Planet Bethlehem is a platform for collecting and sharing resources related to Bethlehem and its remarkable history of global connectivity. For over 150 years, Bethlehemites have been travelling, trading and building communities all over the world. Today, around half a million people of Bethlehem origin reside in the Americas alone. Meanwhile, Bethlehem itself has developed a culture of openness and creativity, despite the problems it faces as a Palestinian city living under occupation. Planet Bethlehem was created in that same spirit of openness and creativity.
This site acts as the project's online archive, providing access to thousands of digital materials that have been catalogued and described by the Planet Bethlehem team. Many of the archive's materials have been donated by Bethlehem families in various parts of the world and we welcome further contributions. Please contact us if you're interested in sharing your Bethlehem stories or simply learning more about the project.
Core team:
Leila Sansour (co-director)
Leila is a film maker and campaigner from Bethlehem who founded the Open Bethlehem campagin. Her films include Jeremy Hardy vs the Israeli Army (2003) and Open Bethlehem (2014). The original idea for the Planet Bethlehem Archive came from the large collection of photos and old news reels she collected during her documentary film making in Bethlehem.
Jacob Norris (co-director)
Jacob is a historian of Palestine and the Middle East. He works as a lecturer at the University of Sussex and is currently completing a book about Bethlehem's emigration explosion in the late 19th century. He has also published several articles on Bethlehem, including on the "Real Bethlehem", the town's role in the creation of the global Arab diaspora, and Bethlehem's historic encounters with Catholic Europe.
Freja Howat (project archivist)
Freja carried out much of the initial cataloguing and digitisation of the Planet Bethlehem Archive, as well as the design of its infrastructure. She has worked on numerous archiving projects including the Making African Connections Digital Archive. She is currently doing a PhD at the University of Sussex on the decolonisation of Palestinian archiving.
Dimitris C. Papadopoulos (website developer)
Dimitris is a researcher, educator, and technologist working at the intersection of built and mediated environments for teaching, learning, and research. His research work focuses on space and landscape, borders and migration, memory, media, and materiality, with a regional focus on Greece and Southeast Europe.
He has been working with scholars, students, and practicioners on developing digital sholarship projects in different institutions, including, recently, Columbia University and the City University of New York. He is currently an instructional designer at the Teaching & Learning Lab, Rhode Island School of Design.
Partners:
Bethlehem University
Bethlehem University is working in collaboration with the Planet Bethlehem Archive in the digitisation of their oral history collection, which spans from the late Ottoman period to contemporary events. As a first stage of this collaboration we have digisted the digitisation of World War 1 materials which can be found in the "Bethlehem University Oral History" collection.
Open Bethlehem
Founded by Bethlehem film maker and campaigner Leila Sansour, Open Bethlehem is an organisation that promotes support for a free and flourishing Bethlehem. The Planet Bethlehem Archive includes collections of materials drawn from images, audio recordings and video footage compiled by Leila during the making of the Open Bethlehem film.
Centre for Cultural Heritage Preservation (CCHP)
CCHP is Bethlehem’s leading institution for preserving and restoring the city’s rich urban heritage. CCHP acts as consultants for the Planet Bethlehem Archive, providing research expertise as well as a physical base for the project's outreach activities in Bethlehem.
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
The Khayrallah Center fosters scholarship and public knowledge relating to the Lebanese diaspora and Middle Eastern migration more broadly. It publishes the journal Mashriq&Mahjar: the Journal of Middle East Migration Studies. The Center director, Prof Akram Khater, is impact advisor to the Planet Bethlehem Archive project, providing guidance on dissemination activities, particularly in the realm of education.
Funding:
Funding for the initial phase of collecting and documenting the archive's materials was provided by the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).
