MS 3898 Materials relating to Powellʹs alphabet for recording Indian languages
McGee, W J, 1853-1912
Boas, Franz, 1858-1942
Harrington, John Peabody, 1884-1961
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Folder 1: Powell to Whitney, July 17, 1877 (Copy) Whiteney to Powell, July 25, 1877 (Draft) Powell to Whitney, July 31, 1877 (Draft) List of vowel and consonant symbols, with definitions, from Whitney (so identified in George Gibb's hand--MCB); undated copy of draft of Whitneyʹs manuscript which is also in the Yale manuscripts. It was subsequently …
MS 7127 Joseph Simon's "Phonetic Alphabet" and related manuscripts
Harrington, John Peabody, 1884-1961
Includes printed explanation of Simon's writing system in hard cover, a transmittal letter to the Smithsonian Institution , an evaluation by John P. Harrington, and transmittal slips.
Robert Stanton Avery Papers
This finding aid was digitized with funds generously provided by the Smithsonian Institution Women's Committee.
MS 3095 Some results of a protracted analysis of human speech from a mechanical standpoint
Also a new phonetic alphabet consisting of geometrical figures based upon this analysis.
S. Colum Gilfillan Papers
Kranzberg, Melvin, Dr., 1917-1995
Gilfillan, Seabury Colum (college instructor)
The collection documents S. Colum Gilfillan, a charter member of the Society for the History of Technology (SHOT) in 1958 and his SHOT correspondence, particularly with Melvin Kranzberg.
Smithsonian Speech Synthesis History Project
National Museum of American History (U.S.)
The Smithsonian Speech Synthesis History Project, conducted by H. David Maxey from 1986 through 2002, created a collection of archival materials documenting the history and development of speech synthesis technology. Maxey collaborated with Dr. Bernard Finn, Elliot Sivowitch and Harold Wallace of the National Museum of American History's Division of Information, Technology, and Society.
Geoffrey N. O'Grady Papers
bulk 1957-1998
11.8 Linear feet (24 document boxes and 3 card file boxes)
This collection is comprised of the professional papers of linguistic anthropologist Geoffrey O'Grady. Included are research materials consisting of field notes and notebooks, correspondence, published and unpublished writings, annotated copies of other scholars' work, photographs, and sound recordings. The materials in this collection document O'Grady's career as a linguistic scholar …
MS 4800 James O. Dorsey papers
bulk 1870-1895
Reverend James Owen Dorsey (1848-1895) was a missionary and Bureau of American Ethnology ethnologist who conducted extensive research on Siouan tribes and languages.The papers of James Owen Dorsey comprise mostly ethnographic and linguistic materials on various tribes of the Siouan language family as well as tribes from Siletz Reservation in Oregon. These materials include texts and letters with interlineal translations; grammar notes; dictionaries; drawings; and his manuscripts. In addition, the collection contains Dorsey's correspondence, newspaper clippings, his obituaries, and reprints.
William A. Smalley papers
William A. Smalley (1923-1997) was a missionary and anthropological linguist. This collection mainly concerns his work with Hmong scripts and the Khmu' language and contains correspondence, notes, writings, reference materials, photographs, and sound recordings.
John Peabody Harrington papers
Harrington was a Bureau of American Ethnology ethnologist involved in the study of over one hundred American tribes. His speciality was linguistics. Most of the material concerns California, southwestern, northwestern tribes and includes ethnological, archeological, historical notes; writings, correspondence, photographs, sound recordings, biological specimens, and other types of documents. Also of concern are general linguistics, sign language, writing systems, writing machines, and sound recordings machines. There is also some material on New World Spanish, Old World languages. In addition, there are many manuscripts of writings that Harrington sketched, partially completed, or even completed but never published. The latter group includes not only writings about anthropological subjects but also histories, ranging from a biography of Geronimo to material on the history of the typewriter. The collection incorporates material of Richard Lynch Garner, Matilda Coxe Stevenson, and others. In his field work, Harrington seems sometimes to have worked within fairly firm formats, this especially being true when he was "rehearing" material, that is in using an informant to verify and correct the work of other researchers. Often, however, the interviews with informants (and this seems to have been the case even with some "rehearings") seem to have been rather free form, for there is a considerable intertwining of subjects. Nevertheless, certain themes frequently appear in his work, including annotated vocabularies concerning flora and fauna and their use, topography, history and biography, kinship, cosmology (including tribal astronomy), religion and philosophy, names and observations concerning neighboring tribes, sex and age division, material culture, legends, and songs. The fullness of such materials seems to have been limited only by the time Harrington had to spend with a goup and the knowledge of his informants.
