This oral history interview is an intimate conversation between two people, both of whom have generously agreed to share this recording with Oral History Summer School, and with you. Please listen in the spirit with which this was shared.
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Born in Washington, D.C. Elizabeth grew up in the surrounding capital district. Elizabeth told of life with her older sister, Rachel, and younger brother, Daniel, and her parents who were both lawyers. Family life and interactions were complex. Elizabeth’s exceptional abilities in school changed the family dynamic in many ways. Her relationship as the main support for her mother left her with many issues to work through. The progression of her family life through physical and mental illnesses was described as well as the lead-up to and the aftermath of her parents’ divorce. Her attendance at an all-girls’ high school and mainly all-women’s college provided the background for her deep-seated feminism and wide-ranging interests. Her position as librarian and classroom teacher in a Jewish school now give her the opportunity to help youngsters to broaden their outlook on life and see the world beyond their neighborhood and school. Elizabeth’s connection to the Judaism of her mother and her strong sense for social activism have been strong impulses in her life. She spoke of teachers who had inspired her and a particular friend who founded and runs a non-for-profit which helps people in the Congo.
This interview would be of interest to those people interested in family dynamics, Jewish culture, women’s education, family life with mental illness, the not-for-profit Resolve, Democratic Republic of Congo, feminism, social activism, gifted children, the effect of divorce upon a family, privileged Childhoods, elementary school education, opportunities of librarians, the teaching profession, global perspective.
Marty Hunt is a long-term, now retired, co-worker in Camphill Village USA in Copake, New York. She is a mother and grandmother and has held many positions of responsibility at Camphill Village.
Oral history is an iterative process. In keeping with oral history values of anti-fixity, interviewees will have an opportunity to add, annotate and reflect upon their lives and interviews in perpetuity. Talking back to the archive is a form of “shared authority.”