Status of the Ethnosphere: New Statistics about Language Loss Across the World

Statistics and Folklore Despite popular and persistent statistics, we really do use more than 10% of our brains. We don’t actually eat an average of seven spiders a year, and suicide rates simply do not jump during the holidays. When statistics become sound bites, they sometimes become folklore. One such […]

 •   •   •   • 

Ojibwe Language Revitalization, Multimedia Technology, and Family Language Learning

Although Indigenous language loss and revitalization are not new topics of academic work nor new areas of community activism (e.g., King, 2001; Grenoble & Whaley, 2006), increased attention has been paid in recent years to the ways that new technology can support efforts to teach and renew endangered languages such […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Challenges and opportunities in the protection and preservation of indigenous knowledge in Africa

This chapter presents challenges and opportunities in the protection and preservation of indigenous knowledge (IK) in Africa. Specific examples have been taken from the Maasai pastoralists and the Sambaa and Zigua traditional medicine men of North-eastern Tanzania. The chapter argues that there is a threat of IK extinction due to […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Preserving our Past with Toys of the Future

This paper presents the initial outcomes of a key scoping study undertaken to explore the role of augmented reality and motion detecting technologies in the context of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) for museums related environments. Initial prototypes are in the form of an interactive infrared camera based application for children […]

 •   •   •   •   • 

Wathaurung use technology to take control of their cultural heritage

For over 25,000 years, the land around Ballarat, Geelong and the Bellarine Peninsula has been inhabited by the Wathaurung people. Traditionally, important cultural knowledge was passed down the generations through word of mouth. Today, a simple yet groundbreaking piece of mapping software is allowing the Wathaurung to pinpoint and record […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Obsidiana TV

What is Obsidiana TV? Obsidiana TV is a web platform that is born to be a support tool in the broad spectrum of work audiovisual- for emerging and professional filmmakers, who make visible the reality of Indigenous Peoples of America through his eyes. What makes Obsidiana TV? We have created […]

 •   •   •   • 

Fishing with New Nets: Maori Internet Information Resources and Implications of the Internet for Indigenous Peoples

Abstract This paper surveys Internet information resources relating to the Maori, the indigenous people of Aotearoa/New Zealand, and examines issues that arise when indigenous peoples’ culture is placed in a digital networked environment. Introduction The indigenous people of New Zealand are the Maori, descended from the great Polynesian voyagers who […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Patrimony, Power and Politics: Selecting, Constructing and Preserving Digital Heritage Content in South Africa and Africa

Memory institutions in South Africa and Africa, as digital heritage content creators and custodians, are engaging in a political, social, ideological and technological site of struggle. The decisions about what to digitise for long term preservation, why and also how this information is made accessible, speaks to notions of information […]

 •   •   •   •   •   • 

FOTool: Modeling Indigenous Community Cultures in Sarawak

Formal-Object Tool (FOTool) is a software modelling approach that integrates formal specification and object oriented model. FOTool integrates the rigour of formal methods and the ease of use of OO techniques. The idea of FOTool is to provide an easy interface by allowing the application developer to develop the software […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •   • 

Making the Connection: Essays on Indigenous Digital Excellence

We all understand the power of being connected in the digital world, being on-line, with everything at our finger-tips. But what will it take to make the most of this opportunity when it comes to Indigenous Australia? This unique set of essays commissioned by the Telstra Foundation, shows how Aboriginal […]

 •   •   •   •   • 

Globalization, Negotiating Technology, and Indigeneity in Nepal

This paper explores how indigenous peoples negotiate with their state and mainstream narratives by glocalizing indigenous political and cultural identities through virtual spaces offered by digital technology or information and communication technology (ICT). The first section makes an announcement of its concern about how globalization and indigeneity at some points […]

 •   •   •   •   •   •