The Boma is in the process of renovating its attic space to be utilized as an archive and library, making documents relevant to Iringa’s culture and history available to interested researchers and the general public. The collections will include literature, historical records, and community testimonies in Swahili, English, German, and Hehe gathered by our researchers. These are to be made accessible in physical as well as digital formats. Further research will be used to expand and create new exhibits at the Iringa Boma, including the illustration of human evolution in Iringa, community documentations of Hehe folktales in Iringa, and aspects of colonial history and memory sharing. We expect to share the results of the different research projects with diverse heritage scholars and practitioners by hosting an international symposium in 2021.
The scholarly activities around Iringa Boma are supported by the Gerda Henkel Foundation.