{"id":140,"date":"2016-04-19T16:30:00","date_gmt":"2016-04-19T16:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/?p=140"},"modified":"2020-05-04T07:44:59","modified_gmt":"2020-05-04T07:44:59","slug":"kratli","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/2016\/kratli\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;Between Quandary and Squander&#8221;: A List of Added Online Content"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Graziano Kr\u00e4tli\u2019s article \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/muse.jhu.edu\/article\/645865\">Between Quandary and Squander: A Brief and Biased Inquiry into the Preservation of West African Arabic Manuscripts<\/a>\u201d  provides a critical overview of major initiatives undertaken to  identify, describe, and preserve Arabic manuscripts in West Africa. He  is a librarian at Yale University and a scholar of the the material,  technological, economic, and cultural aspects of book production,  circulation, and preservation in the non-Western world. He can be  contacted at <a href=\"mailto:gkratli@gmail.com\">gkratli@gmail.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/muse.jhu.edu\/article\/645865\">My article<\/a> on West  African Arabic Manuscript Heritage has a three-pronged approach. In the  first place, it provides an overview of the major initiatives that have  been undertaken since the 1960s to collect, describe, and preserve  Arabic-language manuscripts in Mali, Mauritania, and Nigeria. Mainly  focused on bibliographic description, content analysis and preservation,  these initiatives employed storage and reformatting technologies  (microfilm and digitization), database management systems, and the  Internet, to develop computerized catalogs and finding aids, create  surrogate copies of selected manuscripts, and eventually make these  resources available online. Considering the harsh environment, the  problematic nature of the materials and their storage conditions, and  the limited human, technological and financial resources employed, it is  remarkable how some of these projects managed to survey and map large  swaths of the West African manuscript landscape, often making the  results of their work permanently available online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In the second place, it reviews the accomplishments and shortcomings of some major projects, in order to understand how they often failed to meet \u2013 or even understand properly \u2013 the expectations of their intended and potential users. (Or if they did meet such expectations, they misunderstood or underestimated the nature of the tools they employed and the rapidly evolving technological and cultural environment that nurtures and supports them.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Thirdly, it advocates a different approach to preservation and its priorities with respect to both, the particular heritage at issue and its particularly challenging geopolitical context.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Below is a list of added online content, with indication of the article pages on which each resource is referred.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Octave Houdas\u2019 French translations of the <a href=\"http:\/\/gallica.bnf.fr\/ark:\/12148\/bpt6k261452\"><em>Ta\u2019r\u012bkh al-s\u016bd\u0101n <\/em><\/a>(1898-1900) and the <a href=\"http:\/\/gallica.bnf.fr\/ark:\/12148\/bpt6k5444371d.r=baghirmi.langEN\"><em>Tadhkirat al-nisy\u0101n<\/em><\/a> (1901) (<strong>401<\/strong>) are both available available on Gallica, the digital library of the <a href=\"http:\/\/gallica.bnf.fr\/ark:\/12148\/bpt6k261452\">Biblioth\u00e8que nationale de France<\/a> (BnF).<\/li><li>Louis Archinard\u2019s (<strong>401<\/strong>) account of the \u201cconquest and pacification\u201d of French Sudan (current Mali), <em>Le Soudan en 1893<\/em> (Havre: Imprimerie de la Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 des anciens courtiers, 1895), is available on Gallica, the digital library of the <a href=\"http:\/\/gallica.bnf.fr\/ark:\/12148\/bpt6k8560807\">Biblioth\u00e8que nationale de France<\/a> (BnF).<\/li><li>Timbuktu\u2019s great mosques of Djingareyber (rebuilt in the 16<sup>th<\/sup> century), Sankore (14<sup>th<\/sup> century), and Sidi Yahia (ca. 1400), and sixteen mausoleums and holy public places were included on <a href=\"http:\/\/whc.unesco.org\/en\/list\/119\">UNESCO\u2019s World Heritage List<\/a> in 1988 (<strong>404<\/strong>)\n as \u201coutstanding witnesses to the urban establishment of Timbuktu, its \nimportant role of commercial, spiritual and cultural centre on the \nsouthern trans-Saharan trading route, and its traditional characteristic\n construction techniques.\u201d<\/li><li>The four ancient <em>ksour<\/em> of W\u0101d\u0101n (Ouadane), Shinq\u012b\u1e6d\u012b (Chinguetti), T\u012bch\u012bt (Tichitt) and Wal\u0101ta (Oualata), in Mauritania, were included on the <a href=\"http:\/\/whc.unesco.org\/en\/list\/750\">World Heritage List<\/a> in 1996 (<strong>404<\/strong>),\n with the motivation that they represent medieval towns with an \noutstanding example of the type of architectural ensembles illustrating \nseven centuries of human history, and focuses on their bearing \u201cunique \nwitness to a nomadic culture and trade in a desert environment.\u201d<\/li><li>Noureddine Ghali and Sidi Mohamed \nMahibou published their catalog of the library of Umar Tal (Al-\u1e24\u0101jj \n\u2018Umar b. Sa\u2019\u012bd al-F\u016bt\u012b al-T\u016br\u012b, 1797-1864), <em>Inventaire de la biblioth\u00e8que Umarienne de <\/em>S\u00e9gou, in 1985 (<strong>407<\/strong>). The document is now available on Gallica, the digital library of the <a href=\"http:\/\/gallica.bnf.fr\/ark:\/12148\/bpt6k1301519\">Biblioth\u00e8que nationale de France<\/a> (BnF).<\/li><li>Between 1947 and 1950, Georges Vajda \n(1908-81), a leading French scholar of Judeo-Islamic Studies, described \nmore than 500 manuscripts in the Biblioth\u00e8que d\u2019Ahmadou (i.e., Umar Tal)\n (<strong> 407<\/strong>). The typewritten inventory is now available on Gallica, the digital library of the <a href=\"http:\/\/gallica.bnf.fr\/ark:\/12148\/btv1b53023944q\">Biblioth\u00e8que nationale de France<\/a> (BnF).<\/li><li>The <a href=\"http:\/\/omar.ub.uni-freiburg.de\/\">Oriental Manuscripts Resource<\/a> (OMAR) database (<strong>411<\/strong>),\n developed in 2000 at the University of Freiburg (Germany), in \ncooperation with the Information Technology&nbsp;Center of the University of \nT\u00fcbingen (Germany). provides access to approximately 2.500 Arabic \nmanuscripts from Mauritania, together with the corresponding \nbibliographical metadata. It remains a valuable resource, and the only \none of this kind focused on Mauritanian manuscripts. At the same time, \nit represents a \u201cclosed project,\u201d combining stabilized content with \noutdated features and functionality, and the lack of basic maintenance \n(as shown by the broken links on the welcome page).<\/li><li>Unlike OMAR, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.westafricanmanuscripts.org\/\">Arabic Manuscript Management System<\/a> (now West African Arabic Manuscript Database)&nbsp;(<strong> 412<\/strong>)\n has evolved significantly since its inception, both in terms of content\n and technology. More recently, it has helped shape the fifth \ninstallment of the Arabic Literature of Africa series, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.brill.com\/products\/reference-work\/arabic-literature-africa-volume-v-2-vols\">The Writings of Mauritania and the Western Sahara<\/a>, compiled by Charles C. Stewart et al. (Leiden: Brill, 2015).<\/li><li>The Task Force on Archiving of Digital \nInformation was created in December 1994 by the Commission on \nPreservation and Access and the Research Libraries Group (RLG) to \n\u201cinvestigate the means of ensuring continued access indefinitely into \nthe future of records stored in digital electronic form.\u201d Their <a href=\"https:\/\/www.clir.org\/pubs\/reports\/pub63watersgarrett.pdf\">final report<\/a> (<strong>413<\/strong>)\n was released in May 1996. In 1997 the Commission on Preservation and \nAccess (established in 1986) merged with the Council on Library \nResources (formed in 1956) to create the Council on Library and \nInformation Resources (CLIR).<\/li><li>The March 2002 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ifla.org\/files\/assets\/preservation-and-conservation\/publications\/digitization-projects-guidelines.pdf\"><em>Guidelines\n for Digitization Projects for Collections and Holdings in the Public \nDomain, Particularly Those Held by Libraries and Archives<\/em><\/a> (<strong>414<\/strong>)\n were sponsored by UNESCO and drafted by a group of experts on behalf of\n IFLA (International Federation of LIbrary Associations and \nInstitutions) and ICA (International Council on Archives).<\/li><li>UNESCO\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/portal.unesco.org\/en\/ev.php-URL_ID=17721&amp;URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&amp;URL_SECTION=201.html\"><em>Charter on the Preservation of the Digital Heritage<\/em><\/a> (<strong>414<\/strong>) was adopted in October 2003 and published in the Records of the General Conference, 32<sup>nd<\/sup> Session, Paris, 29 September \u2013 17 October 2003. Volume 1: Resolutions (Paris: UNESCO, 2004): 74-77.<\/li><li>Founded in 2000 by John O. Hunwick of \nNorthwestern University and R. S\u00e9an O\u2019Fahey of the University of Bergen,\n with funding from the Ford Foundation, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.isita.northwestern.edu\/\">Institute for the Study of Islamic Thought in Africa<\/a> (ISITA) (<strong>416)<\/strong>\n sponsors collaborative interdisciplinary scholarship on the Islamic \ntradition of learning in Africa, and promotes broader awareness of the \nrole of Islam in African societies, past and present.<\/li><li>In the summer of 2003 the Library of \nCongress, in conjunction with the Smithsonian Folklife Festival on the \nNational Mall, which featured the cultural heritage of Mali, held an \nexhibition entitled <em>Ancient Manuscripts from the Desert Libraries of Timbuktu<\/em>.\n The exhibition featured 23 manuscripts from the Mamma Haidara \nCommemorative Library and the Library of Cheick Zayni Baye of Boujbeha. \nThe manuscripts were later digitized and made available online as a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.loc.gov\/exhibits\/mali\/\">virtual exhibition<\/a> as well as through the Global Gateway Web site <em><a href=\"https:\/\/memory.loc.gov\/intldl\/malihtml\/malihome.html\">Islamic Manuscripts from Mali<\/a>&nbsp;<\/em>launched in 2005 [link to ] (<strong>416-17<\/strong>).<\/li><li>Although all West African countries are represented in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wdl.org\/en\/search\/?countries=M\">World Digital Library<\/a> (WDL) &nbsp;(<strong>417<\/strong>),\n Mali is the only one represented by a substantial number of manuscripts\n (31, all from the Mamma Ha\u00efdara Library in Timbuktu). Nigeria is \nrepresented by one (also from the Mamma Ha\u00efdara Library) and so is \nMauritania, although this latter manuscript \u2013 a fragment of the Qu\u2019ran \nfrom the Walters Art Museum \u2013 was actually produced in the Maghreb.<\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aluka.org\/\">Aluka<\/a> (<strong>418<\/strong>)\n was founded in 2003 as an initiative of the non-profit-organization \nIthaka, established the same year to support of JSTOR\u2019s founding \nmission. Following a recommendation made in 2008 by the trustees of \nJSTOR and Ithaka, Aluka\u2019 primary source collections (including 323 \nmanuscripts from Timbuktu) are being integrated with JSTOR as part of \nits \u201cWorld Heritage Sites: Africa\u201d collection.<\/li><li>Founded in 1996 by Abdel Kader Haidara,\n director of the Mamma Haidara Library in Timbuktu and the most \nprominent advocate of Malian manuscript preservation, the association <a href=\"http:\/\/www.savamadci.net\/\">Sauvegarde et la Valorisation des Manuscrits pour la D\u00e9fense de la Culture Islamique<\/a> (SAVAMA-DCI)&nbsp;(<strong>418<\/strong>)\n became a non-governmental organization in 2005. Its activities, largely\n funded by international foundations and agencies, include manuscript \nrestoration and digitization, training workshops, seminars, and \nconferences.<\/li><li>Officially established in 2003 and \ncurrently (as of 2016) supported by the D\u00fcsseldorf-based Gerda Henkel \nFoundation and the University of Cape Town, the T<a href=\"http:\/\/www.tombouctoumanuscripts.org\/\">ombo<em>uct<\/em>ou Manuscripts Project<\/a> (<strong>418<\/strong>)\n pursues the preservation of the manuscript tradition of Timbuktu \nthrough a number of related activities, including digitization, content \nanalysis, and translation of individual manuscripts as well as the \nidentification of unknown or lesser known collections.<\/li><li>The <a href=\"http:\/\/digital.soas.ac.uk\/okim\">Old Kanembu<\/a> collection of Islamic manuscripts (<strong>418<\/strong>)\n is one of a number of digitized collections of materials from Africa \nthat are made available by SOAS (University of London) for online use. \nIt provides access to a growing corpus of Qur\u2019an manuscripts dating from\n the 17<sup>th<\/sup> to 19<sup>th<\/sup> centuries, and various other religious texts dating from the 19<sup>th<\/sup>\n century to 1980\u2019s, which contain marginal and interlinear annotations \nin Old Kanembu, one of the earliest sub-Saharan languages written in \nArabic script.<\/li><li>In August 2016, FADGI\u2019s Still Image Working Group issued a set of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.digitizationguidelines.gov\/guidelines\/FADGI_Still_Image_Tech_Guidelines_2016.pdf\"><em>Technical Guidelines for Digitizing Cultural Heritage Materials<\/em><\/a> (<strong>419<\/strong>)\n that represent \u201cshared best practices for still image materials (e.g., \ntextual content, maps, and photographic prints and negatives) followed \nby agencies participating in the Federal Agencies Digitization \nGuidelines Initiative (FADGI).\u201d The <em>Guidelines<\/em> is an update of a\n previous (2010) document of the same title that, in turn, was based on \nthe National Archives and Records Administration\u2019s (NARA)<em>Technical Guidelines for Digitizing Archival Records for Electronic Access: Creation of Production Master Files \u2013 Raster Images<\/em> (June 2004). Similarly, the 2009 <em>Digitization Activities<\/em> guideline is based on an internal draft developed by NARA in August 2008.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cite this article:<br>Graziano Kr\u00e4tli,<em class=\"\"> <\/em>&#8220;&#8216;Between Quandary and Squander&#8217;: A List of Added Online Content,&#8221; <em>Book History Unbound<\/em>\u00a0(2016),\u00a0https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/2016\/kratli\/.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Graziano Kr\u00e4tli\u2019s article \u201cBetween Quandary and Squander: A Brief and Biased Inquiry into the Preservation of West African Arabic Manuscripts\u201d  provides a critical overview of major initiatives undertaken to  identify, describe, and preserve Arabic manuscripts in West Africa. He  is a librarian at Yale University and a scholar of the the material,  technological, economic, and cultural aspects of book production,  circulation, and preservation in the non-Western world. He can be  contacted at gkratli@gmail.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-140","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2016-19"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":248,"href":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140\/revisions\/248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sharpweb.org\/book-history-unbound\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}