Panel 2: Connecting Archives and Communities through Technology
“Introduction to Mukurtu”

Presenter Biographies:
Alana Kanahele was born and raised on Oʻahu and graduated from Mills College with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics. She is currently pursuing her Master’s degree at the Center for Pacific Island Studies at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, where she serves as a graduate assistant in the Department of Linguistics and is the Hub Manager for the Kaipumakani/Mukurtu Project.

Dr. Gary Holton has over two decades of experience working to support cultural and linguistic preservation in Indigenous communities from Alaska to Indonesia. He is currently Professor of Linguistics at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, where he serves as project director for the IMLS-funded Kaipumakani Project (kaipumakani.org).

Presentation Description:
Join me for a fun and informative session exploring options for sustaining digital cultural heritage. This presentation will describe a number of content management options, focusing on the Mukurtu CMS, a free content management software that allows communities to preserve, share, manage, license and curate their digital heritage and stories. Mukurtu promotes a community approach to digital heritage management and preservation, integrating already established social and cultural systems with technological tools. Preserving digital cultural heritage can be a significant challenge for smaller organizations without access to dedicated content management solutions. Relying on outside vendors can provide short-term solutions but can be difficult to sustain over the long term. In this presentation we will discuss open source solutions, which can be easily implemented and maintained. Participants will see examples of Mukurtu in use in communities emphasizing sustainable preservation strategies, cultural protocols, and the use of traditional knowledge labels. Participants will also get hands-on experience with Mukurtu CMS, including: 1) basic site set up 2) core features, and 3) procedures to curate digital heritage items with Mukurtu CMS. An introduction will be presented to the IMLS-funded Kaipumakani Project, which is providing resources and support for digital cultural heritage preservation in Hawai‘i and the Pacific.