As I’ve mentioned before, I’m very interested in the topic of adversity. My past struggles have been largely financial, but I’ve be fortunate to live out of harm’s way. Not so for Sy Bakker, who had to endure Nazi oppression during the German occupation of The Netherlands during World War II. Bakker, and other Charleston Retirement Community members, told their stories as part of The Charlestown Digital Story Project which involved students from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.
For this critique, I focused on three assessment traits to gauge the storytelling:
- Voice: This story is a straight “I was there” narration told by Sy Bakker himself. There are no other soundbites. At times, I could hear Bakker’s tone change as he described an encounter with a German soldier pointing a gun at him. In another instance, he describes the terrible conditions at a prison camp: the straw floors, the small amounts of bread and the tiring labor tasks. The recording is crisp, clean and easy to hear. In a historical context, voice is important to consider since the eyewitness can give a unique account of small details of a large war.
- Flow/pacing: The students at UMBC do a very good job of organizing the main audio elements of the story: Bakker’s narration and simple violin music. The breaks in the narration gives the viewer a chance to reflect on Bakker’s experiences. There is a nice flow of historical images, still photos and a picture of Sy Bakker at the time of the recording. Pacing is important to give the viewer a chance to soak in all the historical details and gain a greater understand of what it meant to be a prisoner in a Nazi labor camp.
- Media application: Like the comments before, the students use a simple mix of audio and video elements. Some of the still photos are of sunsets and barren fields, which I believe gives the viewer an opportunity to briefly reflect. It would have been nice to see additional historical photos of Bakker as a student in The Netherlands or maybe of his family in France, but such archived material may not have been available. If there is one more thing I would have liked to have seen, it would have been some type of statement/reflection from Sy Bakker about how that time during Nazi occupation changed his life. Maybe he could have passed along some words of wisdom to younger generations.
There are many more digital stories from The Charlestown Digital Story Project and I recommend anyone to click on the hyperlink above and check them out.