Recitation of oral texts by the late Latte
Apa, senior ritual practitioner of the Thangmi community, India.
An urgent global initiative to document and make accessible endangered oral literatures before they disappear without record
For many communities around the world, the transmission of oral literature from one generation to the next lies at the heart of cultural practice. Performances of these creative works - which include ritual texts, curative chants, epic poems, musical genres, folk tales, creation tales, songs, myths, legends, word games, life histories or historical narratives - are increasingly endangered. Globalisation and rapid socio-economic change exert complex pressures on smaller communities, often eroding expressive diversity and transforming culture through assimilation to more dominant ways of life. As vehicles for the transmission of unique cultural knowledge, local languages encode oral traditions that become threatened when elders die and livelihoods are disrupted. Of the world's over 6,000 living languages, around half will cease to be used as spoken vernaculars by the end of this century > more
Events
- On December 15-16, 2009, the project hosted its first Annual Workshop which brought together established scholars, early career researchers and graduate students with indigenous researchers, museum curators, archivists and audio-visual experts to discuss strategies for collecting, recording, preserving and disseminating oral literatures and endangered indigenous traditions. Videos of the presentations can be viewed by clicking here.
News
- Project covered in the Independent on Sunday (PDF), in La Repubblica (PDF), PhysOrg, WorldHum and OurFuturePlanet. Listen to a radio interview on FM4 ORF Austrian Radio, on Newstalk with Sean Moncrieff and coverage on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation show As It Happens.
- Project profiled in the Cambridge University Newsletter, click here to read the PDF.
- Project team invited to present at the Department of Linguistics Seminar at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London; the Golden Web Living Traditions Programme; Recovering Voices at the National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution; the Arctic Centre in Finland and at the Centre for Anthropology, British Museum, London, in October and November > more
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