By: Teague Schneiter, Posted: Jul 22 09

Regions: Global

Issues: Corporations and human rights, Indigenous peoples, Internally displaced persons

Tags: Aboriginal, access, archives, blogging, citizenmedia, Community Empowerment, community media, cultural heritage, cultural preservation, First Nations, indigenous law, indigenous people, participatory media, socialnetworking, under-representation

Hello, Hub blog readers! My name is Teague Schneiter, and I am a new intern at WITNESS. I've come here through a partnership between WITNESS and my Master's program at the University of Amsterdam in Preservation & Presentation of the Moving Image, and though there have been a number of students from the P&P program at WITNESS, I have the exciting privilege of being the first to join forces with the Hub. I have a background in media art curating, film programming and restoration, and have a burgeoning interest in the need for improved preservation of Indigenous cultural heritage and improving access to Indigenous media. My forthcoming thesis will be focused around the challenges and opportunities of the web for Indigenous cultural heritage preservation, especially as it relates to intellectual property differences and the increased need for audiovisual archives to make their material accessible.

During my 14 weeks here I will predominantly function as a researcher focused on Indigenous, First Nations and Aboriginal media, helping the Hub to develop its reach to content and communities in various ways. The Hub - as a online participatory media platform that encourages the development of interactive community-building, seeking to connect individuals, organisations, networks and groups to bring stories and campaigns to global attention - is a perfect match for me as an archivist who wants to advocate for a less top-down, less institutionalised approach to Indigenous cultural heritage preservation.

Though I am an archivist, I am very excited about the opportunity to work for a participatory online platform, as I believe that access to knowledge and knowledge-sharing in particular is an incredibly important part of preserving cultures, especially those which have been marginalised from public debate. To begin this atmosphere of sharing, I will be blogging on the Hub blog about current events that affect Indigenous communities, with a particular focus on the ways in which information about these events is being shared or spread - i.e. uses of video, blogging, social networking, geomapping, etc. for advocacy. I will also do a series of blog posts that will profile the major organisations and portals that make Indigenous media available online (such as Isuma TV), as well as groups and individuals creating content, and platforms which share content. As part of my ongoing research, I will also be including blog posts (some of which will appear on the WITNESS Archive blog) about efforts by researchers on indigenous media and activism, such as a profile on NYU's Faye Ginsburg, who was part of a recent panel on Indigenous media at the first inaugural Open Video Conference. (For more information on this panel - which involved members of WITNESS' own Sam Gregory and Sameer Padania - check out my recent conference report written for the Institute for Network Cultures blog or to see the video documentation, check out Archive.org here.)

We see an opportunity for the Hub to make a contribution facilitating connections between those creating, using and researching Indigenous content to help bridge the gap between these geographically-dispersed efforts. I will be working with Sameer Padania and Priscila Néri to create a space within the Hub that is a kind of launchpad into Indigenous media with a hope to inspire stronger links with the online video community and indigenous archives as well as groups working to put their material online. This new section of The Hub will not necessarily only include particular calls-to-action, but will work to inform non-Indigenous and Indigenous individuals both about the state of media online as well as important struggles, and how media is being used within those struggles. It will work to highlight different communities, groups, networks and individuals internationally that face similar problems, whether they be human rights- or media-related, or both.

So far, the Hub has over 100 videos that are related to indigenous content. 
This is a good place to start exploring the issue.  Additionally, if you would like to contribute, you can get involved in a few ways: 1) upload video +  related contextual material relevant to indigenous rights to the Hub; 2) email me with resources, including links to videos, or information on media groups that focus on Indigenous media; and 3) email me if you write about indigenous media or if you have an idea for a blog post.  I would love your feedback and resources, after all, this is about sharing! 

hub.witness (at) gmail (dot) com

This conversation is just beginning, but to get our toes wet, here is a clip from a recent video art piece I was lucky enough to see during a visit to Vtape video art distribution organisation. It is a fantastic example of how advocacy for human rights can be communicated through artistic practice. 

Promotional Clip posted on Myspace Video by the artist.

Nikamowin / Song (Canada, 2007, 12 mins, color)
In this experimental work, Cree video artist Kevin Lee Burton creates a sonic and visual statement about the loss of native languages. Full length video available via Vtape. Distribution Contact: Wanda Vanderstoop: wandav (at) vtape (dot) org

Note: Though I have been discussing the power and importance of the web in the development of community networks, I want to acknowledge the reality that for some remote communities or individuals this is not a feasible way of creating networks. I would also like to acknowledge that for some material (sacred or secret in nature, or only for the eyes and ears of initiated members of the community) the web can also be a complicated or unsuitable place to make Indigenous media freely available or shared. This is something which I will be elaborating more on during these fourteen weeks, and even more directly in my forthcoming thesis.