oral history, compilation of historical data through interviews, usually tape-recorded and sometimes videotaped, with participants in, or observers of, significant events or times. Primitive societies have long relied on oral tradition to preserve a record of the past in the absence of written histories. In Western society, the use of oral material goes back to the early Greek historians Herodotus (in his history of the Persian Wars) and Thucydides (in his History of the Peloponnesian War), both of whom made extensive use of oral reports from witnesses. The modern concept of oral history was developed in the 1940s by Allan Nevins and his associates at Columbia Univ. In creating oral histories, interviews are conducted to obtain information from different perspectives, many of which are often unavailable from written sources. Such materials provide data on individuals, families, important events, or day-to-day life.

The discipline came into its own in the 1960s and early 70s when inexpensive tape recorders were available to document such rising social movements as civil rights, feminism, and anti-Vietnam War protest. Authors such as Studs Terkel, Alex Haley, and Oscar Lewis have employed oral history in their books, many of which are largely based on interviews. In another important example of the genre, a massive archive covering the oral history of American music has been compiled at the Yale School of Music. By the end of the 20th cent. oral history had become a respected discipline in many colleges and universities. At that time the Italian historian Alessandro Portelli and his associates began to study the role that memory itself, whether accurate or faulty, plays in the themes and structures of oral history. Their published work has since become standard material in the field, and many oral historians now include in their research the study of the subjective memory of the persons they interview.

Oral, formerly Uralsk, city (1989 pop. 199,835), NW Kazakhstan, on the Ural River. Among its industries are the repair of agricultural equipment, grain processing, and tanning. It was founded as Uralsk in 1622 by the Ural Cossacks, who fought with Stenka Razin in the uprising of 1667 and against the Bolsheviks in 1918-19. It was an important trade center on the border of European Russia and Kazakhstan.

or oral cavity or buccal cavity

Orifice through which food and air enter the body. It opens to the outside at the lips and empties into the throat at the rear and is bounded by the lips, cheeks, hard and soft palates, and glottis. Its chief structures are the teeth (see tooth), tongue, and palate. It is the site of chewing and speech formation. The mouth is lined by mucous membranes containing small glands that, along with the salivary glands, keep it moist and clear of food and other debris.

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or hoof-and-mouth disease

Highly contagious viral disease of cloven-footed mammals (including cattle), spread by ingestion and inhalation. The afflicted animal develops fever and painful blisters on the tongue, lips, other tissues of the mouth, muzzle or snout, teats, and feet. FMD is endemic in many places. Because of its rapid spread and impact on animal productivity, it is considered the most economically devastating livestock disease in the world. It is not a human health hazard. No effective treatment exists; vaccines control epidemics but have not eliminated them. Since the virus can persist, quarantine, slaughter, cremation or burial of carcasses, and decontamination must be rigorous. Strict surveillance has kept North America largely FMD-free since 1929. In early 2001 a major outbreak occurred in the United Kingdom, followed shortly by outbreaks in The Netherlands and France.

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