Research Questions

In an island of such multivocality, crowdsourcing is a perfect way to incorporate new and unique histories and heritage of local communities. After local secondary school teachers in the Dominican Republic identified a need to create more interactive educational tools, we joined forces to create Arqueología Interactiva. Crowd sourced information represents the diverse past and present of the Dominican Republic through the inclusion of archaeological heritage, local traditions and narratives, museum collections and important local sites. The opinion of present day society is of great importance in the protection and recognition of heritage.

The research questions concerning the development of this tool were as follows:

What is the local heritage of the Dominican Republic?

How can crowdsourcing provide interactive learning opportunities for teachers and students?

How can crowdsourcing be integrated into  educational programs or educational resources?

Do  local narratives accurately represent heritage collected by the crowdsourcing tool?

Towards Visualizing Dominican Indigenous Heritage

The Caribbean is a region of many historical and cultural processes over time. As a result Caribbean society today is multicultural. The vestiges of the past can be found through the material cultural heritage as well as expressions of intangible cultural heritage. This interactive tool aims to facilitate the visualization of the Dominican indigenous heritage in the geographical space of the island. It is important that as much people as possible participate, and we would like to ask those interested to have a look at the questions below when using this tool.

For the public using the tool we would like them to ask themselves

/ Para empezar a usar la herramienta utiliza las siguientes preguntas como guía para localizar en el mapa los lugares:

identified or associated with pre-Columbian indigenous peoples (Taínos) material culture and natural environment

/ identificados o asociados a los pueblos indígenas pre-colombinos (Taínos) su cultura material y entorno natural

related cultural manifestations and expressions today associated with the indigenous cultural legacy / relacionados con manifestaciones y expresiones culturales hoy en día asociadas al legado cultural indígena

What is indigenous heritage mean to you? / ¿Qué significa para ti patrimonio indígena?

What have been the transformations of indigenous heritage over time? / ¿Cuáles han sido las transformaciones del patrimonio indígena a través del tiempo?

What aspects of Dominican culture today retain elements of the past? / ¿Qué aspectos de la cultura dominicana hoy en día conservan elementos del pasado?

If you would like to contribute / Si quieres contribuir: Arqueología Interactiva

By Eloise Stancioff, Eldris Con Aguilar, Habiba, and Arlene Alvarez