Great way to start 2013… the Ethnos Project welcomes a new collaborator, Rachael Petersen

I am excited to announce that Rachael Petersen is now part of the Ethnos Project! Rachael is a 2012-2013 Thomas J. Watson Foundation Fellow investigating indigenous peoples’ use of technology around the world. Her current year-long research has taken her to the Canadian Eastern Arctic and the Ecuadorian Amazon, and […]

Our Side of the Divide: African Perspectives on Information and Communication Technologies

Introduction This booklet is part of a broad strategy called ‘Speaking for Ourselves’. It recognises, that while the African perspective on the digital divide is underrepresented in the context of the World Summit on the Information Society, the people most directly affected by the digital divide have the best ideas, […]

 •   •   •   •   •   • 

Workshop: Digital Media for Speakers of Endangered Languages in Latin America

Originally posted on rising.globalvoicesonline.org by Eddie Avila on 30 November 2012 Rising Voices Note: Rising Voices is pleased to be collaborating with this upcoming event in early 2013. This is a translation of the original website in Spanish at the Living Tongues blog. Enduring Voices: Digital Media Workshop for Speakers of Endangered Languages in […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Secwepemctsin language app for Nintendo DSi and soon iPad

From The Daily News (Kamloops): Nintendo scores for native language “With as few as 150 fluent Secwepemctsin speakers remaining, most of them over age 65, the Secwepemc Cultural Education Society has come up with software for preserving the language. Nintendo DSi software that teaches Secwepemctsin to young children is in […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Acknowledging Indigenous protocols: Traditional Knowledge (TK) licenses and fair-use labels

From the Mukurtu website: Mukurtu CMS (mentioned before on this site) makes it possible for you to share your digital cultural heritage using a set of innovative traditional knowledge licenses and labels specifically designed for the unique needs of Indigenous cultural materials. Mukurtu CMS provides several TK license options for […]

 •   •   •   •   • 

Decolonial Media Aesthetics and Women’s ICT4D Video

Dalida Maria Benfield, artist, activist, and Berkman Center fellow … speaking at The Berkman Center Luncheon Series, a weekly series of informal luncheons and other meetings, providing students, fellows, faculty, and anyone who reserves a seat opportunities to discuss issues relevant to their work and to engage other leading thinkers […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Language app: Iwaidja

Ma! Iwaidja app on iTunes The Ma! Iwaidja app is an initiative of the Minjilang Endangered Languages Publication project (also known as Iwaidja Inyman), based on Croker Island in Northwestern Arnhem Land in Australia’s Northern Territory. This ‘touch and listen’ app includes: a 1,000 entry Iwaidja-English dictionary a 400-entry Iwaidja-English […]

 •   •   •   •   • 

World Oral Literature Project

About the Project From the project website: “The World Oral Literature Project is an urgent global initiative to document and disseminate endangered oral literatures before they disappear without record. The Project supports local communities and committed fieldworkers engaged in the collection and preservation of all forms of oral literature by […]

 •   •   •   •   •   • 

Organization Highlight: World Oral Literature Project

About the Project From the project website: “The World Oral Literature Project is an urgent global initiative to document and disseminate endangered oral literatures before they disappear without record. The Project supports local communities and committed fieldworkers engaged in the collection and preservation of all forms of oral literature by […]

 •   •   •   •   •   • 

Living Tongues Endangered Language Resources

The folks at Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages have put together a fine list of language archives and online resources dealing with endangered languages. Here is the intro from their website: “People often approach us seeking information about the world’s most endangered languages. Students ask us, “I want to […]

 •   • 

Being Human: Human-Computer Interaction in the year 2020

“The question persists and indeed grows whether the computer will make it easier or harder for human beings to know who they really are, to identify their real problems, to respond more fully to beauty, to place adequate value on life, and to make their world safer than it now […]

 •   •   •   • 

The eBario project

eBario Sdn Bhd operates the eBario project, which is a multi-award winning initiative that brought computers and the internet to the isolated communities of Kelabit people living in the remote highlands of northern Sarawak, one the East Malaysian States on the island of Borneo. It is located in the ecologically important area known […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

The eBario project and their vision for Indigenous people and ICT

eBario Sdn Bhd operates the eBario project, which is a multi-award winning initiative that brought computers and the internet to the isolated communities of Kelabit people living in the remote highlands of northern Sarawak, one the East Malaysian States on the island of Borneo. It is located in the ecologically important area known […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

A decade of ICT4D: two academic perspectives

Two recent papers provide insights into the trends and changing field of ICT4D. The first is a 2011 paper by Ricardo Gomez, Luis F. Baron, and Brittany Fiore-Silfvast: The Changing Field of ICTD: Content analysis of research published in selected journals and conferences, 2000-2010 In this study, we report the […]

 •   •   •   •   •   • 

eBorneo: Information and Communication Needs and Opportunities for Remote Indigenous Communities

The eBorneo research project is being undertaken by eBario Sdn Bhd in partnership with the Centre of Excellence for Rural Informatics at Universiti Malaysia Sarawak and the assistance of research interns from the College of Business at the City University of Hong Kong. Be sure to visit the eBario Sdn […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

IICD project profile: ICT for Strengthening the Capacities of Female Indigenous Leaders – Bolivia

In July of last year I highlighted an organization called IICD (worth a visit if you haven’t see it). IICD has quite a few projects in their database, but this one is of particular interest to me and so I thought I’d share it here. Summary From the project page […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

ICTs and Indigenous People

Introduction Article 15 of the WSIS Declaration of The World Summit on the Information Society states “In the evolution of the Information Society, particular attention must be given to the special situation of indigenous peoples, as well as to the preservation of their heritage and their cultural legacy”. Although worldwide […]

 •   •   •   •   •   • 

Digital Subjects, Cultural Objects

Special Issue of the Journal of Material Culture The Journal of Material Culture is concerned with the relationship between artefacts and social relations irrespective of time and place and aims to systematically explore the linkage between the construction of social identities and the production and use of culture. Digital Subjects, […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Special Issue of the Journal of Material Culture: Digital Subjects, Cultural Objects

The Journal of Material Culture is concerned with the relationship between artefacts and social relations irrespective of time and place and aims to systematically explore the linkage between the construction of social identities and the production and use of culture. Special Edition edited by Amiria Salmond and Billie Lythberg Introduction […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Cry Rock: a short documentary about stories, memory and Nuxalk tradition

Synopsis [from the Cry Rock website] Less than fifteen Nuxalk language speakers and storytellers remain in Bella Coola, British Columbia. One of these elders is the director Banchi Hanuse’s 80-year-old grandmother. In a technologically obsessed century, it would seem easier to record Nuxalk stories for future generations, but Hanuse resists. […]

 •   •   •   •   • 

Digital Memories: Exploring Critical Issues

This publication is available through the Inter-Disciplinary Press(many good things there – definitely worth checking out). Contents Introduction Anna Maj and Daniel Riha Part I: Theories and Concepts in Digitizing Individual and Community Memory The Trouble with Memory: Reco(r)ding the Mind in Code Laura Schuster (New) Media and Representations of the […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Connect a School, Connect a Community: Toolkit of Best Practices and Policy Advice

About Connect a School, Connect a Community From the connectaschool.org website: “Connecting all primary, secondary and post-secondary schools to ICTs by 2015 was one of the targets set by world leaders at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). Connect a School, Connect a Community is a public-private partnership […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Connect a School, Connect a Community: Providing ICTs to Indigenous Peoples

This post was created to share a document called “Providing ICTs to Indigenous Peoples” which is part of a best practices toolkit created by the ITU’s Connect a School, Connect a Community initiative. But before I present the document, I’d like to step back and introduce it in context starting […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Digitising and handling Indigenous cultural resources in libraries, archives and museums

Abstract Indigenous cultural resources expose long memory trails which extend from understandings of origins to engagement with contemporary challenges. The tangible traces of aeons old intangible experience, they include practical and ceremonial artefacts housed in museums, sites of cultural significance, testimony and stories collected in libraries, and records of experience […]

 •   •   •   •   •   • 

Aboriginal Culture in the Digital Age

Introduction The object of this paper is to bring a holistic perspective to the implications of ICT for Aboriginal ways of living, thinking and knowing. Is ICT the potent enabler for the promotion, renewal and enrichment of Aboriginal cultures as many claim? For example does ICT offer new possibilities for […]

 •   •   •   •   •