We present an ab initio method to calculate phonon-assisted absorption and emission spectra in the presence of strong excitonic effects. We apply the method to bulk hexagonal BN, which has an indirect band gap and is known for its strong luminescence in the UV range. We first analyze the excitons at the wave vector q[over ¯] of the indirect gap. The coupling of these excitons with the various phonon modes at q[over ¯] is expressed in terms of a product of the mean square displacement of the atoms and the second derivative of the optical response function with respect to atomic displacement along the phonon eigenvectors. The derivatives are calculated numerically with a finite difference scheme in a supercell commensurate with q[over ¯]. We use detailed balance arguments to obtain the intensity ratio between emission and absorption processes. Our results explain recent luminescence experiments and reveal the exciton-phonon coupling channels responsible for the emission lines.