Authentication of indigenous archives

Organisations, communities, families, and individuals that are in control of the conceptualised, recontextualised, and reconstructed indigenous archives such as family praises, rock art paintings, and murals may need guidance on how to safeguard the trustworthiness, reliability, authenticity, integrity, and immutability of such memory. This chapter will look at how the identified indigenous archives are authenticated traditionally. Furthermore, archival principles and disruptive technologies such as blockchain technology are explored to see if they can be used to authenticate these records. The chapter concludes by arguing that some indigenous archives are authenticated through corroboration and witness accounts, as is the case with blockchain technology. This is so because information in oral history is shared in the natural setting, where there are witnesses that act as chains. Theories such as archival diplomatics should be explored to see how they could be used to authenticate other forms of indigenous records, such as rock art paintings, as these have embedded structures aimed at communicating information.