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Arcadia

Arcadia serves humanity by preserving endangered cultural heritage and ecosystems.

We protect complexity and work against the entropy of ravaged and thereby starkly simplified natural environments and globalized cultures. Innovation and change occur best in already complex systems. Once memories, knowledge, skills, variety, and intricacy disappear – once the old complexities are lost – they are hard to replicate or replace. Arcadia aims to return to people both their memories and their natural surroundings. What we want to preserve remains fragile, small and dispersed. But if we do not protect it – if it vanishes forever – then future generations will have no base from which to build a vibrant, resilient, green future.

Because knowledge should belong to all, we also promote open access, seeking to make information available without barriers of cost or distance. Charities, businesses, universities, schools, the media, politicians, and citizens all benefit when research and data are no longer locked behind paywalls or reserved for those who live near their repositories. The economy benefits too from better-informed decisions, improved schooling and knowledgeable citizens, from enhanced academic research and innovation based on shared knowledge.

We do not accept applications, but seek and support organizations run by exceptional individuals, operating in a cost-effective, scientifically sound, and ethical manner that share our vision.

Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin

Funder Website

Arcadia Projects

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Endangered Languages Documentation Programme

To establish a grants programme that funds projects to document endangered languages and to train linguists in documentation methods. The digitized materials are available for…

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Endangered Archives Programme

To establish a grants programme that funds projects to digitize neglected, vulnerable or inaccessible archives generally older than the mid-twentieth century. The digitized ma…

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UCLA Library Digitization

To digitize vulnerable collections in UCLA's library and make them available for free online; to digitize ephemera through the open-access Collecting Los Angeles project.

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Dead Sea Scrolls Online Database

To develop resources related to the Dead Sea Scrolls including bibliography, transcriptions of the text, translations and commentaries from experts and make them available for…

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Digitization of Manuscripts in the Middle East and Africa

To digitize endangered manuscripts in libraries in the Middle East, Africa and India and to make them available for free online.

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Institute for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage

This project aims to build a new cultural conservation and digitization centre at Yale University.

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International Digital Ephemera Project

To collect, digitize and preserve printed ephemera from the early history of modern Israel and make them available for free online.

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TARA image project

To preserve and curate the Trust for African Rock Art's (TARA) photographic archive of more than 20,000 images, and make it available for free online.

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Preserving Bhutan's Cultural Heritage

This project aims to document the oral traditions of Bhutan and make the records available for free online.

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