In 1967, the central government of Uganda abolished the historic Bantu kingdoms that had for centuries formed the regional administrations of the country. Out went the kingdoms, out went the kings, and out with them went generations of musical and cultural lore.
In 1993, the government restored the kingdoms, and the reinstated King of Bunyoro-Kitara is now tackling the daunting task of recreating the institutions, articles and music of the regional heritage.
Samuel Kahunde, a PhD student in ethnomusicology at the University of Sheffield, began studying the royal music of Uganda through the Klaus Wachsmann collection on Archival Sound Recordings. In a fieldwork trip last June, Samuel visited the royal court to discuss the recovery of this music with the King of Bunyoro-Kitara.
Continue reading "Archival Sound Recordings in Action - Reviving the Lost Music of Bunyoro-Kitara" »
The Archival Sound Recordings (ASR) team is always looking for ways to expand the ASR site – not just in terms of content but in usability. And usability these days means a great deal more than having a clear design and easily navigated menus. What sites like ours really want to create is a community of practice around its content: a growing and dynamic body that will interact with the material, repurpose it, and share the results as widely as possible.
This is why two members of the team attended a seminar held by the Quality Improvement Agency (QIA) earlier this month. QIA describes itself as a champion of “excellence and innovation in the provision of learning and skills”. The seminar itself was the start of a four-month programme to see how the content of resources such as ours can be expanded upon and interacted with in Further Education colleges; in particular, how content can be recombined into multimedia learning “journeys”.
Continue reading "Engaging People with digital content" »