"Nonnatus House, Midwife Speaking": co-curating a new oral history of Call the Midwife with BBC audiences

这个项目是与英国广播公司合作开发的，旨在与观众共同制作一个特别的百年播客，阐明英国广播公司最受关注和最着名的戏剧之一《呼叫助产士》的文化影响，该戏剧探讨了英国的医疗和社会历史。在超过15集的播客中，将有30个观众故事，这些故事是由该节目重新讲述战后社区生活和挖掘人类从摇篮到坟墓的经历而引发的。每集将有两名观众在对话中反思和分享节目中特定故事情节的个人经历，例如堕胎合法化，同性恋合法化或沙利度胺丑闻。这可能是两个童年时代的朋友，他们经历并回忆了历史上的一个特定的“时刻”，助产士亲眼目睹了避孕药的引入，父亲和女儿被节目的戏剧化收养所感动，祖母和孙子讨论了他们过去和现在在NHS中的角色，或者是一个兄弟姐妹，他们回忆起他们的姑婆作为温德鲁什一代的一部分来到英国。通过问观众“呼叫助产士对你意味着什么？”“，播客将产生新的和多样化的故事，并引发未讲过的当地故事和代际对话的灵感来自观看戏剧。然而，该节目的主题并不局限于过去，这意味着播客将参与围绕医疗保健，福利国家和NHS的当代辩论。与观众交谈也将揭示该节目在人们生活中的“位置”-数百万家庭聚集在一起观看圣诞特别节目的焦点-从而利用BBC对英国广播的贡献和对媒体参与的影响。奇迹呼叫助产士的码头设置，观众将从三个港口城市招募：利物浦，纽卡斯尔，和布里斯托。这个项目提供了一个令人兴奋的机会，创造一个音频纲要，以深受喜爱的节目和捕捉声音如何以及为什么戏剧与观众产生如此强烈的共鸣。这个项目的灵感来自《呼叫助产士》与观众之间的特殊联系，这一点被系列作家海蒂托马斯（2018）巧妙地捕捉到：“我经常被那些费心发电子邮件或写他们的经历的人所感动和谦卑，这确实让我非常关心我们所做的可能具有挑战性的故事情节，特别是关于残疾或移民的故事情节，因为我认为新来的人并不总是受到欢迎，残疾人并不总是得到他们可能得到的或他们应得的支持。所以我想，当人们写信给我说，‘是的，你的故事或你上周的一集照亮了我的经历’时，我真的感到很谦卑，我真的很高兴我们能像讲故事那样伸出脖子。播客试图挖掘观众的兴趣，阐明20世纪50年代和60年代生活与当今生活之间的联系和脱节，并放大那些记得并经历过故事情节的观众的声音。因此，播客将创造一个观众的故事和经验的口述历史，以庆祝该节目的持久流行为英国广播公司的百年纪念。该项目将为文化地理学的“创造性转向”做出宝贵贡献，这将揭示新的研究对象和创新的研究方法。这种向创造性实践的转变正在见证地理学家转变为创造者和合作者，越来越沉浸在文化地理的实践中，而不是简单地分析文化地理。尽管人们对声音地理学的兴趣越来越大，但视觉和文本媒体和方法继续使听觉黯然失色。通过共同制作播客，该项目将在最新的“创意转向”中突出音频和收听方法。

This project, developed in partnership with the BBC, aims to co-produce with audiences a special podcast for the centenary that illuminates the cultural impact of Call the Midwife, one of the BBC's most watched and celebrated dramas which explores Britain's medical and social history. Over fifteen episodes, the podcast will feature thirty audience stories sparked by the show's re-telling of post-war community life and excavation of human experience from the cradle to the grave. Each episode will feature two viewers in conversation who reflect on and share personal experiences of a particular storyline from the show, such as the legalisation of abortion, decriminalisation of homosexuality, or Thalidomide scandal. This might be two childhood friends who lived through and reminisce about a particular 'moment' in history, midwives who witnessed firsthand the introduction of the contraceptive pill, a father and daughter moved by the show's dramatisation of adoption, a grandmother and grandson who discuss their past and present roles in the NHS, or a brother and sister who recall their great aunt's arrival in Britain as part of the Windrush generation. By asking audiences 'what does Call the Midwife mean to you?', the podcast will produce new and diverse storytelling, and elicit untold local stories and intergenerational conversations inspired by watching the drama. The show's subject matter is not, however, confined to the past meaning the podcast will engage in contemporary debates around healthcare, the welfare state, and the NHS. Speaking with audiences will also reveal the show's 'place' in people's lives - a focal point for the millions of families who gather to watch the Christmas special - thereby tapping into the BBC's contribution to British broadcasting and impact on media engagement. Mirroring Call the Midwife's dockland setting, viewers will be recruited from three port cities: Liverpool, Newcastle, and Bristol. This project offers an exciting opportunity to create an audio compendium to the much-loved show and capture in sound how and why the drama resonates so strongly with audiences. The inspiration for this project lies in the special connection between Call the Midwife and its audiences, which is captured neatly by series writer, Heidi Thomas (2018): "I am constantly touched and humbled by people bothering to email or write about their experiences, and it does make me think with great care about storylines that we do that might be challenging, particularly storylines around disability or immigration, because I think newcomers to this country aren't always made as welcome as they might be and disabled people don't always get the support that they might receive or that they deserve. And so I think when people write to me saying, 'Yes, your stories or your episode of last week has shone a light on my experience', I just feel really humbled by it and I'm really pleased that we stick our necks out the way we do with our storytelling". The podcast seeks to tap into this audience interest, illuminate the connections and disjunctures between life in the 1950s and 60s, and the present day, and amplify the voices of viewers who remember and have lived through its storylines. The podcast will therefore create an oral history of viewers' stories and experiences in celebration of the show's enduring popularity for the BBC's centenary. The project will make a valuable contribution to the 'creative turn' in cultural geography, which is revealing new objects of study and innovative ways of researching them. This shift towards creative practices is witnessing geographers turn creators and collaborators, increasingly immersed in doing, rather than simply analysing, cultural geographies. Despite growing interest in sonic geographies, visual and textual media and methods continue to overshadow the aural. By co-producing a podcast, this project will foreground audio and methods of listening within the latest 'creative turn'.