Creating digital maps to help preserve cultural heritage of Russian community
▻http://phys.org/news/2014-01-digital-cultural-heritage-russian.html
Indigenous communities from Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula are dealing with an issue of great concern – the possible impending loss of the Itelmen language, which, in the community of 4,000, is only spoken by roughly one dozen elders.
To ensure that younger generations of the Itelmen ethnic group retain their heritage, University of Arizona anthropologist Benedict Colombi and Tatiana Degai, an Itelmen student pursuing a doctorate in American Indian Studies at the UA, have been working with the community in partnership with Google Earth Outreach, a program supporting non-profit organizations raising awareness of global issues, to create interactive and engaging digital maps of locations that hold cultural and historic significance.
The maps will be customized versions of Google Maps, with information specific to the Kamchatka area, located in far eastern Russia. The maps will be accessible to the world just like other Google maps, although some of the information specific to the community – such as hunting areas – will be visible only to the Kamchatka community.
#cartographie_participative #russie #kamtchatka #peuples_autochtones