[Aztlan] Atitlan Digital Ethnographic Archive

[Elaine Schele]

Andrew Weeks asked me to post the following message to Aztlan:

As many listeros already know I have been visiting the town of
Santiago Atitlán for some years. This is a place known to many of you,
and I have been documenting the traditions of the town for a
documentary film. A by-product of this has been to get involved
peripherally in a project initiated and carried through by my friends
Xilani Luz and Violeta Luz – the ATITLÁN DIGITAL ETHNOGRAPHIC ARCHIVE
which has the goal of making available to the citizens of Santiago
Atitlán their rich historical heritage of photographs, documents, film
and video, and written description amassed over more than a century by
visitors of all sorts.

The intention is to make a series of digital kiosks (like a website
but not on the web) available on hard drives to the people of the town
in locations such as the Muni churches and most important, schools. A
beta version is currently being tested which already contains  images
with captions and a search facility in Spanish and English.

As a first step a projection was arranged close to the Muni (Town
Hall) for the Thursday night of Semana Santa and hundred of images,
including some from Alfred Maudslay, Samuel Lorthrop, and our good
friend Justin Kerr and ranging in time from the 1870’s to the present,
were shown on a sheet to a large and fascinated crowd of all ages –
parents and grandparents pointing things and people out to the kids.

If any listeros know of more sources for material or have images
themselves please contact balancingthecosmos at gmail.com and I will pass
it on.

There is more detailed information in a blog together with photos of
the projection event on the website for my film

http://balancingthecosmos.com

also a much more detailed proposal for the archive is at

http://www.scribd.com/doc/17765761/Atitlan-Digital-Archive-Project-Description-May-2009-PDF

We see this as a very effective way of using technology to allow
access to a peoples cultural and historical heritage without affecting
the delicate holdings of archives, museums or individuals. And this is
borne out by the very positive response received from some
institutions who have been contacted.

If any of you know of other similar projects we would love to know
about them. The hope is that this may provide a test-run and template
for projects in other communities and that others will take up the
baton.

Hope this may be of interest.

Best

Andrew Weeks