Oral Literature in the Digital Age: Archiving Orality and Connecting with Communities

By: Mark Turin, Claire Wheeler and Eleanor Wilkinson (Eds.)

Thanks to ever-greater digital connectivity, interest in oral traditions has grown beyond that of researcher and research subject to include a widening pool of global users. When new publics consume, manipulate and connect with field recordings and digital cultural archives, their involvement raises important practical and ethical questions. This volume explores the political repercussions of studying marginalised languages; the role of online tools in ensuring responsible access to sensitive cultural materials; and ways of ensuring that when digital documents are created, they are not fossilized as a consequence of being archived. Oral Literature in the Digital Age is an essential guide and handbook for ethnographers, field linguists, community activists, curators, archivists, librarians, and all who connect with indigenous communities in order to document and preserve oral traditions.

Contents
Introduction by Mark Turin, Claire Wheeler and Eleanor Wilkinson Part 1. Principles and Methods of Archiving and Conservation

1. The Archive Strikes Back: Effects of Online Digital Language Archiving on Research Relations and Property Rights by Thomas Widlok
2. Access and Accessibility at ELAR, A Social Networking Archive for Endangered Languages Documentation by David Nathan
Part 2. Engagements and Reflections from the Field
3. Researchers as Griots? Reflections on Multimedia Fieldwork in West Africa by Daniela Merolla and Felix Ameka in collaboration with Kofi Dorvlo
4. American Indian Oral Literature, Cultural Identity and Language Revitalisation: Some Considerations for Researchers by Margaret Field
5. Ecuador’s Indigenous Cultures: Astride Orality and Literacy by Jorge Gómez Rendón
6. From Shrine to Stage: A Personal Account of the Challenges of Archiving the Tejaji Ballad of Rajasthan by Madan Meena
7. Mongghul Ha Clan Oral History Documentation by Ha Mingzong, Ha Mingzhu, and C.K. Stuart
Oral Literature in the Digital Age was published on 23 May and can be read for free online here, where it is also available in inexpensive PDF, paperback and hardback editions.

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