The digital life history project: intergenerational collaborative research.

ABSTRACT

This article describes the Digital Life History Project, a 10-week "lab" linked to a course on aging, in which students and community-dwelling elders work together to create a short digital story honoring the elder's life. After two interview sessions, the pair works together to produce a 3- to 5-minute digital life story narrated by the elder. The resulting multimedia videos are then screened for the community at large at the end of the semester. Students and elders alike report long-term personal, interpersonal, and community-based effects from participating in the Digital Life History Project, including making meaningful relationships, linking biography and history, learning to confront ageism, charting the next chapter, and participating in community-wide education.