Mukurtu (MOOK-oo-too)
The Mukurtu project, led by Project Director Kimberly Christen of the Washington State University, began in the remote Central Australian town of Tennant Creek with the creation of the Mukurtu Wumpurrarni-kari Archive.
The project was born from the needs of the Warumungu Aboriginal community who wanted a system to archive and organize their digital cultural materials in line with their cultural protocols.
CoDA’s CTO, Michael Ashley, is the Development Director of the Mukurtu project. Michael is collaborating with Mukurtu to develop a user-friendly and culturally relevant management system embedded with indigenous social and cultural protocols.
By creating an easy-to-use, cultural protocol-based archival and presentation platform, the Mukurtu project fills the void left by current content management systems, digital archive platforms and Web 2.0 social networking sites that focus on large institutions and the general public.
The principles that are guiding the Mukurtu project are:
- Highlight the concerns of indigenous stakeholders by providing cultural protocol based granular access parameters
- Allow for real-time collaboration and engagement between indigenous community’s and the institutions that hold their cultural heritage
- Provide a safe and secure platform for managing cultural heritage materials and traditional knowledge.
Check the Mukurtu website and the development blog at the Townsend Humanities Lab.