Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 27, Number 2, 1 Pepeluali 2010 — OHA grant helps digitize Hawaiian newspapers [ARTICLE]

OHA grant helps digitize Hawaiian newspapers

By Kau'i Sai-Dudoit

Most everyone is familiar by now with the existence of the Hawaiian language newspaper repository that illuminates every facet of Hawaiian life from the 1800s through the middle of the 20th century. Today students, scholars, researchers, genealogists or anyone with an interest in Hawai'i are able to scour at the eliek of a mouse through the 76,000 pages of the eollection at nupepa.org to glean a unique perspective of Hawaiian life written by the people who lived it. (It's all in Hawaiian, and a challenge to track through, but making it easier to find allows speakers and nonspeakers to locate important information; translation or interpretation ean follow onee it's found.) More than 10,000 of those pages have been converted from page images to searchable text files by Ho'olaupa'i: Hawaiian Language Newspaper Resource during the last seven years for nupepa.org. It's a wonderful new resource, changing what we know about the past. Mueh remains to be done, but the project team has committed to completing this immense endeavor. Although funding opportunities are extremely limited at present and the project has transitioned from a full-time project at the Bishop Museum to a collaborative effort of the Bishop Museum and the Awaiāulu Literacy Project, the team remains optimistic. Through the generous support of an Office of Hawaiian Affairs Education Hale grant under Hau'oli Akaka, Ho'olaupa'i has completed text files for 1,800 pages of Hawaiian language newspapers. Additionally, Kamehameha Publishing under Kēhau Abad has provided ongoing funding opportunities for the project, and the team has completed an additional 1,400 pages through their generosity. The Bishop Museum, Awaiāulu Ine. and Ho'olaupa'i are proud to announee that the additional 3,200 pages will be uploaded to the World Wide Web in February 2010. A doorway into the past will be made 30 percent larger just in time for second semester research papers. ■ Kau 'i Sai-Dudoit is the manager ofHo 'olaupa 'i: Hawaiian Language Newspaper Resource Project.