Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Documenting African Food as Intangible Cultural Heritage in Wali Language (ID: 23424696)/Final Report
Application type: Standard application
Part 1: Project and impact
1. Describe the implemented activities and results achieved. Additionally, share which approaches were most effective in supporting you to achieve the results. (required)
The project was executed through a highly focused training and content generation strategy aimed at increasing the volume and quality of content related to African food culture on Wikimedia platforms, specifically within the emerging Wali language community.
Hybrid Training Session Organization:
A foundational training workshop was organized with both in-person and remote participation.
Content Focus: The training curriculum was split into two main areas: Wikipedia editing skills (syntax, citing sources, article structure) and Wikimedia Commons best practices (uploading high-quality images, categorization, licensing).
Target Audience: Participants included members of the Wali Wikimedians Community, members of the WAALEE BAABO Association, and local linguistic and cultural experts.
In-Person Focus: The core in-person sessions focused on practical, hands-on editing and immediate, customized feedback, which proved crucial for skill transfer.
Content Generation Focus:
Participants were guided through the process of creating new Wikipedia articles focused on African Food as Intangible Cultural Heritage, with a specific emphasis on traditional Waala and other Ghanaian dishes.
A parallel effort was made to capture and upload high-resolution images of the documented foods, ingredients, preparation methods, and consumption rituals to Wikimedia Commons.
Quality Control: Linguists and experienced Wikimedians reviewed initial drafts to ensure linguistic accuracy in the Wali language and adherence to Wikipedia’s Neutral Point of View (NPOV) and notability guidelines.
The most effective approach was the in-person trainings where participants collaborated and shared knowledge.
2. Documentation of your impact. Please use space below to share links that help tell your story, impact, and evaluation. (required)
Share links to:
- Project page on Meta-Wiki or any other Wikimedia project
- Dashboards and tools that you used to track contributions
- Some photos or videos from your event. Remember to share access.
You can also share links to:
- Important social media posts
- Surveys and their results
- Infographics and sound files
- Examples of content edited on Wikimedia projects
1. Project page on Meta-Wiki: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Event:Documenting_African_Food_as_Intangible_Cultural_Heritage_in_Wali_Language
2. Outreach Dashboard: https://outreachdashboard.wmflabs.org/courses/Wali_Wikimedians_Community/Documenting_African_Food_as_Intangible_Cultural_Heritage_in_Wali_Language
Photos of event 3. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Workshop_0128.jpg 4. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Workshop_0126.jpg 5. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Workshop_0125.jpg 6. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Workshop_0124.jpg 7. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Workshop_0123.jpg 8. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Workshop_0122.jpg 9. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Workshop_0121.jpg 10. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Workshop_0114.jpg 11. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Workshop_012.jpg 12. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Workshop_011.jpg
Videos of event 13. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHIhHsTlDjg 14. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUSdiUb3q-c 15. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDmGuSoj9_E
Social media posts 16. https://www.facebook.com/61564242640566/posts/122168176178474754/?mibextid=rS40aB7S9Ucbxw6v 17. https://www.facebook.com/61564242640566/posts/122168077280474754/?mibextid=rS40aB7S9Ucbxw6v 18. https://www.facebook.com/61564242640566/posts/122164513388474754/?mibextid=rS40aB7S9Ucbxw6v 19. https://x.com/waliwikimedians/status/1966266547833548918?t=HQqz0C6OXAMeQIJnglzA4A&s=09 20. https://www.linkedin.com/posts/waali-wikimedians-community_documenting-african-foods-in-wali-language-activity-7372224813404278784-ZWvR?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_android&rcm=ACoAAEKVhzsBP8JPVl-UESiDmZfAIQqpMDUNJdw
Examples of content edited on Wikimedia projects: 21. 172 images of African foods uploaded (Category:Afɩrɩka Paalʋʋ Sɩmɩhɩ): https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Af%C9%A9r%C9%A9ka_Paal%CA%8B%CA%8B_S%C9%A9m%C9%A9h%C9%A9
22. Example of Wikipedia article: https://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/wlx/Fried_plantain 23:https://incubator.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wp/wlx/Amala_(food)&veaction=edit
Additionally, share the materials and resources that you used in the implementation of your project. (required)
For example:
- Training materials and guides
- Presentations and slides
- Work processes and plans
- Any other materials your team has created or adapted and can be shared with others
The following materials and resources were utilized and/or adapted for the implementation of the project on documenting African Food in the Wali language:
Training and Instructional Materials, Presentations and Slides (Wali/English): Developed customized slides for beginner and intermediate editors, covering Wikipedia editing and image licensing requirements for Commons.
Wali Language Editing Guide: A quick-reference handout translated into Wali, focusing on local linguistic conventions and the correct usage of the unique Wali orthography (Waalɩɩ) during content creation.
Digital Platforms and Tools, Wikipedia (Wali Language): The primary platform for article creation and publication.
Wikimedia Commons: Used for uploading and categorization of all media (photos) documenting the food items and cultural practices.
Outreach Dashboard: Used for tracking participant contributions, articles created, and monitoring the success of the training metrics.
Zoom: Utilized to facilitate the "hybrid" nature of the training, allowing remote participation and live screen-sharing demonstrations for all attendees.
Equipment (Shared), Computers/Laptops
Internet Connectivity (for training venue)
Projector and Screen
3. To what extent do you agree with the following statements regarding the work carried out with this Rapid Fund? You can choose “not applicable” if your work does not relate to these goals. Required. Select one option per question. (required)
| A. Bring in participants from underrepresented groups | Strongly agree |
| B. Create a more inclusive and connected culture in our community | Strongly agree |
| C. Develop content about underrepresented topics/groups | Agree |
| D. Develop content from underrepresented perspectives | Agree |
| E. Encourage the retention of editors | Strongly agree |
| F. Encourage the retention of organizers | Strongly agree |
| G. Increased participants' feelings of belonging and connection to the movement | Strongly agree |
| F. Other (optional) |
Part 2: Learning
4. In your application, you outlined some learning questions. What did you learn from these learning questions when you implemented your project? How do you hope to use this learnings in the future? You can recall these learning questions below. (required)
You can recall these learning questions below: Through this project, we want to assess the following questions: i) To what extent does a community-led approach, utilizing in-person training and targeted edit-a-thons, effectively capture and digitize complex oral traditions and intangible cultural heritage (like foodways) on Wikimedia platforms? ii) How does a concentrated effort on a specific domain (African food heritage) in the Wali language impact the overall digital visibility, discoverability, and usage of Wali Wikipedia and related Wikimedia projects? iii) Does the creation of culturally relevant content like food traditions lead to increased engagement from both existing Wali speakers and broader global audiences? iv) How does participation in a project focused on cultural heritage influence participants' sense of ownership and pride in their language and culture on digital platforms? v) What are the primary cultural, technical, or logistical challenges encountered when documenting intangible cultural heritage, particularly food traditions, in a local language on Wikimedia?
This project aimed to assess the viability and impact of documenting intangible cultural heritage in a local Ghanaian language on Wikimedia platforms. The significant output of 200+ new Wali Wikipedia articles and 100+ images uploaded to Wikimedia Commons provided clear answers to our initial learning questions.
What We Learned from the Learning Questions:
i) Effectiveness of Community-Led Hybrid Approach:
Finding: The community-led, in-person training approach was overwhelmingly effective in capturing and digitizing complex oral traditions. Learning: Direct, localized training overcomes key barriers (technical literacy and orthographic consistency) necessary for documenting complex oral content like food recipes, which require detailed, step-by-step descriptions.
ii) Impact on Digital Visibility and Discoverability (Wali Wikipedia): Finding: The concentrated effort immediately increased the content depth of the Wali Wikipedia by focusing on a high-interest, specific domain (food). Learning: Domain-specific projects create a critical mass of related articles that improves the overall search engine optimization (SEO) and internal linking structure of the language Wikipedia, leading to better discoverability.
iii) Content Relevancy and Audience Engagement: Finding: We observed increased social media sharing and local community interest in the content generated. Learning: Content centered on tangible cultural markers (like food, which is universally appealing and rooted in daily life) acts as a powerful gateway, attracting both existing speakers and potentially broader global audiences interested in Ghanaian heritage.
iv) Influence on Participant Ownership and Pride: Finding: Participation fostered a strong sense of pride, particularly among youth who felt empowered to legitimize their language digitally. Learning: Actively documenting intangible heritage provides participants with evidence of their language’s value and relevance in the digital age, significantly boosting their motivation for future contributions and community ownership of the project.
v) Primary Challenges Encountered: Finding: The primary challenges were linguistic consistency (standardizing food names across different countries and communities) and technical logistics (securing high-quality images of hot, ready-to-eat dishes under time pressure). Learning: Future projects must include dedicated pre-project sessions for linguistic standardization and specialized photo documentation teams to manage the logistical complexity of cultural photography.
Future Application of Learnings: The successful methodology and the lessons learned from the challenges will be applied to future Wali Wikimedia initiatives:
Iterative Curriculum Design: We will formalize the content worksheets developed for this project into structured modules for future trainings, focusing on other aspects of intangible culture (e.g., traditional music, festivals, folklore).
Strategic Content Segmentation: We will continue to target high-impact, specific domains. Following food, the next domain will likely focus on traditional Waala architecture and building techniques to replicate the success in concentrated content creation and discoverability.
Enhanced Quality Control: The approach of integrating local linguists (WAALEE BAABO Association members) directly into the editing and review process will become the standard procedure to ensure all content adheres to high linguistic and cultural standards.
Community Recruitment: We will leverage the success stories and the positive visibility generated by the 200+ food articles to recruit more female participants, who often hold significant knowledge regarding food heritage and domestic cultural practices.
5. Did anything unexpected or surprising happen when implementing your activities? This can include both positive and negative situations. What did you learn from those experiences? (required)
During the implementation of the project, we experienced both a significant positive surprise and a notable challenge related to participant engagement and retention.
Positive Surprise: Overwhelming Elder and Community Support, The project saw participation far exceeding our initial targets, most surprisingly from the elders of the Wali-speaking communities. Their presence was not initially guaranteed or even fully anticipated in the numbers we received.
Impact: The participation of the elders had an immediate and profound effect on the young editors. It served as a powerful form of encouragement and validation, lending cultural authority and gravity to the project. The elders’ involvement was crucial in ensuring the accuracy of traditional knowledge being documented.
Learning: Cultural Endorsement is Key for Youth Engagement. Future projects must deliberately seek formal endorsement and active participation from community elders and traditional leaders. Their presence not only provides crucial cultural knowledge but also acts as the single most powerful incentive for younger generations to invest their time and effort into digital documentation efforts.
Challenge: Low Post-Workshop Retention While the attendance at the initial in-person workshop was excellent, the rate of continuous contribution (the number of participants who continued to practice and contribute regularly after the event) was lower than desired.
Impact: This means that the reliance on a few dedicated editors remains high, limiting the speed and volume of decentralized content creation, despite the high initial training investment.
Learning: Sustained Physical Engagement is Necessary. The motivation provided by the initial physical meeting wanes quickly once participants return to their separate lives and face technical difficulties alone. We confirm that the solution lies in ensuring more frequent physical engagement points (e.g., monthly mini-meetups or physical office hours) rather than relying solely on online follow-ups.
In the future, we will adjust our strategy and budget to:
Prioritize Physical Follow-up: We will budget for smaller, more frequent "Physical Practice Meetups" (instead of relying exclusively on one large workshop) to reinforce skills and sustain momentum among newly trained editors.
Formalize Elder Integration: We will integrate traditional community leaders into project reporting and evaluation to maintain their high level of endorsement and ensure they can continue to encourage young editors to practice their learned skills.
6. What is your plan to share your project learnings and results with other community members? If you have already done it, describe how. (required)
It is important to share the successful strategies and key learnings from the Documenting African Food as Intangible Cultural Heritage in Wali Language project to encourage replication and inspire other language communities.
Activities Already Completed or In Progress:
Drafting Wikimedia Diff Post (In Progress): We are currently preparing a comprehensive blog post for the Wikimedia Diff platform. This post will serve as the primary source for global community sharing.
Content Focus: The post will detail the breakthrough of creating over 200 new Wali Wikipedia articles on African food and 100+ of images of African foods uploaded onto commons, highlight the key learning that in-person training is the most effective approach for documenting complex oral traditions, and showcase the successful partnership between the Wali Wikimedians Community and the WAALEE BAABO Association.
Social Media Dissemination (Planned): Once the Diff post is finalized, excerpts, key results (e.g., the number of articles created), and links to the full post will be actively shared across our community's various social media channels (e.g., Facebook, Twitter/X, local WhatsApp groups).
Goal: To reach local Wali speakers and non-Wikimedians who are interested in cultural heritage but may not follow traditional Wikimedia channels.
Part 3: Metrics
7. Wikimedia Metrics results. (required)
In your application, you set some Wikimedia targets in numbers (Wikimedia metrics). In this section, you will describe the achieved results and provide links to the tools used.
| Target | Results | Comments and tools used | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Number of participants | 35 | 26 | Since there was re-adjustment to the budget after approval, the target participants was changed to 25. One In-person workshop was also organized which the approved funds can cater for.
Outreach Dashboard was used to track participation. https://outreachdashboard.wmflabs.org/courses/Wali_Wikimedians_Community/Documenting_African_Food_as_Intangible_Cultural_Heritage_in_Wali_Language |
| Number of editors | 35 | 12 | 12 out of the 25 targeted participation continued editing throughout the campaign. |
| Number of organizers | 5 | 5 | Each team member was given a role throughout the campaign. Each team diligently perform their duties throughout the project. |
| Wikimedia project | Target | Result - Number of created pages | Result - Number of improved pages |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wikipedia | |||
| Wikimedia Commons | 50 | 172 | 0 |
| Wikidata | 250 | 4 | 137 |
| Wiktionary | |||
| Wikisource | |||
| Wikimedia Incubator | 250 | 200 | 224 |
| Translatewiki | |||
| MediaWiki | |||
| Wikiquote | |||
| Wikivoyage | |||
| Wikibooks | |||
| Wikiversity | |||
| Wikinews | |||
| Wikispecies | |||
| Wikifunctions or Abstract Wikipedia |
8. Other Metrics results.
In your proposal, you could also set Other Metrics targets. Please describe the achieved results and provide links to the tools used if you set Other Metrics in your application.
| Other Metrics name | Metrics Description | Target | Result | Tools and comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
9. Did you have any difficulties collecting data to measure your results? (required)
No
9.1. Please state what difficulties you had. How do you hope to overcome these challenges in the future? Do you have any recommendations for the Foundation to support you in addressing these challenges? (required)
Part 4: Financial reporting
[edit]10. Please state the total amount spent in your local currency. (required)
16427
11. Please state the total amount spent in US dollars. (required)
1296.74
12. Report the funds spent in the currency of your fund. (required)
Provide the link to the financial report https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/10BhVdMlhXgYHUfr-QqqG5yDW0pUrRpSQZt-vj1RsyK8/edit?gid=928458698#gid=928458698
12.2. If you have not already done so in your financial spending report, please provide information on changes in the budget in relation to your original proposal. (optional)
We asked to re-adjust our activities after the approval of the project on the meta discuss which we did: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:Programs/Wikimedia_Community_Fund/Rapid_Fund/Documenting_African_Food_as_Intangible_Cultural_Heritage_in_Wali_Language_(ID:_23424696)
13. Do you have any unspent funds from the Fund?
No
13.1. Please list the amount and currency you did not use and explain why.
N/A
13.2. What are you planning to do with the underspent funds?
N/A
13.3. Please provide details of hope to spend these funds.
N/A
14.1. Are you in compliance with the terms outlined in the fund agreement?
Yes
14.2. Are you in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations as outlined in the grant agreement?
Yes
14.3. Are you in compliance with provisions of the United States Internal Revenue Code (“Code”), and with relevant tax laws and regulations restricting the use of the Funds as outlined in the grant agreement? In summary, this is to confirm that the funds were used in alignment with the WMF mission and for charitable/nonprofit/educational purposes.
Yes
15. If you have additional recommendations or reflections that don’t fit into the above sections, please write them here. (optional)