Our project, Digital Preservation of Fuuta Jalon Scholars’ Arabic and Ajami Materials in Senegal and Guinea, is funded by a grant from the Endangered Archives Programme (EAP1430). It seeks to digitally preserve 50,000 pages of endangered Arabic and Ajami manuscripts (texts written with modified Arabic script) produced by Fuuta Jalon scholars who lived between the 18th and early 20th centuries in what is now the Republic of Guinea. The 50,000 pages of the endangered Arabic and Ajami manuscripts to be preserved and digitised include the surviving texts of important scholars and the handwritten copies made by their students, followers and family members who have kept them in their private libraries in the Fuuta Jalon region in Guinea and Senegal where the second largest Fuuta Jalon community in Africa lives. These archives will be the largest digital records of this material in the world.

        The project aims to advance existing scholarly knowledge about the rich bilingual works of Fuuta Jalon scholars. This knowledge is still very scarce, partly due to Guinea’s isolation after its independence from France in 1958 and the lack of public repositories for manuscripts. The texts deal with diverse topics including astrology, divination, Sufism, theology and jurisprudence and comment on talismanic devices, panegyrics of the Prophet Muhammad, Quranic exegesis, didactic materials in prose and poetry, elegies, jurisprudence, calendars, history, biographies, genealogies, legends, commercial records and records of important events, among others. These materials could lay a foundation for future research on the legacy of Fuuta Jalon in the New World  and enable scholars, students and the public to better understand how and where some African slaves such as Abdu Rahman (1762-1829) of Fuuta Jalon acquired literacy skills before being enslaved in the Americas.

        While African Ajami literatures are largely unknown to the broader public, they hold a wealth of knowledge on the history and intellectual traditions of many African communities. Ajami has played an important role in literacy and education in many West African communities. Its history helps offset many colonial stereotypes, countering assumptions that sub-Saharan Africa lacks written traditions. The downplaying of the importance of African Ajami traditions has been perpetuated by Arab-centric and Eurocentric scholars and administrators, and its legacies persist to this day.

        Fula communities have been central to the composition, instruction and dissemination of Ajami in West Africa. Fula is the language of the Fulɓe people and it developed in several communities that spread from west to east, from Senegal to Nigeria and Cameroon, over the last millennium. The Muslims of the region played a leading role as critics and reformers of Islamic practice in the Sahel and created several Islamic states in that area during the 18th and 19th centuries. These Islamic states (especially in Fuuta Jalon and Sokoto) spurred the development of rich Arabic and Ajami literatures and literacies.

 

Image 1. Manuscript pages digitised by the project team in Senegal.

 

        Our project focuses on preserving manuscripts central to these important legacies. The materials are endangered because they include the old and poorly preserved surviving works and handwritten copies of Fuuta Jalon scholars. Most of the manuscripts show signs of deterioration and are kept in old trunks, suitcases and boxes. Some are wrapped in animal hides. They are continuously exposed to water and fire damage and termite and vermin attacks in the homes of their owners in Senegal and Guinea.

        Our project aims to preserve these primary sources and make them available to researchers, educators, students and the public worldwide. We use digital photography for copying the materials, which are digitised on-site. Our field teams involve local scholars and facilitators whose linguistic experience and familiarity with local communities are crucial to the project’s success. When identifying manuscripts for digitisation, our teams work closely with local communities. Our local facilitators are often esteemed elders and experts who are knowledgeable about local Ajami texts and their authors and collectors and are respected in their communities. The team members locate the texts within the communities, consulting with the manuscript owners and local experts about the history, meaning and use of each manuscript. This provides the team with contextual knowledge and relevant historical and cultural information for a proper interpretation of the manuscripts and their importance and aids in the development of the manuscripts’ metadata.

        Our African Ajami projects highlight the role of local experts, scholars, community members and facilitators in knowledge-making processes. Through field interviews, our research teams seek insights into the daily practices of Ajami users, their educational and professional background and their history of learning and using Ajami. This provided us with significant information about the present-day role of Ajami in West African communities, casting light on the meaning and purpose of the Ajami texts that we study and the voices of the people who have written, collected or used them.

        The long-term goals of the project include knowledge transfer and capacity building in African communities, as well as fostering teaching, research and publications of peer-reviewed articles, book chapters and scholarly monographs. Besides the current project, we have been engaged in several other African Ajami-related research initiatives recently. Our project, Ajami Literacy and the Expansion of Literacy and Islam: The Case of West Africa, funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, undertook a comparative study of Ajami manuscripts in four major West African languages: Hausa, Mandinka, Fula and Wolof. Our international team of scholars digitised the manuscripts, transcribed and translated the texts into English and French, prepared commentaries and created related multimedia resources. This project marks the first time that such varied African Ajami documents have been translated into two major European languages and made accessible to communities globally. Another ongoing project we are working on, Readers in Ajami, funded by a grant from the United States Department of Education, is developing specialised Ajami readers in Hausa, Wolof and Mandinka with a multimedia companion website. It aims to provide students, language teachers, scholars and professionals with the necessary linguistic and cultural skills to engage Ajami users of West Africa. Synthesising the knowledge gathered, our new double special issue in Islamic Africa examines Ajami literatures and literacies in West Africa and situates African Ajami studies in participatory multimedia and digital archiving approaches (volumes 14, issue 2, 2023 and 15, issue 1, 2024).

        Our current project on Fuuta Jalon Arabic and Ajami archives is not the first project funded by the British Library. Project EAP334, which digitised over 5,000 pages of endangered Wolof Ajami manuscripts, and Project EAP1042, which preserved over 18,000 pages of Arabic and Mandinka Ajami texts, were both funded by the Endangered Archives Programme. Our team is grateful to EAP for supporting our work in the preservation and dissemination of these important but lesser-known written African sources of knowledge.

        The core team members of our project are Professor Fallou Ngom (PI), Dr. Daivi Rodima-Taylor (Project Manager), Mr. Ablaye Diakite (Local Team Leader), Mr. Mouhamadou Diallo (General Coordinator), Mr. Oumar Diallo (Regional Facilitator), Mr. Ibrahima Ngom (Cameraman) and Mr. Mamadou Billo Sall aka Bappa Sall (Senior Facilitator). We are deeply grateful to all our collaborators and the communities we work with in West Africa.

 

     

Image 2. Ibrahima Ngom (standing) and Ablaye Diakite (sitting) digitising a manuscript in Ziguinchor, Senegal.

Image 3. Mouhamadou L. Diallo preparing a manuscript collection for digitisation in Ziguinchor, Senegal.

Image 4. Fallou Ngom (on the right) and Ablaye Diakite (in the middle) discussing with Mamadou Seydou Diallo  (manuscript owner) in Ziguinchor, Senegal.

 

 

 Image 5. Senegalese and Guinean field team members at our Digitisation Workshop, Dakar, Senegal, May 2023. 

 

Fallou Ngom is a professor of anthropology at Boston University. His research interests include the interactions between African languages and non-African languages, the adaptations of Islam in Africa and Ajami literatures— records of African languages written in Arabic script. His work has appeared in numerous scholarly journals, including African Studies Review, Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies, Language Variation and Change and International Journal of the Sociology of Language. His book, Muslims beyond the Arab World: The Odyssey of Ajami and the Muridyya (Oxford University Press, 2016), won the 2017 Melville J. Herskovits Prize.

Daivi Rodima-Taylor is a social anthropologist and researcher at the African Studies Center of the Pardee School of Global Studies of Boston University. Her work focuses on informal economies, financial technology and social media, migration and diaspora and land and agrarian relations. Her longitudinal field research in East Africa studied local associations of mutual security. She has co-edited several book volumes and published in journals such as Africa, African Studies Review, Social Analysis, Journal of Cultural Economy, Geoforum, and Review of International Political Economy. Find Daivi on Twitter: @DaiviRTaylor

 

 

In a landmark decision, the Government of the Republic of North Macedonia, on 30 August 2023, bestowed a prestigious honour upon the Brothers Manaki-Bitola Collection (1853-1964). This collection was declared a cultural heritage of particular significance. It comprises the photographic legacy of the Balkan's first filmmakers Yanaki and Milton Manaki and is located amongst the stacks of the State Archive of the Republic of North Macedonia's Bitola Department.

This announcement marks the culmination of work that began in May 2022, initially by the leadership team at the State Archive and then continued by a dedicated team at the Bitola Department. It has involved contacting key stakeholders responsible for the preservation, organisation, and processing of the collection.

The importance of this archival material cannot be overstated. It contains the complete photographic material as well as personal documentation of the Manaki family, which has never undergone the process of full digitisation. The photographic material contains more than 7,000 glass negatives, over 3000 rolls and sheet films and in excess of 10,000 original prints, produced at the end of the 19th century up until Milton’s death in 1964. The photographic collection is one of the most extensive covering the Balkans.

With this important decision by the Government, the "Brothers Manaki" collection carves its place in history as the first national case of declaring archival material as cultural heritage. This recognition heralds a new era in how we evaluate and cherish archival and cultural activities associated with the Manaki Brothers' legacy. It reinforces our commitment to preserving the "Brothers Manaki" and all its contents, ensuring the allocation of resources for its proper preservation, organization, digitisation, research, and presentation.

This recognition not only honours the legacy of the Manaki Brothers but also underscores the nation's dedication to preserving and celebrating its cultural heritage. It sets a precedent for acknowledging the cultural significance of archival collections and emphasises their central role in safeguarding and sharing a nation's heritage.

Notification supplied by the EAP1470 team.

We are accepting applications for grants to be awarded next April, for projects that will start from the summer of 2024. Applications are made via the EAP portal and the deadline for preliminary applications is Monday 13 November. Applicants should consult the newly updated Guide for Applicants on our website for information on how to make the strongest application. In addition we are holding two webinars (in English) on Wednesday 27 September to accommodate different time zones. We will give an overview of the process, followed by a Q&A session. Register in advance using the following links:

Morning session (11 am)

Afternoon session (3 pm)

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.

As always, we look forward to receiving a wide range of applications from historians, archivists and others, as we enter the 20^th year of EAP.

ستامبا ميجرانتى : نافذة على مصر المتعددة اللغات

Stampa Migrante: una finestra sull’Egitto multilingue

So much unfolding on a single page. I wandered and wondered in the past just by leafing through the holdings of the Centro Archeologico Italiano (CAI) in Cairo, managed by the Italian Institute of Culture (IIC) in the same city. In a relatively good state yet vulnerable, this historical collection of daily newspapers published in Italian in the late 19th and 20th centuries in Egypt provides an exceptional window on the history of Italian migration to and through Egypt as well as the larger migratory movements through the Mediterranean and the Middle East of the time. A mix of political convenience and economic opportunity made nineteenth-century Egypt attractive to underemployed Italian labour and others (Gorman, 141).

هكذا يتكشف الكثير في صفحة واحدة فقط. بينما كنت اتصفح مقتنيات المركز الإيطالي للآثار في القاهرة، والذي يديره المعهد الثقافى الإيطالي  بالمدينة نفسها, حيث من الممكن التجول بين الماضى و التسأل عنه و اكتشاف الكثير عن خباياه, وجدت هذه  المجموعة التاريخية من الصحف اليومية التي نُشرت باللغة الإيطالية في أواخر القرنين التاسع عشر والعشرون في مصر.  هي في حالة جيدة نسبيًا ولكنها معرّضة للتدهور.  وتمثل هذه المجموعة نافذة استثنائية على تاريخ الهجرة الإيطالية إلى مصر وعبرها بالإضافة إلى حركات الهجرة الأكبر عبر البحر المتوسط والشرق الأوسط في ذلك الوقت. مزيج من الفرص السياسية والاقتصادية جعل من  مصر في القرن التاسع عشر بلداً جاذباً للعمالة الإيطالية وغيرها التي تبحث عن فرص عمل

Così tanto si dispiega in una sola pagina. Sfogliando i volumi in possesso del Centro Archeologico Italiano (CAI) del Cairo, gestito dall’Istituto Italiano di Cultura (IIC) con sede nella stessa città, è possibile girovagare nel passato e scoprirvi meraviglie. Conservata in uno stato relativamente buono, anche se di vulnerabilità, questa collezione storica dei quotidiani pubblicati in lingua italiana nel tardo Ottocento e inizio Novecento in Egitto costituisce una finestra eccezionale da cui osservare la storia della migrazione italiana verso e attraverso l’Egitto nonché dei movimenti migratori nel Mediterraneo e nel Medio Oriente del tempo. La presenza di un insieme di opportunità politiche ed economiche rese l’Egitto del diciannovesimo secolo particolarmente attraente per lavoratori italiani e di altre nazionalità che erano alla ricerca di impiego (Gorman, 141).

Lucia Carminati reading (Photograph taken by Sebastiano Mussi, 2015)

Entrance of CAI in Cairo (Photograph taken by Raffaele Pentangelo, IIC)

I was immediately struck by the richness of these sources when I encountered them for the first time in 2015-2016, following the generous lead of then-fellow PhD adventurer Joseph Viscomi- during doctoral fieldwork in Egypt and across Europe. I kept mulling over ways to preserve and make this collection available beyond Egypt’s fickle attitude towards academic researchers, capricious access rules to the CAI holdings, and unpredictable travel restrictions. The discovery of the British Library’s Endangered Archives Programme (EAP) came at a fortuitous if yet chaotic time, as I transitioned from Texas to Norway. I quickly found out that similar efforts had already been under way by Helwan University’s Dr. Wafaa El Beih and Dante Campioni of Alexbank, both of whom I thank.

أدهشني على الفور ثراء هذه المصادر عندما قابلتها أول مرة بين عامي ٢٠١٥ و٢٠١٦, بناء على النصائح السخية من زميلى طالب الدكتوراه آنذاك جوزيف فيسكومي أثناء بحثي للدكتوراه في مصر و أوروبا. ظللت أفكر في طرق للحفاظ على هذه المجموعة وإتاحتها بما يتجاوز موقف مصر المتقلب تجاه الباحثين الأكاديميين و بما يتجاوز قواعد الوصول المتقلبة إلى المقتنيات وبما يتجاوز قيود السفر غير المتوقعة.  جاء اكتشاف برنامج المحفوظات المهددة بالانقراض التابع للمكتبة البريطانية في وقت مناسب وإن كانت الظروف مضطربة الى حد ما, حيث كانت فترة انتقالى  من تكساس إلى النرويج. سرعان ما اكتشفت أن جهود مماثلة قد بذلت بالفعل من قبل الدكتورة وفاء البيه من جامعة حلوان ودانتي كامبيوني من بنك الإسكندرية واوجه لهما جزيل الشكر

La ricchezza di queste fonti colpisce immediatamente. Ne fui catturata per la prima volta nel 2015-2016, seguendo il generoso consiglio dell’allora compagno di avventure e collega dottorando Joseph Viscomi, durante il mio lavoro di ricerca sul campo in Egitto e in Europa per la preparazione della tesi di dottorato. In seguito, ho continuato a rimuginare su come poter conservare e rendere disponibile questa collezione a prescindere dall'atteggiamento volubile dell’Egitto nei confronti dei ricercatori accademici, dalle mutevoli regole di accesso ai materiali CAI e dalle imprevedibili restrizioni di viaggio. La scoperta dell’Endangered Archives Programme (EAP) della British Library è capitata in un momento fortuito anche se caotico durante la mia transizione accademica dal Texas alla Norvegia. Ho subito scoperto che sforzi simili erano già in corso da parte di Wafaa El Beih dell'Università di Helwan e di Dante Campioni di Alexbank e ringrazio entrambi.

IIC materials (Photographs taken by Raffaele Pentangelo, IIC)

The CAI/IIC collection of daily newspapers that EAP1474 “Stampa Migrante” will finish to digitise and broadcast by September 30, 2023, are the following:

Il Messaggero Egiziano (the issues tentatively comprised between July 1926 and March 1930), born as Lloyd egiziano in 1875 in Alexandria, then morphed into Messaggiere or Messaggere; L’Imparziale (March 1892 - December 1929), founded in 1892 in Cairo; Il Giornale d’Oriente-L’Imparziale of Cairo (April 1930 - June 1940); Il Giornale d’Oriente-Messaggero Egiziano in Alexandria (July 1930 - June 1940). Thanks to EAP, more than 70,000 pages will go live instead of gathering dust in locked cabinets.   

مجموعة الصحف اليومية التي سينتهي  المشروع ستامپا ميجرانتي -الصحافة المهاجرة- من تحويلها رقميًا وبثها عبر الإنترنت بحلول ٣٠ سبتمبر ٢٠٢٣ هي كالتالي

تقريبا بين يوليو ١٩٢٦ ومارس ١٩٣٠, تأسست في عام ١٨٧٥ في الإسكندرية  Il Messaggero Egiziano

تقريبا بين مارس ١٨٩٢ وديسمبر ١٩٢٩, تأسست عام ١٨٩٢ في القاهرة   L’Imparziale 

تقريبا بين أبريل ١٩٣٠ ويونيو ١٩٤٠ في القاهرة   Il Giornale d’Oriente-L’Imparziale

تقريبا بين يوليو ١٩٣٠ ويونيو ١٩٤٠ في الإسكندرية   Il Giornale d’Oriente-Messaggero Egiziano

بفضل هذا البرنامج سيتم نشر أكثر من ٦٠٠٠٠ صفحة بدلاً من تجمع الغبارعليها في الخزانات المغلقة

La collezione di quotidiani del CAI/IIC che il progetto EAP1474 “Stampa Migrante” finirà di digitalizzare e diffondere entro il 30 settembre 2023 comprende i seguenti: Il Messaggero Egiziano (i numeri contenuti provvisoriamente tra il luglio 1926 e il marzo 1930), nato come Lloyd egiziano nel 1875 ad Alessandria d’Egitto, poi trasformatosi in Messaggiere o Messaggere; L’Imparziale (marzo 1892 - dicembre 1929), fondato nel 1892 al Cairo; Il Giornale d'Oriente-L'Imparziale del Cairo (aprile 1930 - giugno 1940); Il Giornale d’Oriente-Messaggero Egiziano di Alessandria (luglio 1930 - giugno 1940). Grazie al programma EAP, più di 70.000 pagine acquisiranno nuova vita invece di continuare ad impolverarsi in armadi chiusi.

More IIC materials (Photographs taken by Raffaele Pentangelo, IIC)

It may be confusing to determine whether the collection is made of three or four newspapers. This is due to the fact that, in April 1930, L’Imparziale and Il Messaggero Egiziano merged under the name of Il Giornale d’Oriente. But they continued to coexist in two different editions, respectively based in Cairo and in Alexandria, apparently so that the Italian community in each city could have its own paper (Petricioli, 293; Marchi 2010, 115). But why did the Alexandrine and Cairine communities want or need two separate dailies? Here is where questions running deep below the surface of this project burst forth: for whom and by whom was the Italian language press printed at the time? Who was writing it? Who was financing it? What perspectives and biases transpire through its pages? Who was reading it? Why and how were people reading it? Are such Italian-language sources circumscribed to the history of Egypt-bound migration from the Italian peninsula or do they reach much farther away?

قد يكون من المربك تحديد ما إذا كانت المجموعة مكونة من ثلاث أو أربع صحف. هذا يرجع إلى حقيقة أنه في أبريل ١٩٣٠ اندمجت "الميساجيرو" و"ليمپارزيالي" تحت اسم "الجورنال دوريينتي". لكنهم استمروا في التعايش في نسختين مختلفتين في القاهرة والإسكندرية ، على ما يبدو بحيث يمكن للجالية الإيطالية في كل مدينة أن يكون لها صحيفتها الخاصة. ولكن لماذا أرادت جاليات الإسكندرية والقاهرة أو احتاجتا إلى صحيفتين يوميتين منفصلتين؟  هنا حيث تتوارد بعض الأسئلة المُلحّة التي تدور بعمق تحت سطح هذا المشروع: لمن ومن قام بطباعة الصحافة الناطقة باللغة الإيطالية في ذلك الوقت؟ من كان يكتبها؟ من كان يمولها؟ ما هي وجهات النظر والتحيزات التي تظهر من خلال صفحاتها؟ من كان يقرأها؟ لماذا وكيف كان الناس يقرؤونها؟ هل هذه المصادر باللغة الإيطالية مقيدة بتاريخ الهجرة المتجهة إلى مصر من شبه الجزيرة الإيطالية أم أنها تصل إلى أبعد من ذلك؟

Stabilire se la collezione sia composta da tre o quattro giornali può creare confusione. Ciò è dovuto al fatto che, nell’aprile del 1930, L'Imparziale e Il Messaggero Egiziano si fusero sotto il nome di Il Giornale d'Oriente, ma continuarono a coesistere in due edizioni diverse rispettivamente con sede al Cairo e ad Alessandria, a quanto pare perché la comunità italiana di ciascuna città potesse avere il proprio giornale (Petricioli, 293; Marchi 2010, 115). Ma perché la comunità alessandrina e quella cairota volevano o necessitavano di due quotidiani separati? È qui che emergono prepotentemente alcune delle domande che scorrono appena sotto la superficie di questo progetto: per chi e da chi veniva prodotta la stampa in lingua italiana dell’epoca? Chi vi scriveva? Chi la finanziava? Quali prospettive e pregiudizi trasparivano dalle sue pagine? Chi la leggeva? Perché e come la si leggeva? Queste fonti in lingua italiana sono circoscritte alla storia della migrazione verso l’Egitto dalla penisola italiana o hanno il potenziale di spaziare oltre?

Example pages from the newspapers (Photographs taken by Irina Schmid, AUC)

The potential of the CAI/IIC collection goes beyond Egypt’s strictly defined “Italian” community to embrace at the very least all those who could speak and read Italian. Sure, as I suggest in my book Seeking Bread and Fortune in Port Said: Labor Migration and the Making of the Suez Canal, 1859-1906, Egypt’s foreign-language newspapers tended to divide the public along linguistic and political lines. Retracing their history is useful to understand the process by which immigrant communities tried to settle down, imagine their identity, shape their boundaries. Yet, a study of the contents of these very same newspapers reveals how deeply fractured these foreign communities were along -for example- fault lines dictated by class and education (Gorman, 146). Even beyond the communities they apparently targeted, these mono-lingual newspapers are windows into a multi-lingual world. More research on language politics and multi-lingual practices is necessary and ongoing, as in Olga Verlato’s exciting dissertation work. I will only provide one example here: one third of Alexandria’s readers of Il Giornale d’Oriente were Maltese and Greeks; two thirds of its readers in Port Said were originally from Malta (Petricioli, 297).

يتجاوز تأثير مجموعة الصحف اليومية الجالية "الإيطالية" في مصر ليضم على الأقل كل أولئك الذين يمكنهم التحدث باللغة الإيطالية وقراءتها. بالتأكيد ، كما اقترحت في كتابي البحث عن الخبز والثروة في بورسعيد: هجرة العمالة وصناعة قناة السويس ١٨٥٩ـ١٩٠٦، تميل الصحف المصرية الصادرة باللغات الأجنبية إلى تقسيم الجمهور على أسس لغوية وسياسية . يعد تتبع تاريخهم مفيدًا لفهم كيف حاولت جاليات المهاجرين الاستقرار وتخيل هويتهم وتشكيل حدودهم. ومع ذلك  تكشف دراسة لمحتويات هذه الصحف نفسها عن مدى انقسام هذه الجاليات الأجنبية بعمق على طول خطوط الطبقة الاجتماعية والتعليم . حتى خارج الجاليات التي استهدفتها على ما يبدو فإن هذه الصحف أحادية اللغة هي نوافذ في عالم متعدد اللغات. المزيد من البحث حول سياسة اللغة والممارسات متعددة اللغات ضروري ومستمر كما هو الحال في بحث الدكتوراه لأولغا فيرلاتو. سأقدم هنا مثالاً واحداً فقط: ثلث قراء الإسكندرية للجورنال دوريينتي كانوا مالطيين ويونانيين. ثلثى قراءها في بورسعيد كانوا من اصول مالطيه

Il potenziale della collezione del CAI/IIC va oltre la comunità “italiana” d’Egitto. Come minimo, arriva a includere tutti coloro che potevano parlare e leggere l’italiano. È vero che, come suggerisco nel mio libro Seeking Bread and Fortune in Port Said: Labor Migration and the Making of the Suez Canal, 1859-1906, i giornali egiziani in lingua straniera tendevano a dividere il pubblico lungo linee linguistiche e politiche. Ripercorrere la loro storia è quindi utile per comprendere il processo attraverso il quale le comunità di immigrati cercarono di insediarsi, di immaginare la propria identità, di delineare i propri confini. Tuttavia, uno studio dei contenuti di questi stessi giornali rivela quanto queste comunità straniere fossero profondamente fratturate, ad esempio lungo linee di faglia dettate dall’appartenenza di classe e dal livello di istruzione (Gorman, 146). Anche al di là delle comunità a cui apparentemente si rivolgevano, questi giornali monolingui sono finestre su un mondo multilingue. Sono necessarie e in corso ulteriori ricerche sulle politiche linguistiche e sulle pratiche multilinguistiche, come nell'appassionante lavoro di dottorato di Olga Verlato. Mi limito qui a fornire un esempio: un terzo dei lettori alessandrini de Il Giornale d'Oriente erano maltesi e greci; due terzi dei lettori dello stesso in Port Said erano originari di Malta (Petricioli, 297).

Ahmed Wali Al Din Series - Two men walking on the beach, 1937 [ref931]  (Copyright Al Akkasah)

In sum, EAP1474 provides a privileged yet accessible gateway into underexplored aspects of the history of modern Egypt, the Mediterranean, and the Middle East. But it also opens up a broad-ranging conversation on the ways in which we study the history of migration and the history of the press. As any archive, it houses and excludes; it has its cracks and silences. It will need yet other ideas and resources to complete its gaps by retrieving missing issues from the public library of Alexandria; Italian libraries and archives; even private collections. It will have to follow in the steps of the experts who have pioneered this field at Transfopress, at the ΕΛΙΑ archives, and at the Centre d’Etudes Alexandrines, now looking up from Egypt’s francophone press to embrace the multiple shapes of the Mediterranean’s allophone press. That is a welcome and promising new opening.  

باختصار، يوفر هذا المشروع بوابة متميزة ومتاحة في الجوانب الغيرمستكشفة من تاريخ مصر الحديثة والبحر المتوسط والشرق الأوسط. لكنه يفتح أيضًا نقاشًا واسع النطاق حول الطرق التي ندرس بها تاريخ الهجرة وتاريخ الصحافة. مثل أي أرشيف فإنه يضم ويستبعد ؛ له ثغرات ومناطق صمت. سوف يحتاج إلى أفكار وموارد أخرى لسد الثغرات من خلال استرجاع الأعداد المفقودة من مكتبة الإسكندرية العامة والمكتبات ودور المحفوظات الإيطالية وحتى المجموعات الخاصة. سيتعين اذا اتباع خطوات الخبراء الذين كانوا رائدين في هذا المجال في "ترانسفوپريس" وفي دار المحفوظات ΕΛΙΑ وفي مركز دراسات الإسكندرية ، الذي ينظر الأن الى ابعد من الصحافة الفرنكوفونية في مصر لاحتضان الصحافة  بلغات أجنبية متعددة في البحر الأبيض المتوسط. هذه بداية جديدة واعدة ومرحب بها

In sintesi, il progetto EAP1474 offre un punto d’accesso privilegiato ma accessibile ad aspetti poco esplorati della storia dell’Egitto moderno, del Mediterraneo e del Medio Oriente. Tuttavia, il progetto apre anche una conversazione di ampio respiro sui modi in cui studiamo la storia delle migrazioni e la storia della stampa. Come ogni archivio, ospita ed esclude; ha le sue crepe e i suoi silenzi. Avrà bisogno di altre idee e risorse per completare le sue lacune, recuperando i numeri mancanti dalla collezione della biblioteca pubblica di Alessandria, dalle biblioteche e dagli archivi italiani e persino da collezioni private. Dovrà seguire le orme degli esperti che hanno aperto la strada con Transfopress, con gli archivi ΕΛΙΑ e del Centre d'Etudes Alexandrines, dove ora si solleva lo sguardo oltre la stampa francofona dell’Egitto per abbracciare le molteplici forme della stampa allofona del Mediterraneo: una promettente e benvenuta apertura.

Today’s Egypt: man reading the newspaper in Zamalek (Photograph taken by the author, 2022)

I have discussed a few initial findings (in Italian) in the context of a conference at the Università di Pavia titled “Sguardi incrociati. Editoria e oltremare tra colonialismo e post-colonialismo” (9 June 2023).

لقد شاركت بعض الاعتبارات الأولية (بالإيطالية) خلال مؤتمر في جامعة بافيا بعنوان "النظرات المتقاطعة. النشر وما وراء البحار بين الاستعمار وما بعد الاستعمار" (9 يونيو 2023).

Ho condiviso alcune considerazioni iniziali (in italiano) durante una conferenza all’Università di Pavia dal titolo“Sguardi incrociati. Editoria e oltremare tra colonialismo e post-colonialismo” (9 giugno 2023).

For offering support and expertise throughout the project, I want to thank:

:على تقديم دعمهم ومشاركة خبراتهم أثناء المشروع, أشكر

Per aver offerto il loro sostegno e condiviso le loro competenze durante il progetto, ringrazio:

Atef Khalil; Francesca Biancani, Alessandra Marchi, Costantino Paonessa, Teresa Pepe. Grazie a Davide Scalmani; Raffaele Pentangelo; Isabella Bommarito (IIC); Mohamed Abdel Rehim, Heba Sayed, Irina Schmid, Stephen Urgola (AUC); Ingrid Stange Ytterstad (UiO); Alexbank; Helwan university; Marie-Delphine Martèlliere (CeAlex).

Written by Dr Lucia Carminati (University of Oslo), Project Lead for EAP1474

A short bibliography on this topic includes:  

ببليوغرافيا موجزة:

Offro di seguito una breve bibliografia sull’argomento: 

ʻAbduh, Ibrāhīm. Taṭawwur al-ṣiḥāfah al-Miṣrīyah, 1798-1981. Cairo: Muʼassasat Sijill al-ʻArab, 1982.

Baldinetti, Anna. Orientalismo e colonialismo: la ricerca di consenso in Egitto per l’impresa di Libia. Roma: Istituto per l’Oriente C.A. Nallino, 1997.

Bigiavi, Edoardo D. Noi e l’Egitto. Livorno: Arti Grafiche S. Belforte E C., 1911.

Briani, Vittorio. Italiani in Egitto. Roma: Istituto poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato, 1982.

Danovaro, G. B. L’Égypte à l’aurore du XXème siècle. Alexandrie: J.C. Lagoudakis, 1901.

Degli Oddi in Società Dante Alighieri. Calendario Nazionale Della Società Dante Alighieri. Firenze: R. Bemporad e Figlio, 1904.

Empereur, J.-Y., and Marie-Delphine Martellière, eds. Presses allophones de Méditerranée. Etudes alexandrines. Alexandrie: Centre d’études alexandrines, 2017.

Gorman, Anthony. “The Italians of Egypt: Return to Diaspora.” In Diasporas of the Modern Middle East: Contextualising Community, by Anthony Gorman and Sossie Kasbarian, 138–70. Edinburgh: University Press, 2015.

Marchi, Alessandra. “La presse d’expression italienne en Égypte, de 1845 à 1950.” Rivista dell’Istituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea, no. 5 (2010): 91–125.

———. “La presse italophone d’Egypte. Un long siècle d’histoire.” In Presses allophones de Méditerranée, edited by J.-Y. Empereur and Marie-Delphine Martellière. Etudes alexandrines. Alexandrie: Centre d’études alexandrines, 2017.

Munier, Jules. La presse en Égypte (1799-1900). Notes et souvenirs. Le Caire: Impr. de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale, 1930.

Petricioli, Marta. Oltre il mito: l’Egitto degli italiani (1917-1947). Milano: Mondadori, 2007.

Rizzitano, Umberto. “Un Secolo Di Giornalismo Italiano in Egitto (1845-1945).” Cahiers d’histoire Égyptienne Série VIII, no. fasc. 2/3 (Avril 1956).

Sadgrove, Philip. “The European Press in Khedive Isma’il’s Egypt (1863-1866): A Neglected FIeld,” In P.C. Sadgrove (Ed.), Printing and Publishing in the Middle East, Journal of Semitic Studies Supplement 24, 2008, 109-128.

Sammarco, Angelo. Gli italiani in Egitto: il contributo italiano nella formazione dell’Egitto moderno. Alessandria D’Egitto: Edizioni del Fascio, 1937.

Recent online collections include zoological records from Kenya, documents from a Sufi shrine in India, manuscripts from Java, and records from monasteries of cloistered nuns in Lima. You can read a brief overview about these projects below, or go straight to the online collections using these links:

• Preserving endangered zoological archival material in the National Museums of Kenya
• Exploring the archives of cloistered nuns in colonial Lima (Peru)
• Documents in the Sufi shrine at Dhar (India)
• Identifying and Digitising Eastern Salient Manuscripts of Java (Indonesia)

 

Preserving endangered zoological archival material in the National Museums of Kenya (EAP1122)

This project digitised zoological archival records from the Zoology department of the National Museums of Kenya. The records include field trip reports and catalogues that capture details such as species notes, the localities where samples were collected or recorded, and the sources or names of donors. The material spans four taxa: mammalogy, ornithology, ichthyology, and invertebrate zoology. Containing valuable research information on species taxonomy, natural history, and distribution, these records offer insights into historical animal species distribution, shedding light on habitat destruction and helping to map out the extent of species decline.

Exploring the archives of cloistered nuns in colonial Lima (EAP1299)

This project digitised archives from the 17th to 20th centuries of two monasteries of cloistered nuns in Lima, Peru: the Monasterio de Santa Rosa de Lima and the Monasterio Jesus, María y José (Clarisas Capuchinas). Most of these documents shed light on aspects of daily life in colonial and early republican Peru, areas that have been minimally investigated. Due to the scarcity of sources, the lives of nuns and women in general during this period have been under-researched. It is hoped that the materials now digitised will stimulate ongoing and future studies, offering insights into religious and everyday life in late colonial and early republican Lima.

Documents in the Sufi shrine at Dhar (EAP1416)

The goal of this project was to digitise and examine documents related to the tomb complex of Kamal al-Din Chishti in Dhar, Madhya Pradesh, India. Kamal al-Din was a member of the renowned Chishti lineage of Sufis. After spending a period with Nizamuddin Auliya in Delhi, he migrated to central India in the late 1200s and passed away in 1331. His descendants have overseen Kamal al-Din’s tomb for seven centuries. Following some known and published inscriptions from the 1400s, the earliest extant documents from the shrine originate from the late 1600s, bearing seals linked to the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb (1658-1707). Subsequent documents correspond with the reigns of Bahadur Shah, Farrukhsiyar, Muhammad Shah, and Shah Alam II. The archive extends into the Maratha rule of central India, with examples persisting into the 20th century. Predominantly detailing property transactions and endowments, these documents offer invaluable insights into institutional history, charitable endeavours, officials, local geography, and land stewardship.

Identifying and Digitising Eastern Salient Manuscripts of Java (EAP1334)

This project digitised 97 manuscripts from 24 different owners or collections in the regions of Banyuwangi, Jember, Bondowoso, Situbondo, and Lumajang on the island of Java, Indonesia. The manuscripts cover the subjects of religion, history, culture, metaphysics, etc, predominantly written in Javanese and Arabic, but including some in Madurese, Indonesian and Malay.

Every now and then, researchers notify us of a conference talk focusing on content digitised by EAP projects. We are always thrilled to be told about these talks and it prompted us to create a digital lecture series of our own. We approached a handful of people, who we knew had worked on EAP content and they, very kindly, agreed to take part.  We have created two themes in the first instance: Narratives within the Archive and Manuscripts on Magic and the links to the individual lectures are below. The presentations are absolutely fascinating and we hope you enjoy listening to them.

Narratives within the Archive

Dr Helga Baitenmann - Hidden Narratives of Indigenous Women in Nineteenth-Century Mexico

Dr Mégane Coulon - Life histories in mid-nineteenth century Freetown, Sierra Leone

Manuscripts on Magic

Eyob Derillo (PhD student) - Ethiopian amulet scrolls, talisman and divination

Professor Fallou Ngom - Healing, Divination, and Protection Techniques in Wolof and Mandinka Manuscripts

Dr Sam van Schaik - Buddhist Magic

Dr Farouk Yahya - Malay Magic and Divination Manuscripts from Indonesia

We would like to take this opportunity to thank the contributors and if you are using EAP content for your own research and would like to notify us, please email us at  [email protected].

With a full public launch of the new BL Sounds website just around the corner, EAP would like to highlight this month’s blog relating to two sound projects that have been catalogued, and share some phonograph record treasures and images of singers and musicians from South America and Azerbaijan.

If you are a collector of all things vinyl you may have one or two of these squeezed between the sleeves. Affectionately known as 78’s, these two collections of shellac discs have been transferred to digital for research, inspiration and enjoyment. Although the quality of a few recordings is quite weak every piece of audio has one or more stories to tell.

Valparaíso’s musical heritage (EAP359)

The Valparaíso’s musical heritage collection holds shellacs dating from 1910 to 1959 and primarily contains folk songs and folk music dances, like the renowned foxtrot, waltz and tango to, possibly, the less popularised dances of Western Europe; cuecas and corridos. The cueca is known to Chileans as their national dance because of its cultural, social, and historical relevance – it’s one of the most popular music genres in Chile. However, under General Pinochet it went from a sign of freedom and fun to a sign of oppression and force. But since Chile’s return to democracy 44 years ago, la cueca has lost much of the stigma that it had during the dictatorship. The themes on cueca songs are very diverse, but all are incredibly poetic. The lyrics are usually romantic, and often related to the hardships of the poorest in big cities. Other audio treasures include the tonada – a folk music style of Spain, boleros, and Mexican corridos, which is a form of musical folk ballad that has been a typical expression of Mexican life. They are a way of documenting the experiences of people who often have no other voice. Whereas the bolero, the dance and music is centred on themes of romantic love.

These discs were produced by various record labels, which, at the time, were the top of their game; Victor (incl. RCA Victor), Columbia, Odeon Records and Decca, to name but a few.

With a multitude of dynamic singers and musicians from this collection, I would like to highlight an artist that is one of the earliest female folklore names of the 20th century before the appearance of referential artists in history. Singer-songwriter Derlinda Araya was one of the first to record Chilean folklore. In the 1930s she began a successful career as a radio singer and since 1935 she recorded several albums. Her voice and the panache of her interpretation is very present. Eloquent, emotionally expressive and inspirational, which precisely earned her that popularity, embodied in dozens of records. Here's a recording of Derlinda accompanied with her guitar, singing 'Mi cantar'.

Download Mi Cantar

Derlinda with her guitar. Photo credit, and for more information: https://www.musicapopular.cl/artista/derlinda-araya/

I would like to draw your attention to a rendition of ‘Night and Day’ written by American composer and lyricist, Cole Porter. This has been covered by many an artist over the years. Here, Noche y Día is performed by Chilean vocalist Humberto Lozán and accompanied by the Jackie Kohan Orchestra. It’s always a pleasant surprise when you find a song you’re fond of that is sung in another language, as you can pick up the words to it and their correct pronunciation.

Download Noche y Dia

Pages of Azerbaijan (EAP124)

What first struck me about this collection was the intriguing design of the record labels. The visual imagery of most discs have survived, with just a handful that have been vulnerable to fading and deterioration over the decades. The creation of the artwork is aesthetically pleasing – pretty and effective. No doubt some labels played a relevant role in the distribution sales of the discs. As the EAP cataloguer, when the labels were missing, it proved difficult to identify exactly who the artists were and when the music was recorded.

CEAP124/98 side 2

The other interesting find I had while cataloguing this project, were the images of the musicians and singers, such as this Azerbaijani folk singer below:

Jabbar Garyaghdi Oglu

You can see the intricacy and craftsmanship of not only the instrument but the garments he is wearing. Immaculate!

However, what captured my imagination was listening to and discovering a variety of instruments. Each recording gave me a thought process and insight into the ideas and imaginations of the instrument makers. For example; the kamancheh, which appears to combine systems of a violin and a cello, as it is bowed with the right hand in a palm-up position and held vertically with an endpin rod (or spike). Here you can hear the kamancheh, with the accompaniment of a tar, and singer and daf (drum) musician, Islam Abdullayev.

04_DISQ_QATAR_BAYATI

Left to right: Islam_Abdullayev (daf), Shirin_Akhundov (tār), Levon_Garakhanov (kamancheh). Source

We hope that on reading this blog post you will be inspired to delve into a selection of EAP sound projects from around the world.

Remember, you will be able to access these on the new BL Sounds website. It is an exciting time to try out the new Universal Player. Have fun!

As a PhD placement student at the British Library, I had the privilege of being part of the Endangered Archives Programme. It allowed me to dive into the rich history and culture of West Africa through its manuscripts, and to play a role in making these unique works accessible to a wider audience. I feel fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with such a talented and supportive team. Initially, I had planned to participate in the PhD placement scheme full-time, but due to unforeseen circumstances, I had to switch to part-time. The team was incredibly supportive and understanding throughout my journey, making the transition smooth and hassle-free.

Nahida Ahmed

My initial meetings were with Jody Butterworth (EAP) and Mariam de Haan (Lead Curator Africa), who introduced me to EAP's work in Mali. I was then connected with Sophie Sarin (project holder for the projects in Djenné and Timbuktu) and Saadou Traore (who catalogued the several thousands of manuscripts). I was also introduced to Lucy Hinnie, who trained me on Wikipedia. Through Lucy, I also had the opportunity to attend the University of Edinburgh's "Women in Red" Wikithon online. The aim of this is to highlight and update Wikipedia pages about notable women who were not yet featured on the platform. The idea was also to highlight the rich content of the manuscripts on various pages dedicated to Mali on Wikipedia as well. Whilst this was one of the main aims of the placement, we found out that the Wiki entries would be more suited in the local languages and it was difficult to highlight primary sources on Wikipedia as the encyclopaedic nature of the platform requires context and other reliable published sources talking about the manuscripts. Since this was not the case, we decided to publish a blogpost on the British Library’s website instead.

My PhD placement focused on highlighting digitised manuscripts from West Africa for a West African as well as worldwide audience. Robert Miles, from the EAP team, provided me with the list of “most viewed” manuscripts from Djenné, Senegal and Nigeria, which was helpful in choosing manuscripts to be included in my report. The chosen manuscripts relate to everyday West African Muslim practices such as prayers for getting along with a superior, interpreting dreams, sayings of the Prophet, astronomy, geomancy, prayers for carrying a baby to term and even prayers for cursing the wicked. 

Exploring the manuscripts was an exciting adventure. I was fascinated by the different handwriting styles and unique topics exclusive to West Africa. At first, it was challenging as I had to get used to the anomalies in the authors and scribes' writing styles. For instance, most writers of the manuscripts put the dot of the Arabic letter "fa”/ ف ) under the alphabet instead of above it, and the letter "qaaf/ “ق that usually had two dots on top sometimes had one and at other not even one! I found this to be a consistent  characteristic in all the manuscripts I studied. Another noticeable characteristic common among all the manuscript was  the traditional Muslim opening phrase, Basmalah, which praises Allah and his prophet Muhammad, the equivalent of doxology in Christian practice.

The manuscripts were unique in their own way, and no two were exactly alike. Despite not having page numbers, order of the pages was maintained in some by copying the word of the next page at the bottom of the preceding one. Additionally, some of the text highlighted the name of Allah and Muhammad in red ink. There was also the use of Ajami script, tables and sometimes figures in some manuscripts. For example, "Fā’idat ḍarb al-tis‘at ‘alā al-Shaykh Muḥammad al-Ghazāliy: Esoterics", which I could not decipher due to time constraints and hope that someone else researching the collections will be able to do so in future. I hope that my efforts will help others who are interested in learning about the rich history and literary culture of West Africa.

My report on the manuscripts explored can be found on the EAP website, along with my notes of any anomalies and illegible and ambiguity within the texts. Both these documents will also be added to the Library's digital repository and will hopefully be of interest to future researchers. 

Nahida Ahmed is currently undertaking a PhD titled "Sociolinguistic Study of Wakhi in Urban Areas" at SOAS. The EAP team would like to thank Nahida for all her work over the past few months - it has been an absolute joy having her with us.