Usage rights
What is published on EWA is not free of rights. Every item remains the property of the community that entrusted it to us. This page says what you may do with it — and what you may not.
Three levels of access
Public — open to all, under the conditions set out below.
Restricted — available on reasoned request: researchers, teachers, partner institutions. The originating community approves or refuses each request.
Community-only — reserved for members of the community that entrusted the material. This content exists in the archive but is neither indexed nor visible in any public search.
The access level is set by the community, not by us, and may be changed at any time.
What you may do freely
On public content, without asking us for anything:
- view, listen, watch;
- quote an extract in research, an article or a dissertation, provided you credit the person and their community;
- screen it in an educational or non-profit setting, with no ticket charge;
- share a link to the original page.
What requires written permission
- any commercial use, direct or indirect — including a film, a book or a paying exhibition;
- any modification, re-editing, published translation, or reuse of extracts in a new work;
- any intellectual-property filing covering the item or a piece of knowledge it describes — patent, trademark, plant variety right;
- automated extraction of the site, including for the purpose of training an artificial-intelligence system.
These permissions are not granted by EWA alone. We pass the request on; the decision belongs to the community concerned, and a refusal does not have to be explained.
How to cite
Name of the person (community, place), “title of the record”, EWA — Human Legacy, year, page address, accessed on [date].
Where the person has asked to remain anonymous, cite the community alone. Never replace a name with “local source” or “native informant”: that erasure is precisely what this project exists to undo.
Cultural labels
Some items carry a usage label defined by the community itself (a TK Label). It has no legal force: it states the cultural rule attached to the knowledge — seasonal use, reserved for women or for men, non-commercial, or not to be shared outside the community. We ask you to respect it as you would respect a contractual clause.
Requesting permission
Describe the intended use, its duration, its medium and its audience. We pass the request to the community concerned and reply within a reasonable time.
These conditions do not replace the rights recognised to Indigenous peoples over their cultural heritage and traditional knowledge. Where the two conflict, those rights prevail.