Hi /r/AskHistorians,
I’m a college senior about to graduate, and one of my post-grad plans was to create a history podcast about select Third World countries during the Cold War (after I get a salaried job with good work-life balance, move out of my parents’ house, and become a financially independent adult).
I would not cover the more Eurocentric / Americentric history, such as the Berlin Wall, the various Soviet coups, and US / UK domestic politics such as Walter Cronkite, Walter Mondale, Joseph McCarthy, James Callaghan, Clement Attlee, etc. Instead, I’d cover the Cold War histories of some countries such as:
I don’t want to cover every Third World country because I want this project to be manageable and to not be overwhelming (and I may not cover all the countries I’ve listed above).
I was thinking of doing 12-episode series for each country that I covered, to make this project even more manageable (I don’t plan to be as exhaustive as Mike Duncan was when he covered the French, Mexican, and Russian Revolutions, just to keep my sanity and make sure I’m not taking on more than I can handle).
Onto my main concern about research: I think I will still have access to my university’s online databases (JSTOR, etc.) as an alumni (I will probably not return to the actual town though since the region is economically depressed). How do I do research for a podcast like this and make sure everything is factually correct?
How do I account for political bias, especially considering the Cold War is still a politically charged subject in the minds of many people?
How do I account for lack of information, especially considering the knowledge of some subjects, such as the Malaysian Emergency, is still classified?
How much research should I be doing, and what sources should I use? How do I balance between using primary and secondary sources? How do I account for the fact that I do not speak languages such as Spanish, Portuguese, French, Arabic, or Serbian?
Above all, how do I establish and maintain credibility? How can I be viewed as a trustworthy and historically accurate source?
I do a Cold War podcast and while we’re little broader in scope then what you’re talking about, we’ve done in-depth series on North Korea and Vietnam, and we are currently talking about Yugoslavia. As an Australian, I tend to be skeptical of the more mainstream American narratives, so I work hard to try and find a balance of perspectives. I try to get my hands on source materials from as many perspectives as possible. And then read between the lines to figure out my own narrative. After a while it gets easier to spot the recurring narrative structures.