Project Background:
The Cultural X-change is a joint initiative between County Carlow in Ireland and Carlow in Wales to create two virtual museums, one for each county.
The concept of the Cultural X-change began in 2004 during talks between members of both Carlow’s and Carlow’s Museum Services. It was agreed that a project should be undertaken to allow the exchanging of historic and cultural information relating to both counties.
This innovative project enables people from all over the world to learn about the heritage and culture of both Carlow and Carlow through an interesting and easy-to-use website
Traditionally, museums have been the focus/gathering point of the culture of a community as they have collected, displayed and interpreted artifacts that tell some aspect of the history of that area. That mission is no less relevant today than it has been in the past and with the rapid development of information technologies means that some of the difficulties that museums have had in achieving their aims can be overcome.
Both Councils sees the creation of the Cultural Xchange as a means by which many items which form part of each county's cultural heritage can be shared throughout the whole community whilst remaining in the ownership of the individual or organisation to whom they belong. Using the latest technologies, the project is about accessing and preserving, for both current/ future use, digital records of many elements of the history and culture of counties Carlow and Carlow.
Interreg IIIA Programme
This project has been funded through the European Union’s Interreg IIIA Programme under the project name the Cultural Exchange Project, reference numbers 55466 / 55465 / 55960. Further funding for the project came from Carlow County Council, Carlow Town Council and Carlow County Council.
The INTERREG IIIA Programme is a community initiative which promotes cross-border, transnational and inter-regional co-operation in the European Union and its border regions. INTERREG IIIA supports joint Irish/Welsh projects with the aim of promoting the sustainable development of the cross-border region through an integrated approach to economic, social and environmental development.
For further information on the Interreg IIIA Programme go to www.interreg.ie
interreg Cultural Xchange Project
The development of this website is the culmination of the Cultural Xchange project. Over the course of the project most of Carlow County Museum’s collection has been digitised and over time will be added to and updated to this website. Also the Museum worked closely with a number of local and national companies, organisations, groups and individuals to digitise part or all of their collections. Again the results of which are used throughout this website.
Also, the Museum has developed a number of “Discover Packs”. This is based on the Carlow Museum Service “Discovery Box”. The pack contains a number of digitised images form the Museum collection. The images are either copies of original images, photographs, paintings, drawings etc or images of artefacts. The Packs are based around themes such as industry, streetscapes, sports, old ways etc. Initially these have been circulated to local hospitals and nursing homes and in due course they will be offered to primary schools.
Training
As part of the Cultural Xchange project Carlow County Museum offered basic and advanced computer training courses. These courses took place in the Carlow Rural Information Services Project (C.R.I.S.P.) Computer Training Centres which are located in Borris, Carlow Town, Hacketstown, Myshall & in the Tullow Civic Offices. Carlow Rural Information Services Project aims to provide an online information resource for the communities it serves, through community web pages and links to web sites of local, regional and national relevance.
These training courses allowed members of the public to be come involved in the project, firstly to allow those who had little or no computer experience to become familiar with computer basics thus allowing them to access this site. Secondly, in a follow on advanced computer course the participants submitted their own articles of local history and folklore for inclusion on this site. All courses ran for between eight and ten weeks and a choice of day and night time courses were offered.
During the advanced course there were a number of workshops organised to assist the participants in developing their articles. Sean Hardie, former Carlow Writer in Residence held two workshops on creative writing. Sean has a wealth of experience having worked for ten years as a journalist and documentary maker for BBC television. After a period as Head Of Entertainment for BBC Scotland he moved to Ireland to concentrate on writing and since then he has published three well-received novels. Sean under took collective group work as well as giving individual advice.
Photo Caption: Project Training Workshop: (L to R) Sean Hardie, Workshop Facilitator, Mary O’Gorman, Dale O’Neill, Mary Walsh & Dan Carbery. Photo: Carlow County Museum.
Carlow County Library facilitated a special evening visit to their Local Studies Room. This room contains a wide variety of material on all aspects of local history, folklore, archaeology and old newspapers. A number of the participants hadn’t availed of this service before but all did in the completion of their article.
Project Staffing
Project Coordinator: Data Editor: Data Capturer:
Dermot Mulligan, Richard Murray James Egan
Photo Caption:
Project Meeting, March 2006 at Browneshill Dolmen. : (L to R) James Egan, Owen Roberts, Mark Thomas, Charlotte New, Richard Murray, David Loughlin and Dermot Mulligan. Photo: Carlow County Museum
