•  Diversity is precious
•  Culture is experienced and enacted, i.e. lived , it can't be preserved like an artefact
•  Cultures are not static, they evolve
•  Stories are the essence of a culture
•  Once the stories are no longer re-told,
the culture is dead
•  The communities must own the process and its pace
•  Bottom-up, not top-down
•  Outsiders can facilitate - bringing in a global perspective and extracting general principles and developing digital tools which can help nurture other minority cultures

Oral heritage and the importance of story telling  

Stories are the essence of a culture. For indigenous peoples they inspire, offer analogies, teach practical skills and an understanding of how to live in fragile or hostile environments. Furthermore, the recounting of myths and narratives are vital for maintaining ethnic identity and group solidarity. Stories have social functions, representing the collective memory of the people, combining the past with the present and attaching meaning to space and time. They encapsulate the deeper beliefs and values of a culture, promoting role models, ways of living, behaving and believing. In summary, storytelling is at the heart of social life, personal and cultural identity. Once the stories are no longer re-told, the culture is indeed dead.

Nurturing internal dialogue and self-determined growth  

Culture and tools or technologies evolve inter-dependently. New practices or potent Western media and inappropriate digital tools are brought in by development initiatives to improve the basic living conditions. Ironically however, too often these destroy the older culture by promoting instant gratification, excluding the elders or disadvantaging the oral heritage, instead propagating a written majority culture. Self-determined development springs from having the time and the means for internal debate based on a self-awareness of identity, the traditional way of life and values in the face of external opportunities and threats. Narrative can be the tool to guide a group's development and the cultural choices they face. In other words, the reinterpretation of folklore is important for shaping the cultures of the future.