Share Your Story

Record a Testimony

For years, recording an oral history meant a camera crew and a professional interviewer. Today, the power to preserve these stories is in your hands. Families, students, teachers, and communities can now record a testimony with a phone and add it to JIMENA’s collection, so that no story is lost simply because no one was there to record it.

Download our free tools:

JIMENA Oral History Guide (PDF): step by step instructions, interview questions, a pre-interview questionnaire, and an FAQ for narrators.
Release and Consent Form (PDF): required for every testimony; it lets each narrator choose how their story is shared.

Five Steps to Recording a Testimony

Prepare. Read the guide, talk with your narrator about the project, and ask them to gather photographs and documents.
Get consent. Review the release form together and have the narrator sign it before you record.
Record. Find a quiet room, hold the phone horizontally on a steady surface, and let the narrator tell their story in their own words.
Preserve. Back up the recording in two places and write a short summary of what the narrator shared.
Share. Submit the testimony, the signed release form, and a photo through our Share My Story form. For large files, upload a short excerpt and email info@jimena.org with a link to the full recording.

What Happens After You Submit

JIMENA reviews every submission and confirms the narrator’s consent and sharing choice before anything is published. With the narrator’s permission, testimonies may be featured on our website, used in educational programs, and preserved alongside JIMENA’s collection at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.

Explore the Collection

Watch testimonies from Jews born in Algeria, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Syria, and Yemen in our Stories collection, or view full length interviews on the Ben-Gurion Archives YouTube channel. Teachers can bring these voices into the classroom with JIMENA’s Oral Histories lesson plan.

Questions? Email info@jimena.org.