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The School of Cultural Texts and Records was formally set up in August 2003, and began functioning in January 2004 after allocation of space and funds. It has a broad and open-ended agenda of documenting, processing and studying the textual basis (both verbal and audio-visual) of human society and cultural life in the widest sense. Its approved activities include:
editing manuscripts and printed texts, especially those requiring multidisciplinary inputs, in electronic and print form
preparing databases, bibliographies, concordances, indexes, hand lists, location registers and other reference tools and search engines for cultural and textual studies;
studying the history of publishing and the printing press, especially in Bengal and in India as a whole;
recording oral literature, oral history, interviews and other oral material;
cross-modal or cross-segmental documentation: i.e., gathering material of different categories and genres in relation to a particular date, event or theme;
collection of ephemera (political and commercial publicity material, job printing work etc.);
developing the resources for cultural informatics in India by accessing and developing appropriate technology for the above activities: in particular, creating appropriate software;
publishing the output in printed and digital (including online) form.
Website: http://granthsouthasia.in/
ANICM - Archive of North Indian Classical Music
ANICM - Archive of North Indian Classical Music
The School has growing archives of various kinds, the Archive of North Indian Classical Music is one of such unique archives at the school. All of this started with a aim to create an extensive database of recorded North Indian Classical Music, from the earliest phonographs onward, in digitised versions.
The Archive of North Indian Classical Music (ANICM) was set up at the School of Cultural Texts and Records, Jadavpur University, in early 2004 by Prof. Amlan Das Gupta. The work has been funded by two successive Major Project Grants from the Endangered Archives Programme of the British Library. See the British Library web page: https://eap.bl.uk/project/EAP274. Along with funding under the Documentation of Rare Texts Programme instituted by the University Grants Commission (UGC). Over the last 15 years, the archive has grown substantially, and at present contains about 8000 plus hours of recorded music in digital form as well as a substantial corpus of music on loan, awaiting digitization. The archive houses music recorded commercially as well as covers and private recordings more than a hundred years old. It is thus one of the largest repositories of Hindustani classical music in the country, especially rich in the genres of traditional music available across a large variety of carriers—from wax-cylinders, 78 rpm records to reel-to-reel magnetic spool tapes etc.
Media Outreach:
Media Outreach:
http://archive.indianexpress.com/news/songs-sung-true/564010/
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kolkata/House-Of-Lost-Song/articleshow/54371424.cms
https://www.thehindu.com/features/friday-review/music/no-shastra-only-prayog/article4389951.ece
http://www.epaper.eisamay.com/Details.aspx?id=50996&boxid=34934
Prof. Amlan Das Gupta conducting a hands-on seminar on 'Early Recorded Music in India - and it's Digitization'.
“The idea of having a music archive is something we have thought about for a long time - ever since we are listening to music. For a lot of us, it was a kind of community activity. Many of my friends were learning music, others were interested in music. There were lots and lots of talk about music, and there were these wonderings, 'oh only if there was some place where we could listen to these things'. The more we heard about great singers of the past we thought that whether it will ever be possible to go and listen to these songs. At that point of time it did not seem possible. It was much later in fact, that we came to know about these great 78 RPM record collectors. Unfortunately, we had no access to them as music lovers-young, extremely young music lovers. Very frankly, we would not get much of their time, or they would not allow us to listen to music, unless we have had some kind of connection. It was somewhat later, I think only in the early 80’s that there were these music collectors like Anjan Sen, Biman Sinha, later Rantideb Maitra who gave us access to their collection and we heard a lot. Somewhat around this time I got acquainted with Sarbari Da. We also listened to music there. It was then that we started understanding that there is a great den of music in private hands. So the idea of having an archive where people could come in and listen to music as people read books in the library [...] today you can listen to most of these on YouTube. Only thing I can say which distinguishes the archive from a collection like YouTube [...] much less organized. The archive is organized on a different principle. Even the largest collection has not been organized in the same principle. The principle of the archive is that the archive pays attention both to content and the metadata; and that is what makes it valuable, makes it an easier recourse for research."
- From the pen of the founder of the archive, Prof. Amlan Das Gupta, Ex-Director, School of Cultural Texts and Records. http://kolkatamusicmapping.com/making-school-cultural-texts-records-jadavpur-university/
Picture Carousel - Various ANICM Events (Past & Present)
Picture Carousel - Various ANICM Events (Past & Present)
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