Google has announced its partnership with Pan-Atlantic University based in Lagos to launch the first Nigerian historical archive on the Google Cultural Institute, an online platform created by the search giant to ‘help preserve and promote culture online.’

According to Google, the Google Cultural Institute was established in 2010 with the objective of helping to preserve and promote culture online. The Institute is an effort to make important cultural material available and accessible to everyone and to digitally preserve it to educate and inspire future generations.

Google says that, “we believe that the Cultural Institute can be an especially useful way to engage students, scholars and teachers through innovative and interactive learning. To date, hundreds of museums, cultural institutions and archives have partnered with us to host some of their cultural treasures online.”

UNESCO estimates that half of 6,000 plus languages and cultures today will disappear by the end of this century if nothing is done to preserve them.

Nigeria’s Pan-Atlantic University presents its collection of rare historical documents and photographs spanning 1851 through 1914 that tell the story of Nigeria’s formation as a colony.

The second exhibition traces the transformation of Lagos from a cosmopolitan colonial trading centre to West Africa’s largest metropolis.

Lagos, one of the largest cities in Nigeria, is built on a dense network of islands and waterways and is estimated by Google to be the seventh fastest-growing metropolis in the world.