With the rise of technology in today’s time, collecting and preserving archival materials has become more accessible for the public eye. When you imagine archives, you may imagine them in file boxes stored away in a large, dark room; but, advancements are being made. For example, I will examine an online archival site called PARI (the People’s Archive of Rural India) and analyze how it connects citizens of India to it’s rural communities, as well as the rest of the world. This blog post will explain the importance of sharing stories of those do not typically have a voice, but especially how innovative and effective it is to have an online archive site.
In order to understand PARI to its full extent, allow me to give you a brief introduction. PARI, as stated on its website, is simply defined as both a “living journal and an archive”-meaning it is collecting info on Rural Indian citizens continuously. Their mandate is: “everyday lives of everyday people;” highlighting stories and moments of your average rural Indian resident, of many who reside and speak more than 700 languages in the Indian Rural countryside. These archives are available to whoever has access to internet, as the “Creative Commons” section on the website is free to access-anyone can even contribute to PARI. This work is important because in rural India, there is a strong sense of oppression that is exerted by urban areas of India and the government, and those who are being silenced need a safe place for their stories to be shared.
One interesting aspect of PARI is that anyone can contribute to the archive project considering they meet PARI’s standards and guidelines, which can suggest that this connects not only rural Indians to fellow citizens, but across the world. On PARI’s website, they explain that the content that is uploaded to the archival website every week “ [is] produced by students and teachers themselves.” Not only do students and teachers from around the world contribute stories about rural Indian’s to PARI, but anyone who fills out the profile form can contribute to translating Indian texts, conducting research in rural communities, filming interviews, writing posts, and more. This aspect of community collaboration is extremely important because it helps connect like-minded people who want to share stories about rural Indian life together in a way that others can easily access.
Highlighting personal stories through PARI suggests the importance of sharing experiences with one another in order to give those who are silenced a voice. Sharing these stories on PARI also connects contributors, viewers, and the people who are highlighted throughout the website together, creating a national (or international) relationship. For example, to accomodate Indian and international readers, stories can be read through a series of pictures or in different languages. A story most recently published on PARI titled “Almost everyone in the village has left” discusses a woman’s life in the village of Beed in Marathwada where families leave from October-March to work in the sugarcane fields. This woman would normally never get to share her story about the desolate months in which she stays in the village “shooing away pigs,” but now her story is protected on an archival website that can be shared worldwide. Being able to access these stories online means that we can learn about who we are as humans, as well as deepen our knowledge on different cultures and practices.
By having PARI, a resource for all (especially those in India) and an archival site, it is being used to preserve stories that are told by rural Indian communities (who are often silenced). PARI acts as a link that connects India and the rest of the world together by allowing anyone to contribute to these stories, including students and teachers who use it as a learning resource. With quick technological advancements that continued to be made today, it is important that archival resources like PARI continue to display people’s experiences and life moments in order to create a more harmonious, equal, and compassionate world.
Works Cited
“Rural India: A living journal, a breathing archive.” PARI, n.d., ruralindiaonline.org/pages/about, Accessed 2018-03-04.
“People’s Archive of Rural India – Contributor Engagement Program.” PARI, n.d, docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSes1Vmp-ccg3p-uS9fBIupzxzDNyAxrzaBNslxzowH06vZWHA/viewform, Accessed 2018-03-04.
“Almost everyone in the village has left.” PARI, 28 February 2018, ruralindiaonline.org/articles/almost-everyone-in-the-village-has-left, Accessed 2018-03-04.
