In light of World Day for Audiovisual Heritage the Director-General of UNESCO, Mr. Koïchiro Matsuura, wrote a message about the, “faded legacy of film, television and radio recordings that we may be transmitting to future generations.”

World Day for Audiovisual Heritage logo.

I read the message and I, being the typical technology savvy, young American, was confused. I didn’t understand how we could be losing anything that was once recorded. And everything has been recorded…right?

We have hard drives, external hard drives, jump drives and DVDs. So why would anyone’s, “audiovisual carrier be doomed?”

Can my hard drive decay? And if it can, will it decay before I get a chance to make a back up? And what about my DVDs? If I mess up my entire collection, aren’t there a million people out there with the same DVDs?

LIGHT BULB! While I may have five different technologies to save any and every story that I feel is important, that has not always been the case and still isn’t for the majority of people in this world.

After my light bulb moment, I stopped reading, but continued thinking, which led to researching.

UNESCO, for those of us who didn’t know, has member countries all across the world. Unfortunately, these countries do not all have a level playing field when it comes to technology, or anything else for that matter.

If everyone does not have the capability to share their past and ongoing struggles with each other, how can we truly communicate and understand each other?

It is important for all people to record and honestly communicate their struggles and triumphs in order to move forward towards a peaceful coexistence because in order to understand who someone is today, you need to know how they got there.

Image by Ryan Baxter via Flickr

So, the first problem was presented; everyone does not have the technological capabilities to preserve history through audiovisual carriers.

Second problem, which is what the bulk of Mr. Koïchiro Matsuura’s message was about, is that these audiovisual heritage carriers are being destroyed from, “ignorance, neglect, physical decay or deliberate destruction.”

A perfect example of this is when the footage of the lunar landing was reported lost. Who would have thought that an organization like NASA is capable of losing something so monumental?

Although it was a very big deal when it happened, you may not care about something like the lunar landing, but just think of how you would feel if some type of footage that you cared about was lost forever or how would it affect your cultural legacy?

As an American and as an aspiring journalist, I know ranking high on the list of media that would devastate me if ever lost is the footage of President Obama’s Inaugural speech and my favorite movie, A Mighty Heart: The Daniel Pearl Story.

The likeliness of any of these things being lost forever is highly unlikely. However, that isn’t true for some different pieces of media that are equally important to people.

My list of important things may not hold any significance to other people, but they do to me. And that is exactly the point.

Documentarians, like those at InnerCity Films, Arts Engine and Runaway films, are working hard to preserve people’s heritage through documentaries.

They travel to places where the resources may not be available to tell a current story that is going untold. They also travel to the past to document stories that have been told, but are going unheard.

I want to know what stories you want told and/or passed on. Whether it is the story of your grand daughter’s uncertain future or your country’s struggle to gain independence. What are the stories that you think need to be told and preserved forever?

By Miriam Welderufael