Enhancing Digital Libraries through Digital Storytelling: The Case of the Inuvialuit Digital Library

Indigenous communities around the world have been turning to digital media and platforms to preserve and revitalize their culture, language, and ways of life as part of their broader struggle for self-determination and self-representation. This chapter provides an overview of digital storytelling as a methodology and provides examples of its use in systems and approaches for working with Indigenous communities. The chapter introduces the Inuvialuit Voices project, a federally funded collaborative project underway in Canada to explore the use of digital storytelling technologies to enhance digital libraries and provide a seamless platform for cultural heritage preservation and access in Indigenous communities. In addition, the chapter outlines the benefits of a real-time, seamless digital storytelling system, presents a community-focused participatory design methodology as a basis for working with Indigenous communities, and addresses the contribution of information practitioners to the project.