Monday, February 07, 2005

Digitizing speech and audio

Michigan State University is housing one of the first fully functional, multi-media, interoperable digital libraries available online. The digital library -- Historical Voices -- is working with several partners including the Chicago Historical Society; Northwestern University; University of Michigan, Flint; Institut Fondamental d'Afrique Noire (IFAN), Dakar, SN; West African Research Center (WARC), Dakar, SN; University of Capetown, SA; University of the Western Cape, SA; and University of Durban, Westville, SA. In addition, the project has several research partners including the Center for Speech and Language Research, University of Colorado; Northwestern University; Speech Processing Lab, Michigan State University; Speech and Audiology, Michigan Sate University; and the Oral History Association.

The Historical Voices web site contains links to research reports on digitizing audio and speech. Eventually the site will also contain best practices for sound digitization, system architecture, federated searching, metadata implementations, online delivery, and multimedia education.

Historical Voices is housed at a center at Michigan State that has as its mission to "serve as a catalyst for and incubator of the emerging fields and disciplines resulting from the integration of the humanities with information technologies." The center-- named MATRIX: The Center for Humane, Arts, Letters and Social Sciences Online -- "engages in fundamental research in the development of digital libraries, creates and maintains online resources, provides training in computing and new teaching technologies, and creates forums for the exchange of ideas and expertise in new teaching technologies." (from HistoricalVoices.org)

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