Microsoft South Africa plans to digitise a collection of struggle records being kept at Fort Hare University's Mayibuye Centre and the University of the Western Cape.
Advocate Sonwabile Mancotywa, CEO of the National Heritage Council, says the collection of manuscripts, maps, newspapers, letters, sound and video clips, photographs and other physical artefacts remain a vital part of the country's heritage that could be lost forever unless preserved digitally.
"Digitising archives is more than merely collecting and aggregating documents online," says Mancotywa. "In the past, access to cultural and heritage institutions was denied to the majority of the population, to the extent that history, heritage and culture were deliberately underdeveloped. Heritage is a source of strength and confidence that puts the changes of society into perspective and helps us to build a better future."
Dr Petrus Strijdom, acting director of research and development at Fort Hare University, says the digitised archive will be Web-based to ensure maximum accessibility for South Africans. He notes that it will provide a "highly interactive" user experience, with additional content, comment, links to related artefacts and other information.
"Much of the history of the struggle was suppressed under the previous regime, but the community itself is a store of rich additional information.
"A great deal of South African history is preserved via folklore, and is verbally related. The opportunity is to capture these experiences and preserve these experiences as 'living artefacts' of history," says Strijdom.
Microsoft SA MD Pfungwa Serima says the project would contribute "enormously" towards making the University of the Western Cape a premier centre of research and scholarship on the country's history.
"To fully develop the information society we live in, SA has to be able to preserve, promote and disseminate its art, culture and heritage with the use of modern technology.
"This will allow future generations to 'scroll through history' from a highly personalised perspective, while allowing others to gain insight from their experiences, and ensure our past facilitates an awareness of what our future needs to hold," says Serima.
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