Casting a Wider Net is a community oral history project developed to collect and share the stories of Cape Verdean, Vietnamese, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Guatemalan, and Salvadoran members of the commercial fishing industry. The project provided ethnographic training for 9 individuals from those communities who led the documentation effort, conducting 14 interviews in English, Spanish, Kriolu, and Vietnamese.
Click here to learn more about the project!
Join us for the free grand opening of our new gallery exhibit, Casting A Wider Net!
The exhibit will include videos, photographs, and quotes from the oral history interviews as well as links to the full interview transcripts. Participants will have the opportunity to hear the voices of each person who was interviewed, flip through photos of the narrators and their families, and can even write them a message in our guestbook. The exhibit opening will feature light refreshments and music representing the many cultures featured in the exhibit.
Visitors will also have the opportunity to learn about other storytelling and community documentation efforts in our community and organizations working to support people who have recently immigrated to New Bedford.
We will be joined by Beth Jones, current artist-in-residence at the New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park, who will be sharing information about her project “New Bedford in the Palm of Your Hand: A Citywide Story Initiative.” You can also register to be included in the project!
Plus, representatives from the Immigrants’ Assistance Center will be stopping by to share information about their mission to provide direct services to immigrants and non-English speaking persons, including food, shelter, and clothing, citizen guidance, and workforce readiness.
Casting a Wider Net is funded in part by a Wicked Cool Places grant from New Bedford Creative, a grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and an Expanding Massachusetts Stories grant from Mass Humanities, which receives support from the Massachusetts Cultural Council and is an affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
