Native artifacts go digital at UBC

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      The age of on-line social networking is well and truly upon us, and by now you’d have to be living in an Amish backwater not to have at least contemplated signing up for a Facebook page. And while they might not seem the most academic of pursuits—how many hours have procrastinating undergraduates wasted compulsively sending out status updates?—Web surfing and messaging are set to gain new respectability thanks to UBC’s Museum of Anthropology.

      In 2006, the museum embarked on a $55.5-million renewal projectdubbed A Partnership of Peoples, funded in large part by a $34.4-million grant from the Canada Foundation for Innovation and the B.C. Knowledge Development Fund. And while much has been made of the construction that will expand the museum by 50 percent, it’s what’s happening behind the scenes that is truly groundbreaking.

      Museum curator and UBC anthropology professor Susan Rowley is leading a staff of eight in the development of what’s being called the Reciprocal Research Network, an on-line resource created in partnership with the Musqueam Indian Band, the Sto:lo Nation, the Sto:lo Tribal Council, and the U’mista Cultural Society. A $3-million Internet research tool, the RRN will link the MOA’s collection of Pacific Northwest artifacts, which are in the process of being digitally scanned and photographed, with other Pacific Northwest collections in museums around the world.

      “The purpose of it is to create an environment where different groups, different people, can come together and work together on”¦objects they’re interested in,” Rowley explained recently in conversation with the Straight at the RRN headquarters, a small room filled with laptop computers and some keen young programmers.

      “It’s particularly to try and break down some of the barriers that are there for people doing research.”¦The communities from whom the collections were made are geographically dispersed, and the researchers are geographically dispersed. So it’s to create a space where all of those groups can come together.”

      The RRN is scheduled to go live in October 2009, but a password-protected pilot version listing the databases of the Museum of Anthropology and UBC’s Laboratory of Archaeology has been up and running at www.rrnpilot.org/ since September 2007. (Obtaining a password is as simple as clicking on a link and sending an e-mail outlining the reason for your request.)

      The site is deceptively simple: users are greeted by a home page that allows them to explore the database under the broad parameters of Who, What, Where, and When, with more refined search terms within each of these headings. Each listing not only provides information about an item, but includes room for discussion postings and suggestions for changes to the museum record, and a “sticky pad” to create private notes and observations. RRN users can also create virtual collections by tagging a number of items, and will eventually be able to upload projects such as PowerPoint presentations to share with others.

      “Somebody from Musqueam can be talking to someone in Ottawa about an object that’s actually held in the U.K.,” Rowley explained. “We’re hoping that they’ll generate new ways of doing research and creating new knowledge.”

      The RRN is also meant to enable First Nations members to search for artifacts that originated in their communities, and to work directly with museums in gathering knowledge about their collections. Dave Schaepe, senior archaeologist and comanager of the Sto:lo Research and Resource Management Centre, says the project is already getting a positive reaction from community elders.

      “Once they see what can be done, you watch this transformation happen,” he told the Straight by phone. “We’ve had many, many workshops with elders here”¦and before long they’re typing away and searching things.” He added: “There’s a very, very strong connection between First Nations history, oral history, language, and objects that are held in museums”¦and there’s large parts of knowledge that are not accessible to First Nations communities because they’re in institutions around the world.”

      The RRN, he says, will help with the repatriation process that brings artifacts back to communities. It will also put First Nations on an even playing field with institutions. “A huge part of it [the RRN] is to establish a grounds for developing a new relationship, one that’s more equal.”

      Rowley, too, is eager to redefine the role of museums as one of collaboration with First Nations people. “Museum collections were traditionally made by outsiders who went into communities and collected things, especially some of the early explorers, who were in some place for a day, picked up objects, and brought them back,” she noted. “So one of the things that communities are interested in doing is reconnecting the objects to the language, to the land, to the stories.”

      Currently, the RRN lists 159,000 items, but by the time of its official launch next year, it will boast thousands more Pacific Northwest artifacts, from institutions such as the Royal Ontario Museum, the Canadian Museum of Civilization, and Harvard University’s Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. For researchers in universities, high-school students, and Native communities, that means one more reason—and a productive one—to spend hours on-line. Call it Museums 2.0.

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