Project Aims
The purpose of this project was to compile information on past and present digital
heritage preservation and repatriation projects involving Indigenous communities across
the North American and European Arctic to address two key issues. First, the remoteness
and geographical separation of these Indigenous communities in the Arctic create many
technical and cultural issues for designing digital return platforms, and there is a need to
determine whether these challenges are being addressed by existing projects. Second,
there is a need to collate these digital return projects as local grassroots and institutional
teams are seemingly unaware of the existence and objectives of each other’s projects. In
providing a database of these digital return projects, the strengths and knowledge gaps can
be identified.
Project Objectives
The primary objective was to collect information about digital return projects on cultural
heritage. To provide a broad spectrum of projects three data collection methods were
needed. The first was a literature review of peer-reviewed journals and grey literature, the
second was an online survey to more grassroots projects with little to no academic or
popular articles, and finally a case study of community run organisations in Arviat.
For a more detailed look at the aims and objectives of the project, please find the final
report that was provided to SSHRCC.
