitty Oliver has a Ph.D. in Comparative Studies focusing on race and ethnic communication and an MFA in Creative Writing. She is an oral history consultant and member of the Oral History Association. She pioneered the Race and Change Dialogue model of talking about race in a nonconfrontational way across cultures and generations in public forums.

Race and Change Collection – She founded the Race and Change Oral Histories archive with125 interviews on race relations, one of the only historical archives of its kind and scope, with stories of cross-cultural narrators in the U.S. and Ghana, West Africa prior to and after passage of the Civil Rights Acts of the mid-1960s.

Oral histories are housed in Special Collections at the African American Research Library and Cultural Center, Fort Lauderdale, FL., and her work is part of the  American Folklife Center Civil Rights History Project archive.

Race and Change Videos – The Race and Change Initiative has spawned multimedia explorations of intergenerational oral history interviews including numerous videos of Race and Change on YouTube.

Race and Change Radio Programs- Stories of Elders: Voices of Race and Change: Oral Histories and Podcast,  includes cross-cultural conversations and excerpts from the Race and Change Oral Histories archive.

Race and Change Radio Programs – Younger People Talk About Race: Voices of Race and Change: The Younger Generation, with programs produced by college students and immigrant teens across cultures sharing their personal experiences with race and ethnic issues today.

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The 22 male and female writers in this collection represent a range of backgrounds, ages, racial and cultural perspectives. They are from southern and northern parts of the U.S. and from Europe, Canada, and the Caribbean. They are Latino, Jamaican, African American, and Caucasian. The approaches to autobiographical writing vary as well from philosophical examinations of racial divisions to creative nonfiction techniques to explore the pain of prejudice. White writers look at naiveté and ambivalence to racial issues; Black writers discuss family, community and challenges in interracial as well as intra-racial relationships. Other topics include religion and faith in Black and White cultures; responses to one-on-one encounters with differences, seeing themselves through others’ eyes; and views of race from the perspective of people whose worlds have expanded because of their ethnicity or international travel.

The book also includes approaches to launching a Race and Change project or course that have proven effective with a wide range of cultural audiences and the “3R’s of Writing” Exercises. This creative window into the racial experiences of the post-Civil Rights Movement generation juxtaposed with other stories of America’s problematic past is an enjoyable read and can also be used for further study of race and ethnic relations issues.

Dr. Kitty Oliver is a veteran journalist and academic, an author and oral historian, a media producer, and a professional singer with an MFA in Creative Writing, specializing in literary nonfiction and memoir, and a Ph.D. in Comparative Studies, focusing on race and ethnic communication.

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Dr. Kitty Oliver

A product of the civil rights era who came of age with integration in the U.S., she brings an innovative perspective to race and ethnic relations sharing research and stories across cultures in Race and Change dialogues where people can explore race in a hopeful, progressive way.

She is founder of the cross-cultural Race and Change Oral History Archive, the largest of its kind in size and scope, housed in Special Collections at the African American Research Library and Cultural Center. Her books and television documentaries are used widely in public schools, college classrooms, and community forums. She has also assembled an online resource of Race and Change programs for youth including an iTunes radio channelfeaturing stories of scores of native-born and immigrant college students and teens.

In 2019, she presented the first “Agents of Race and Change Award,” to encourage today’s youth who are building bridges across the racial and ethnic divide. Signup for the email list for information on how to submit a nomination.

Watch her in a brief but pivotal segment of the recent award-winning Ron Howard documentary film on the Beatles – “Eight Days a Week: The Touring Years” – where she shares personal experiences with the band and segregation in Florida. Her cross-cultural intergenerational race and ethnic relations work was also chronicled by CNN.

You can hear her original inspirational music on the CD “The Calling of Our Time” that she also shares as an entertaining aspect of her Race and Change public presentations.

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The Race and Change Oral Histories archive ranges from life histories of baby boomers – U.S. born and immigrants – who came of age with the Civil Rights Movement, to interviews in Ghana, West Africa. It is the only cross-cultural collection of its kind and scope in the U.S. where ordinary people reflect candidly on race relations experiences over the years and how society and they have changed.

The Race and Change Dialogue strategy is a model for talking about differences in a non-confrontational, inclusive, hopeful way, opening the door to global conversations and progress.
“Sharing the truth of our story, all that we have grown through, the progress as well as the pain, can be a healing experience – for the speaker, and the listener – and provide hope for generations to come.”

Kitty O. Enterprises, Inc.

1323 SE 17th St., #108, Ft. Lauderdale, FL 33316

954-382-0793

kittyoliver2@gmail.com

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A product of the civil rights era who came of age with integration in the U.S., she brings an innovative perspective to race and ethnic relations sharing research and stories across cultures in Race and Change dialogues where people can explore race in a hopeful, progressive way.

She is founder of the cross-cultural Race and Change Oral History Archive, the largest of its kind in size and scope, housed in Special Collections at the African American Research Library and Cultural Center. Her books and television documentaries are used widely in public schools, college classrooms, and community forums. She has also assembled an online resource of Race and Change programs for youth including an iTunes radio channelfeaturing stories of scores of native-born and immigrant college students and teens.

In 2019, she presented the first “Agents of Race and Change Award,” to encourage today’s youth who are building bridges across the racial and ethnic divide. Signup for the email list for information on how to submit a nomination.

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“The Race and Change Initiative” is a multimedia project that promotes a 21st Century discussion of race and ethnic relations and differences through the innovative use of archival oral history interviews, video and Web radio programs, and performance presentations. Youth and adults share their stories.

The Initiative is based on The Race and Change Dialogue a model for talking about differences across races, ethnicities, and generations in public forums, and doing it in a non-confrontational, hopeful way.

She pioneered the cross-cultural “Race and Change” research project in South Florida that has expanded to Ghana, West Africa. The work has resulted in an historical archive of oral histories on race, a multimedia website on race, and consulting for historical, tourism, social service, and government organizations.

Her public television and video productions are used widely by schools and libraries She is producer and host of the 10-part series “Crossing Cultures/Changing Lives”, airing on WBEC-TV. In addition, she produces videos, podcasts, and blogs on race and ethnic relations and changes across generations. She is a lecturer and workshop leader on creative nonfiction writing techniques and memoir writing, and a professional jazz singer. She conducts community oral history field work and is a member of the Oral History Association.

For more information and bookings, contact:
Kitty O. Enterprises, Inc.1323 SE 17th Street, #108, Fort Lauderdale, FL, 33316
(Phone) 954-382-0793

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The Race and Change with Doctor Kitty Oliver. Dr. Kitty Oliver is a veteran South Florida journalist, author, oral historian, and university professor with a Ph.D. focusing on race and ethnic communication. She has been featured on CNN news, “Black in America,” for her race relations work. She is also president of Kitty O. Enterprises, Inc., a cultural diversity consulting firm based in Fort Lauderdale, FL, and director of the new Race and Change Initiative at Florida Atlantic University.

Dr. Kitty Oliver is an oral history consultant working with educational and community organizations to develop and teach courses and conduct projects for the purpose of presentations to the public as well as archival research. She is a member of the national Oral History Association. Current projects:

“The Race and Change Initiative” is a multimedia project that promotes a 21st Century discussion of race and ethnic relations and differences through the innovative use of archival oral history interviews, video and Web radio programs, and performance presentations. Youth and adults share their stories.

The Initiative is based on The Race and Change Dialogue a model for talking about differences across races, ethnicities, and generations in public forums, and doing it in a non-confrontational, hopeful way.

“The Race and Change Oral History Collection” has over 125 interviews on race relations and is one of the only historical archives which features multicultural-multiethnic narrators. Blacks, Whites, Hispanics/Latinos, Caribbeans, and Asians share their growing up experiences in various parts of the U.S. as well as other countries, and their encounters with race, focusing largely on the era prior to and just after passage of the Civil Rights Acts of the mid-1960s. The interviews, collected by Oliver and university students she has trained, are housed in Special Collections at the African American Research Library and Cultural Center, Fort Lauderdale, FL. and available to researchers.

For more information and bookings, contact:
Kitty O. Enterprises, Inc.1323 SE 17th Street, #108, Fort Lauderdale, FL, 33316
(Phone) 954-382-0793

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(The University Press of Kentucky, $25.00/hardcover, $17.95 paperback) Kitty Oliver takes readers on a journey of exploration from her hometown of Jacksonville to the halls of the University of Florida as one of its first African American freshmen in 1965 and far beyond. One reviewer describes it as “a thinking woman’s memoir of a journey with many side trips” in her search for a sense of “home.” With humor, poignancy, and lyrical language (reminiscent at times of another Florida writer, Zora Neale Hurston), Oliver shares her passages from the “old world” to the new as an immigrant’s journey, indicative of the American experience. Blending past and present, she searches for roots from the Gullah or “Geechee” culture of South Carolina to the urban streets of northern Florida to the multicultural mix of South Florida, exploring America, Europe and Africa. These autobiographical essays are an upbeat journal – part travelogue, part memoir, described as “a delightful field trip” that’s educational, too. Part of the Women in Southern Culture series. For information and ordering contact The University Press of Kentucky (1-800-839-6855).

For more information and bookings, contact:
Kitty O. Enterprises, Inc.1323 SE 17th Street, #108, Fort Lauderdale, FL, 33316
(Phone) 954-382-0793

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Kitty Oliver Lecture Performances. Kitty Oliver is an author and oral historian, TV and radio producer, Ph.D. race relations scholar and “inspirational jazz” recording artist who shares these talents in enlightening, non-confrontational lecture-performances and workshops that bridge differences and promote reconciliation and progress.

Entertaining and educational topics for civic, community, professional and business groups include:

Lecture-Performances and Workshops:

“Race” and Change: A 21st Century Dialogue on Differences (features cutting edge research)

Beyond Diversity: How to Be a Race and Change Agent (developing cultural bridges in your organization/community/personal life)

Answering the Call of Our Time: A Journey of Jazz and Memories.

The Baby Boomer Generation: A Multicolored Journey (also adapted for secondary school students)

Cross-Cultural Stories of Race and Change in the U.S. (also adapted for secondary school audiences)

How to Tell YOUR Stories of Race and Change and Make a Difference (also adapted for secondary school audiences) 

For more information and bookings, contact:
Kitty O. Enterprises, Inc.
1323 SE 17th Street, #108, Fort Lauderdale, FL, 33316
(Phone) 954-382-0793
or email KittyO@KittyOliveronline.com

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The Race and Change Oral History Collection has over 125 interviews on race relations and is one of the only historical archives which features multicultural-multiethnic narrators. Blacks, Whites, Hispanics/Latinos, Caribbeans, and Asians share their growing up experiences in various parts of the U.S. as well as other countries, and their encounters with race, focusing largely on the era prior to and just after passage of the Civil Rights Acts of the mid-1960s. The interviews, collected by Oliver and university students she has trained, are housed in Special Collections at the African American Research Library and Cultural Center, Fort Lauderdale, FL. and available to researchers.

“The Race and Change Project” is an ongoing research study of race and ethnic relations, geographical history, and social change through the collection of oral histories of Whites, African Americans, and immigrants of various Hispanic/Latino, Caribbean and Asian backgrounds. Research sites have included the South Florida cities of Hollywood, Fort Lauderdale, Delray Beach, and Boca Raton; North Fork and Liberia, historically-significant Black communities; towns along Florida’s landmark Lake Okeechobee; and Ghana, West Africa where women who have experienced America’s racial climate shared their stories.

Oliver has taught field study courses for Florida Atlantic University’s School of Communication and Multimedia Studies where students have assisted in the collection of memories and produced projects for public presentation.

For more information and bookings, contact:
Kitty O. Enterprises, Inc.1323 SE 17th Street, #108, Fort Lauderdale, FL, 33316
(Phone) 954-382-0793

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