Teaching Ojibwe Values through Stories and Song: Building a Digital Repository at the Ojibwemowining Center

FAIN: AD-50052-14

Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College (Cloquet, MN 55720-2964)
Elizabeth Jaakola (Project Director: July 2013 to April 2017)

A two-year project that would organize a substantial archive of Ojibwe culture and produce interpretive materials to enhance Native understanding of the resources.

This grant proposes to bring together a partnership of cultural institutions--the Library of Congress, the University of Pennsylvania, and the American Philosophical Society--to repatriate materials to the Ojibwemowining Resource Center at Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College, which has the infrastructure and central location to preserve digitized materials and to provide access to tribal colleges, communities, and high schools to enhance language preservation and cultural revitalization.

Associated Products

Frances Densmore and the Colonial/Indigenous Archive (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Frances Densmore and the Colonial/Indigenous Archive
Author: Joan Jensen, New Mexico State University
Author: Josh Garrett-Davis, Princeton University
Author: Lyz Jaakola, Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College
Abstract: The collaboration between the colonial institution and tribal archive has often been one-sided with the flow of information and artifact coming from tribes. This session explores another relationship, that of shared resources and future horizons. Learn from three perspectives of this new era of collaboration.
Date: 10/21/2016
Conference Name: Western History Association’s 56th Annual Meeting in St. Paul

Models of Collaboration for Access and Use of Native Language Materials (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Models of Collaboration for Access and Use of Native Language Materials
Author: Elizabeth Jaakola, Director, Ojibwemowining Center, Fond du Lac Tribal Community College
Author: Mary Downs, Senior Program Officer, National Endowment for the Humanities
Author: Tim Powell, Director, Center for Native American and Indigenous Studies, American Philosophical Soc
Author: Daryl Baldwin, Director, Myaamia Center, Miami University
Author: Gabriela Pérez Báez, Curator of Linguistics, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institu
Abstract: Collaborations between non-tribal cultural repositories and tribal organizations offer opportunities to improve access to and use of Native language materials – and to build relationships that benefit both the institutions and tribal communities. Attendees will hear about a number of successful programs that share knowledge among collections specialists, heritage language learners and speakers, and linguists. The programs, based at archives, libraries, and museums, enhance access to collections, teach linguistic methods, and develop language learning resources, while also building valuable relationships through research and use of heritage materials. Session speakers will share their experiences working with language recordings, field notes, word lists, and other linguistic materials -- valuable resources for traditionbearers, language learners, and academic researchers alike. The session will offer a set of best practices and lessons learned for community collaborations that support interdisciplinary research, language documentation, and preservation and revitalization of Native cultural traditions.
Date: 9/11/2015
Conference Name: Association of Tribal Archives, Libraries, and Museums International Conference of Indigenous Archives, Libraries, and Museums

“The Songs Are Alive”: Bringing Frances Densmore’s Recordings Back Home to Ojibwe Country (Article)
Title: “The Songs Are Alive”: Bringing Frances Densmore’s Recordings Back Home to Ojibwe Country
Author: Timothy B. Powell
Author: Lyz Jaakola
Abstract: This is the story of bringing “Frances Densmore’s Ojibwe Music” from the Library of Congress back home to the Ojibwemowining Digital Arts Studio (ODAS), directed by Lyz Jaakola, at Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College. What we hope our story will show is how the songs, so long inaccessible because Densmore recorded them on wax cylinders, come back to life when returned to Ojibwe communities Tim, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, will explain the digital component of the repatriation project and will explore the theoretical question of how digital objects come to be seen in new ways when situated within traditional Ojibwe-Anishinaabe knowledge systems. Lyz will pick up the story in the second half to explain what revitalizing these very powerful songs means to her as a professional musician, a teacher at Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College, and an active member in the community. Given that many of the songs, though not all, are Midewiwin (“Grand Medicine Society”), Lyz will also discuss the proper handling of culturally sensitive materials from an Ojibwe perspective. She will also provide examples of how those songs not designated as culturally sensitive are being used to teach traditional Ojibwe values to the upcoming generation.
Year: 2016
Periodical Title: Oxford Handbook of Musical Repatriation
Publisher: Oxford Handbook of Musical Repatriation

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