By Sarah Thompson, W&M Libraries
W&M Libraries has launched a new digital project that translates and makes available a collection of Judeo-Arabic poems. The project is led by Jonathan Glasser, associate professor of anthropology and director of the Asian & Middle Eastern Studies Program.
Written down in Hebrew script by members of the Algerian city of Oran’s Jewish community during the seventeenth century, these Arabic songs were integrated into Jewish worship, where they were woven together with Hebrew para-liturgical texts to form long musical suites called a țarīq or path.
The manuscript of these poems is housed in the Bodleian Libraries at the University of Oxford. Unless you can get to the Bodleian Libraries, understand Hebrew characters and Arabic, most people will not be able to read the poems. Glasser wanted the poems to be more accessible.
He began transcribing them in 2016. In 2018, he organized a one-day workshop in Oran to share the document with colleagues there and to explore ways to understand the poems and their context. In 2023, with funding from the W&M Reves Center for International Studies, Glasser organized a ten-day collaborative research trip to Oxford to finalize transcriptions and translations in conversation with Algerian colleague.
When he returned, he pursued the idea of building a website to visualize the manuscript and its translations. His W&M colleague Ayfer Karakaya-Stump referred him to the librarians.
“I wanted to make the manuscript accessible and as straightforward as possible,” Glasser said. “The libraries were the best place to figure out how to do that.”
Glasser reached out to Deborah Cornell, Head of Digital Services, about creating a site. From there, a team of staff provided him with ideas that could serve his project well. Applications Administrator Justin Dalton worked on building the site. Publishing & Open Access Librarian Rosie Liljenquist secured rights to images of the manuscript from the Bodleian with support from the Open Access fund and advised publishing and copyright. Instruction & Research Librarian Rachel Hogan managed the project as the digital humanities liaison.
“At W&M Libraries, we’re trying to expand the ways that faculty scholarship can be highlighted, sometimes in non-traditional ways,” Hogan said. “This project is a great example of how open access and digital humanities publishing can enhance a project using creative tools.”
The project site was published on September 16th. Glasser shared the project with his friends and colleagues, especially those residing in Algeria. While he is happy with the published product, he says it’s still a work in progress.
“Parts of the manuscript were left out, so I want to continue fiddling with the project” he said. “My hope is that what is published can start conversations and develop a knowledge sharing space.”
While there is not a comment section on the site, people may contact Glasser directly with commentary, which he encourages viewers to do.
Glasser said that working on this project was a challenge, but it made him excited to use the expertise of the people at W&M Libraries and to think of different ways research projects can be presented.
“I’ve only been here a year and I’ve seen digital humanities pop up more and more on campus,” Hogan said. “We want to increase faculty knowledge and curiosity about digital projects, so we can bring their visions to fruition.”
W&M Libraries is eager to collaborate with faculty on digital projects that bring their unique and important research to light. Judeo-Arabic Love Poems demonstrates how innovative partnerships between researchers and library experts broaden access to and enhance creativity for important digital scholarship.