Академический Документы
Профессиональный Документы
Культура Документы
O
n a dusty side street in While the majority of these YouTube video, which features
Tunis, above a solitary communities ceased to exist only footage of Khartoum’s abandoned
locked doorway, one can within the past few decades, it Jewish cemetery: “I have never
still see a faded Hebrew plaque. remains difficult to visit and often heard that Jews were living in
This plaque is all that remains of the impossible to preserve their Sudan . . . and died there as well!
tomb of Chief Rabbi Messaoud communal sites. As these sites decay Come on, be real, man. This is not
Raphael el Fassi. According to and those with knowledge of them Sudan.”
tradition, el Fassi set off on a pass on, future generations are
caravan bound for Jerusalem from losing tangible connections to While we are in a race against time
his native city of Fez. He made it as communities that once contributed to identify and document Mizrahi
far as Tunis, where he died in 1775. significantly both to Jewish and sites, powerful new assets are now at
world culture. our disposal: user-driven Web 2.0
In December technology.
2008, Ali Kaba, a Google Earth, a
West African-
A COLLABORATION AMONG SCHOLARS SOCIAL , free program
Muslim
undergraduate,
ENTREPRENEURS ,G E
OOGLE ARTH DEVELOPERS , providing
interactive satellite
located this
plaque on a
AND M E
IDDLE ASTERN RESEARCHERS ,D IARNA imagery of the
entire globe to an
research UNDERLINES THE IMPORTANCE OF PHYSICAL audience of 500
expedition for million users,
Diarna (“Our LOCATION TO UNDERSTANDING THE PAST . allows anyone
homes” in Judeo- with an Internet
Arabic), a new initiative dedicated connection to travel like a bird
to mapping Mizrahi heritage. A Mizrahim have recently launched across the Middle East,
collaboration among scholars, social Web forums where visitors post old unencumbered by political and
entrepreneurs, Google Earth photographs and memories of their security restrictions. All sorts of
developers, and Middle Eastern hometowns. These websites are Jewish sites are clearly visible and
researchers, Diarna underlines the being discovered by a new “visitable” in a previously
importance of physical location to generation growing up in cities unimaginable way. Google Earth
understanding the past. By locating devoid of their former Jewish offers zoomable perspective, tiltable
hundreds of sites, collecting old and communities. Some of these young views, 360-degree rotation, and
new photographs of these sites, Muslims have begun posting even three-dimensional modeling of
interviewing current and former contemporary photos of Jewish buildings.
community residents, and communal sites, at times even
assembling a multimedia layer in meeting requests from their former Diarna is assembling an interactive
Google Earth, we are able both to Jewish neighbors to photograph map, stored in an online database
virtually preserve Mizrahi heritage family graves and other nostalgic format and plotted directly onto
and to make it accessible in a locales. This interaction yields Google Earth. For each site there
myriad of popular educational valuable data on the past and present will be a multimedia place-marker
formats. status of Jewish communal sites. featuring a brief summary of its
importance as well as archival and
Mizrahi communities from Saharan For a number of young Arabs, contemporary photos, video
outposts in southern Morocco to Berbers, Kurds, and Persians, the testimony, and embedded links to
Kurdish villages in Iran are rapidly hidden history of their region’s books, articles, and media.
disappearing. The synagogues, Jewish heritage is a source of Additionally, some sites will be
42
• Baghdad’s only remaining
Jewish cemetery, adjacent to
Sadr City
“rebuilt” as 3D models, thus Earth layer, and a website. The • Jewish cave-dwellers’ homes in
enabling the virtual reconstruction result will be a model for digital Gharyan, Libya
of outstanding Mizrahi sites. preservation applicable to
communities, however defined, • The Hasmonean fortress of
Diarna’s multinational and interfaith around the world. Machaerus, and accompanying
coalition is composed of experts on First Revolt–era Roman siege
the Mizrahim, coders and designers Demanding a fusion of academic, camps, in Jordan
of the Diarna infrastructure, technological, and entrepreneurial
photographers and researchers who skills, Diarna is a joint initiative • The Alliance Israélite
travel in the region collecting between the start-up nonprofit Universelle “Hafsia” boys
material, and Middle Eastern youth Digital Heritage Mapping and school in Tunis, Tunisia
eager to map virtual common Wellesley College’s Jewish studies
ground. From an academic program. Research institutions, • Jewish cemeteries in Kuwait,
standpoint, Diarna offers a cutting- including Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, as Oman, and Sudan
44