Anne Grenn Saldinger, Ph.D. has been doing oral history interviews for over 15 years. Her belief in the power of personal stories grew out of her training as a social worker and clinical psychologist and her experience as the executive director of a community-based oral history project.
Her dissertation research was about the psychological effects of telling one’s life story for Holocaust survivors, and she was so compelled by what she found that she went on to gather hundreds of priceless life stories of Holocaust survivors in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Anne is skilled at putting people at ease and listening deeply with compassion as she guides them through the telling of their stories. She is an experienced videographer and a published author. In her young adult textbook, Life in a Nazi Concentration Camp, (Lucent Books, 2001) she captures the voices of interviewees to illustrate the realities of their experience.
She is a trained facilitator for Healing of Memories workshops, which offer an intensive group experience, centered on the personal sharing and mutual witnessing of each participant’s story. Anne is active in community activities and coordinates “Generation to Generation,” an intergenerational oral history project bringing together Holocaust survivors with local students.
Anne has presented her work at numerous conferences worldwide and is a member of the Association of Personal Historians and the Oral History Association. A few of her presentations include:
“Bringing Oral History into the Digital Classroom” Prague, Czech Republic.
“How to Remember?” Contemporary Jewish Museum. San Francisco, California
“The Legacy of Survivors: Effects of Bearing Witness.” Krakow, Poland.
“Creating a “Usable Past” across the Generations: Holocaust Testimony as a Powerful Tool for Education.” Portland, Oregon.
Anne believes that each person’s life story is a unique legacy to be appreciated and learned from. She is passionate about helping people capture their memories and insights for the benefit of themselves and future generations.
