The witnesses are elderly. Every month that passes, stories disappear permanently. This archive exists because their voices cannot wait.
Their Stories is a global archive preserving first-person accounts of colonialism and its aftermath — written, audio, and video. Every language. Every community touched by colonial rule. Before the people who lived it are gone.
"15th August is the day when two new countries are being born. Many a man feels happy today, many a man dies today."
This archive is built on three convictions about how history should be recorded and who gets to tell it.
Colonial history has been written almost entirely by the colonizers. This archive corrects that. Every story here is told by someone who lived it — not summarized, not interpreted, not filtered through an academic or institution. The witness is the authority.
Colonialism reached every continent. So do we. Accounts are welcome in any language, from any community affected by colonial rule — from Bengal to the Belgian Congo, from the Caribbean to the Pacific. Translation support will grow as the archive grows.
The people who experienced colonial rule are elderly. The window to capture their voices is closing — not in decades, in years, in months. This is not an academic exercise. It is a race against time, and we are aware of it in everything we do.
In 2017, Yusra launched Their Stories after spending years listening to her family's accounts of the Partition of India and Pakistan in 1947. In 2016, they discovered diaries her grandfather had kept throughout his journey — from Gwalior to Karachi to Chakwal, across a subcontinent being reorganized by British decree.
Those diaries are primary historical documents. A young man, largely alone, crossing a country achieving independence, writing it all down. They are the foundation this archive is built on.
The platform went dormant when life intervened. The domain lapsed. Eight years passed. But the urgency didn't decrease — it grew. The witnesses are older now. The ones who had the most direct memories of the colonial era are dying.
Their Stories is relaunching because the diaries deserve to be public, and because there are thousands more like them — sitting in boxes, in memory, in the stories elderly people tell their families at dinner and that no one has thought to write down.
This is that place.
"In 2017 I launched a platform to preserve first-person accounts of colonialism before the people who lived it are gone. My grandfather's diaries of Partition were the first entry. Life intervened and I lost the domain. Eight years later the urgency hasn't decreased — it's grown. I'm relaunching. And I'm looking for someone to help steward it. The stories can't wait."
Their Stories needs someone passionate to help galvinize the movement. This project was always intended to be crowd-sourced, support in making that a reality is the natural next step.
This is not a paid role — yet. It is a founding opportunity. The right person will help shape what this archive becomes, we're envisioning a podcast that hosts these stories to complement the website.
Tell us a little about yourself and why this archive matters to you. No formal application — just a conversation.
If you, your parent, or your grandparent lived through colonial rule and its aftermath — and that story has not been recorded — we want it. Written, audio, or video. Any language. Any era.
All submissions are reviewed before publication. We will contact you to discuss how your story will appear, and you retain full control over how it is shared.