Ten Years of the Sunjata Project in Unama’ki/Cape Breton

This article summarizes the methods and concepts of the Sunjata Project in collaborative, practice-based, community-engaged ethnomusicology, and describes some further collaborative interventions it has nurtured over the subsequent decade. Situating the project within its community and academic contexts, the article reflects on the Sunjata Project within the larger scope of the Singing Storytellers Project and its multifaceted approach of using transformative education and community engagement to raise awareness, develop capacities in, and celebrate cultural diversity in Cape Breton and beyond. This collaborative dynamic facilitated creative processes that produced critically informed work through a variety of media and artistic practices, and encouraged interdisciplinary, socially-engaged arts practices among collaborative teams. These relationships, rooted in practice-based arts-creation, are critical to the longevity and sustainability of the Singing Storytellers, Sunjata Project and other such community-oriented projects dedicated to the sharing of knowledge between diverse communities across the globe through the development of educational programs, events, and varieties of media.