Ethnological documents of the Department and Museum of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley, 1875-1958

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Summary

Abstract:
The Ethnological Documents of the Department and Museum of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley, is composed of 216 separate collections of varying size, spanning the period 1875 to 1958, with the exception of a Quiché Maya manuscript leaf, dating from the 17th Century. The collection is comprised of manuscripts, field notes, and other linguistic, ethnographic and ethnobotanical documents, including card files, newsclippings, genealogical tables, charts, maps, drawings, photographs, as well as some original microfilm. Some of the data was gathered by Berkeley anthropology graduate students for the Culture Element Distribution Survey, under the direction of Alfred L. Kroeber. Many of the manuscripts contain notations in Kroeber's hand. The documents were transferred from the Robert H. Lowie Museum of Anthropology (now the Phoebe Apperson Hearst Museum of Anthropology) to The Bancroft Library in 1970.
Extent:
Microfilm: 139 reels Number of containers: 93 boxes, 14 oversize folders Linear feet: 36
Language:
Collection materials are in English

Background

Scope and content:

The Ethnological Documents of the Department and Museum of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley, is composed of 216 separate collections of varying size, spanning the period 1875 to 1958, with the exception of a Quiché Maya manuscript leaf, dating from the 17th Century. The collection is comprised of manuscripts, field notes, and other linguistic, ethnographic and ethnobotanical documents, including card files, newsclippings, genealogical tables, charts, maps, drawings, photographs, as well as some original microfilm. Some of the data was gathered by Berkeley anthropology graduate students for the Culture Element Distribution Survey, under the direction of Alfred L. Kroeber. Many of the manuscripts contain notations in Kroeber's hand. The documents were transferred from the Robert H. Lowie Museum of Anthropology (now the Phoebe Apperson Hearst Museum of Anthropology) to The Bancroft Library in 1970.

As originally described in Dale Valory's 1971 Guide to Ethnological Documents (1-203) of the Department and Museum of Anthropology, University of California Berkeley, the collection is particularly rich in cultural and linguistic information about California Indians. Noteworthy documents include Pliny E. Goddard's notes and manuscripts on California Athabaskan (Na Dené) languages, as well as Edward Sapir's celebrated work with Ishi, the last speaker of Yahi, and on other Yanan languages. The work of Thomas T. Waterman on the Yurok, Diegueño and Yana languages is well represented, as is that of Paul L. Faye on the Cupeño and Philip S. Sparkman on the Luiseño languages. There is a substantial quantity of Edward W. Gifford's much sought-after field notes and manuscripts concerning linguistic groups from throughout California. Documentation of several Paiute languages and cultures figures prominently in the notebooks compiled by Frederick S. Hulse and Frank J. Essene, which are unusual in that Native Americans were sometimes employed to record as well as to supply information. Also worth noting are Abraham M. Halpern's Pomo-Patwin field notes, and the myths, tales and vocabulary collected by Waterman, Charles F. Voegelin and Erminie Wheeler-Voegelin from Tubatulabal informants. There are many smaller yet still significant collections, including information on Nisenan and other Maidu languages, recorded during the brief anthropological career of Hugh W. Littlejohn.

In addition to California languages, the Ethnological Documents Collection also contains linguistic and cultural information from other parts of the country, as well as from abroad. Examples include the seminal work on the Tohono O'Odham language of Arizona by Juan Dolores and Kroeber; Halpern's detailed Yuma linguistic and Papago ethnographic notes; William W. Elmendorf's lengthy Twana and Skokomish field notes; Ronald L. Olson's papers on the Kwakiutl and Tlingit; and Waterman's research on the tribes of the Puget Sound region. From further afield come John Garvan's manuscripts on linguistics and ethnology from the Philippine Islands, as well as documentation of Gifford's work in Oceania.

Since the appearance of Valory's Guide in 1971, the Ethnological Documents Collection has doubled in size. Recent additions to the collection include over 100 field notebooks, containing interviews with Pomo, Wailaki, Nomlaki, Konkow, Yuki, Maidu, Paiute, and Lone Pine Shoshoni informants, which were conducted under the auspices of the United States Works Projects Administration and the California State Employment Relief Administration during the 1930s. Some of these notebooks are remarkable for the level of detail of the information. More recently, multiple drafts of The Sparkman Grammar of Luiseño have been transferred from the Albert L. Kroeber Papers (BANC MSS C-B 925) and added to Sparkman's extensive documentation of the grammar and vocabulary of the Luiseño. Manuscripts on the culture and language of the Yurok and the Diegueño also have been transferred to the Ethnological Documents Collection from the Kroeber Papers. Two late additions to the collection are Arden R. King's field notes on the Mountain (Northeast) Maidu and Gifford's notes on the Karok. The collection's expanded size has been caused in part by careful conservation work and improved housing of documents, including the mylar encapsulation of fragile documents, and the creation of custom-sized acid-free boxes for fragile items.

The final part of the finding aid consists of four indices, three of which were provided by Valory. The Index of Authors [and Compilers] (I) has been updated to reflect recent additions to the collection. Further expanding and enriching access to the holdings of the Ethnological Documents Collection is a newly-created Index of Informants (II), with over 2,200 names. This new index augments Dale Valory's original Author-Persons Index, which had excluded the names of Native American consultants. The Index of Linguistic and Tribal Names (III) has been modernized to show current as well as historic names. The Subject Index (IV) has been left as Valory created it. The finding aid concludes with Valory's bibliography of works cited.

Biographical / historical:

This Guide represents the culmination of some five years' work by the compiler which was initiated in December, 1965. In excess of 50,000 pages of manuscripts and field notes, and thousands of plates and photographs, were sorted, researched, indexed and archived in a decimal system. In 1957-1958, A. L. Kroeber had compiled the first catalog of Museum manuscripts, then numbering but thirty-nine. Beside these relatively few items remained an enormous quantity of collections stored then in the mezzanine of the Anthropology Library of Kroeber Hall. In 1967, Kroeber's list was augmented and edited by the writer, and was then published (Kroeber and Valory 1967) to initiate knowledge of the collection's existence in the academic community at large.

In 1969, a joint committee of Department of Anthropology faculty and Lowie Museum staff met and decided to accept an offer by the University Archives to absorb the collections. By this time, in excess of 150 of the collections had been archived, and their value was becoming known to scholars throughout the United States; numerous scholars came to Berkeley thereafter to examine and utilize the mainly unpublished sources. The lack of adequate facilities to store and use the collections, however, severely hampered this activity, and the Department/Museum "Archives" had merely unofficial status.

The accumulation of these collections began as early as the Department of Anthropology itself (1901), and the Guide, together with the important endnotes, is in itself a meandering history of both the Department and of the course and development of ethnology in California. The collections are significant mainly for their relevance to North American Indian--and California Indian in particular--studies, although there are as well significant Pacific collections. Notable among the archival items are the collections of works by P. E. Goddard, E. W. Gifford, to some extent those of A. L. Kroeber and T. T. Waterman. The private correspondence and scientific papers of A. L. Kroeber and R. H. Lowie are not a part of this collection and are now located in The Bancroft Library. Department and Museum official correspondence to 1958 was also shifted to the University Archives in 1969.

The ethnological documents of the Department and Museum are now available for use to serious scholars, and individuals interested in them should contact the University Archivist, for rules respecting the examination and reproduction of the contents. As a courtesy, permission for citation or publication, in part or in whole, of the collections should be secured, in writing, in advance from the authors where living. In many cases, living authors' addresses can be obtained from either the Lowie Museum files or from the Department of Anthropology in Kroeber Hall; authorization for the use of the collections per se is not necessary on the part of the Museum or Department, however. The University Archivist has sole authority in this matter.

It is hoped that in years to come, the collections now in the University Archives will be utilized to their capacity, as fresh field sources and opportunities for research on traditional cultures of North American Indian societies are swiftly drying up, and the domain of historical Indian civilizations is slipping into the realm of paleoanthropology, and the traditional American Indian is disappearing. As this phenomenon increasingly becomes the general rule, scholars will turn ever increasingly in kind to library and archival sources for new insight and data, and such collections as those in the Archives will gain new and deeper significance.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The writer is grateful to many individuals who responded to queries during the researching of the collections. I would like to especially acknowledge the assistance of the following persons: Mr. Robert Pfeiffer, Anthropology Librarian; Dr. V. K. Golla of George Washington University; Dr. John Rowe, Dr. Robert Heizer, Dr. J. N. Anderson, the late Dr. T. D. McCown, Dr. N. H. H. Graburn, and Dr. Alan Dundes of the University of California, Berkeley; Dr. William Bright and Dr. Harry Hoijer of the University of California, Los Angeles, Dr. Cora Du Bois of Harvard University; Dr. Catherine McClellan of the University of Wisconsin; Dr. T. S. Kauffman of the University of Pittsburg; Dr. Frank J. Essene of the University of Kentucky; Dr. F. S. Hulse of the University of Arizona; Mrs. Delila Gifford; Mrs. Theodora Kroeber-Quinn; Dr. A. B. Elsasser, Mr. Frank Norick, Mr. Gene Prince, and Miss S. R. Gudmundsen of the R. H. Lowie Museum of Anthropology; Dr. W. W. Elmendorf, Dr. J. H. Steward, Dr. Reo Fortune, Dr. C. D. Forde, Dr. Isabel T. Kelly, Dr. Julius Moshinsky, Dr. Shirley Silver, Mr. J. R. K. Kantor of the University Archives; and Dr. Margaret Mead of the American Museum of Natural History.

Berkeley, California
October 1971
[Dale Valory
Archeological Research Facility
Department of Anthropology
University of California at Berkeley
Berkeley, California]

Acquisition information:
The Ethnological Documents of the Department and Museum of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley, were transferred to The Bancroft Library from the Robert H. Lowie Museum of Anthropology (now the Phoebe Apperson Hearst Museum of Anthropology) in 1970. No additions are expected.
Physical location:
Many of the Bancroft Library collections are stored offsite and advance notice may be required for use. For current information on the location of these materials, please consult the Library's online catalog.
Rules or conventions:
Finding Aid prepared using Describing Archives: a Content Standard

Access and use

Location of this collection:
University of California, Berkeley, The Bancroft Library
Berkeley, CA 94720-6000, US
Contact:
510-642-6481
bancref-library@berkeley.edu
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