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This project found its genesis in a request by the Historic
Preservation Office of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands
to create a compendium of German colonial literature on the Mariana Islands.
Funding for the project was provided from the Northern Mariana Islands
Council for the Humnaities and the U.S. National Park Service.
It was envisaged that as many articles
and books on the German colonial period as possible would be copied, indexed
and furnished with a summary in English. In that regard the project was
similar to a project previously carried out for the Republic of the Marshall
Islands in 1998. In total, the compendium contains 1588 entries with copied
material exceeding 11,400 pages. Its bibliography, together with additions
and deletions, forms the foundation for the present publication. The material
has been reorganised here into major categories. The bibliography has
been generated using ProCite 5.0 for Macintosh. The material for the compendium
was collected in December 2001 and January 2002. A bound set of photocopies
was produced in 2003. An annotated bibliography was published by the CNMI
Historic Preservation Office in 2004: Dirk H. R. Spennemann An Annotated
Bibliography of German Language Sources on the Mariana Islands. Saipan,
Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands : Division of Historic Preservation,
342 pp.
This on-line version is a logical continuation of the original
copying project. By placing the files in pdf format on a server, it become
feasible to make this unique collection of resources available to the wider
public. The project was derived from the demand for printed copies of the
compilation, with expressions of interest from various libraries in Micronesia
as well as overseas. As the supply of cloth-bound sets of hard copies is
both expensive and laborious, it was decided to create a digital library
and attach it to the already existing Digital
Library and Archive of the Marshalll Islands (http://marshall.csu.edu.au).
Given the size of the documents scanned
in, it is invetiable that several of the pdf files are large. Where the
files are larger than 5mb, a warning noctice has been added to the download
option.
The project was made possible through
the cooperation of a number of persons who made their resources or their
expertise available during the initial data collection period: Ms. Jutta
Billig (Librarian, Museum f¸r V–lkerkunde, Berlin); Mr. Lon Bulgrin (CNMI
Historic Preservation Office, Saipan); Mr. Alfred Estermann (Librarian,
Stadt- und Universit”tsbibliothek, Frankfurt am Main); Ms. Anne Heimboldt
(Librarian, Museum f¸r V–lkerkunde, Hamburg); Peter Junge (Scientific
Assistant, Đberseemuseum, Bremen); Dr. Antje Kelm (Section Head Oceania,
Museum f¸r V–lkerkunde, Hamburg); Mr. Karl-Heinz and Ms. Gudrun M–ller
(Frankfurt); Prof. Dr. Joachim G. Piepke (Director, Anthropos Institut,
Sankt Augustin); Ms. Elisabeth Quenstedt (Librarian, Museum f¸r V–lkerkunde,
Hamburg); Brother Ephrem Rapp (Missionsprokur, Kapuziner M–nche, M¸nster);
Mr. Scott Russell (CNMI Historic Preservation Office, later CNMI Humanities
Council, Saipan); Prof. Dr. Schindelbeck (Museum f¸r V–lkerkunde, Berlin);
Ms. Eleonore Schmitt (Librarian, Frobenius Institute, Frankfurt); Ms.
Marianne Striedter (Librarian, Frobenius Institute, Frankfurt); Ms. Andrea
Steffen (Hessisches Landesmuseum, Darmstadt); Ms. Angelika Str¸gel (Librarian,
Steyler Missionswissenschaftliches Institut, Sankt Augustin); Dr. Irmtraud
Wolke-Renk (Koloniales Bildarchiv, Stadt- und Universit”tsbibliothek,
Frankfurt am Main).
Jane Downing (Albury) commented on
an earlier draft of the paper version of the bibliography and provided
editorial assistance, which is gratefully acknowledged. Genevieve Cabrera
(CNMI Historic Preservation Office, Saipan) saw the publication through
the production process in Saipan
The realisation of the on-line project
was only possible through the support of Charles
Sturt University, who considers such activities part of its relationship
with its host communities and its emphasis on regional engagement. I am
very much indebted to Belinda Winkley and Lynne Lawrence from the Learning
Materials Center at Charles
Sturt University, Wagga Wagga Campus, who kindly agreed to scan over
11,500 pages at times when they were less busy with the normal production
work. Without their untiring efforts this would not have been possible.
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