SAN DIEGO — Ever wonder what native American land you’re standing on?
In a newly launched app based in San Diego called Our Worlds, users are immersed into a virtual reality that takes them back thousands of years to explore the tribal land and culture.
With the Our Worlds app downloaded, you can point your phone at La Jolla Cove and learn it is Kumeyaay land.
“It works anywhere in the world, every single tribe is represented,” said Catherine Eng.
Eng is a Native American ally and the app's co-founder and Chief Technology Officer. She and Kilma Lattin developed the Our Worlds app in San Diego.
The iOS app allows users to explore Native American land and learn about the culture through virtual reality, holograms, and 3D augmented reality such as being inside a native boat.
When it identifies the indigenous territory, you can tap on phrases in native languages.
“We have the ability to put indigenous languages back in places where they belong,” said Eng.
There are stories from community and cultural leaders, doctors, tribal chiefs, elders and musicians who collaborated with the app developers.
“There are elders, they clearly have an incredible wealth of knowledge. How does that get passed down to the next generation? It's in environments like this, the sort of voice of the speaker,” said Eng.
The mobile-based geolocated immersive reality app to connect the rich tribal history with people.
“With Our Worlds, what people are able to do is from an outdoor place like Hawaii, Cove park, or Oceanside, or Ocean Beach, or Mission Valley or anywhere in San Diego (and the world), they can experience Native American culture outside,” said Kilma Lattin, Our Worlds Founder and CEO.
SANDAG reported San Diego County has the largest number of Native American tribes in the United States but the app is for all cultures around the world.
“Community doesn't just belong to Native Americans. Everyone is native from somewhere,” said Lattin.
Our Worlds is an award winning education tech app that won the South by Southwest Launch competition this year.
“We envision thousands of stories,” said Eng.
Rich tribal stories that can be told at each square mile.
“Using these emerging technologies is a wonderful way to comprehensively capture culture. When you talk about how in depth our platform is, really, it's a testament to how intricate and deep culture and civilizations can be,” said Lattin.
The app is currently on iOS but eventually will be on Android.
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