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GUIDE TO THE UPPER TANANA LANGUAGE COLLECTION (1929-2003)
Alaska Native Language Archives
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Box 757680
Fairbanks, AK 99775
INFORMATION FOR RESEARCHERS
ADMINISTRATIVE INFORMATION
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
COLLECTION ORGANIZATION
COLLECTION SUMMARY:
Title: Upper Tanana Language Collection.
Extent: 5 manuscript boxes covering 2 linear feet.
Repository Location: Alaska Native Language Archive, 406 Brooks Building, University of Alaska Fairbanks. Please consult with the Alaska Native Language Center for information regarding the specific location of materials within the archive.
Forms of Material: The collection includes both original and photocopied manuscript and typescript documents comprised of academic research papers; fieldnotes, particularly pertaining to Upper Tanana phonology and verb forms; wordlists; ethnographic and traditional texts; and educational materials.
Languages: Collection languages are both Upper Tanana and English. Some documents offers Upper Tanana words in comparison to other Athabaskan languages in Alaska.
Abstract: All materials in the Upper Tanana collection are either written in or about the Upper Tanana language. The earliest documents date from the 1950s and 1960s and are largely the works of Paul and Trude Milaniwski of the Summer Institute of Linguistics; they include religious and educational texts and beginning dictionary work. Much of the collection dates from the mid- to late-1970s, with a focus on bilingual educational materials in the Upper Tanana language, much of which was published through the National Bilingual Materials Development Center in Anchorage. Fieldnotes by Krauss, de Laguna, Leer, and others also form an important part of the collection and tend to focus on phonology and verb forms. Work on dialects, grammars, and traditional texts are less well represented. The collection also includes research papers and conference materials. Photocopied material occassionaly represents original material held by other repositories and certain reproduction and use restriction apply.
INFORMATION FOR RESEARCHERS:
Access: Collection access is permitted during regular business hours, Monday through Friday, 8:30 to 4:30, and further by appointment throughout the year.
Preferred Citation: Please list author, date, and title of publication, whether item is a photocopy or original, location of original document if different than ANLC, then note folder title, Upper Tanana Language Collection, Alaska Native Language Center Archive, University of Alaska Fairbanks.
Restrictions: Visitors to the collection may copy non-restricted items, though lack of clerical support prohibits ANLC from processing photocopy requests online or by mail at this time. In addition, many items in the collection are restricted in their use by their authors or by the repositories from which we obtained our copies, and may not be further copied here without permission of the original repositories.
ADMINISTRATIVE INFORMATION:
Acquisition Information: Dr. Michael Krauss of the Alaska Native Language Center began collecting materials now in the Upper Tanana collection when he arrived at the University of Alaska Fairbanks in 1960. Krauss made great effort to assemble a near-comprehensive collection of primary and secondary source material, in the form of wordlists, fieldnotes, manuscript texts, journal articles, and previously published articles on the language. The staff of the Alaska Native Language Center have also contributed primary material to the collection through their fieldnotes, class lectures, and academic research papers.
Processing History: The first major organization of the Upper Tanana Collection occurred in the late 1970s and led to the publication of an annotated catalogue based on folder titles. This system has been retained, and recent work (2002-2006) has concentrated on document preservation, the development of an electronic database, and the creation of a finding aid.
Acknowledgements: Some of the photocopies obtained by Krauss were made from originals held in other repositories, including the Alaska and Polar Regions Collection, Elmer Rasmuson Library, University of Alaska.
Funding: The National Endowment for the Humanities (grant # PA-50139-03) funded collection processing and finding aid development.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION:
Language Information: Upper Tanana Athabascan (earlier called “Nabesna” by Osgood and Hojier) is spoken mainly in the Alaska villages of Northway, Tetlin, and Tok, but has a small population also across the border in Canada. The Alaskan population is about 300, of whom perhaps 105 speak the language. There are some minor but systematic dialectal differences between the villages. During the 1960s, Paul Milanowski established a writing system; linguistic documentation has continued slowly but steadily to the present.
Scope and Content Note: The scope of the Upper Tanana language collection is quite broad in that it strives to include all material written or published in or about the Upper Tanana Language. Dr. Michael Krauss made an effort to collect all things Upper Tanana, and has developed a nearly comprehensive collection. Generally, the collection contains materials relating to linguistic fieldwork, academic research, and educational materials for schoolchildren. However, comparatively little material concerns religious texts in the Upper Tanana Language, and only a handful of traditional stories can be found in the collection.
Linguistic documentation of the Upper Tanana language started relatively late compared to many of the other Alaskan Athabascan languages. The earliest work dates from 1929 and contains wordlists for animal names, body parts, etc., collected by Robert McKennan. The first extensive documentation was undertaken by Paul Milanowski; Milanowski’s research spans the period from 1961 to 1975 (18 items). Milanowski was part of the Summer Institute of Linguistics and the Wycliffe Bible Translators, and a great deal of his work and invovles the production of literacy materials, a proposed orthography, beginning work on a dictionary, and translations of religious materials. He also took part in bilingual education materials development in the 1970s and produced a number of translations of primers from other Alaskan Native languages. Other important linguistic documentation was produced by Alaska Native Language Center staff: Michael Krauss (3 items) conducted fieldwork in the 1960s on dialect comparisons and on phonology; Jeff Leer (3 items) studied aspects of the phonology and grammar in the 1970s; and James Kari (17 items) has collected information on the lexicon, the grammar, place names, and traditional texts from 1980 to the present. Another important contributor since 1989 to lexical studies in particular has been Nobukatsu Minoura (6 items). Although there are some originals, many of the fieldnotes are photocopies provided by the author or field researcher.
By far the largest part of the collection pertains to educational materials, most of which are elementary readers and children’s literacy exercises, produced from the 1960s to the 1970s and published by the National Bilingual Materials Development Center (NBMDC) in Anchorage. Many of these were developed by Milanowski, as mentioned above. Many others are translations by John Alfred (11 items) of templates of children’s primers from the NBMDC; some are original primers developed by Shirley Jimerson (5 items) in the 1970s or, more recently, by Bessie John (5 items) in the 1990s.
COLLECTION ORGANIZATION:
The Upper Tanana Language Collection adheres to the organizational schema developed and applied to each language within the Alaska Native Language Archives by Michael Krauss and Mary Jane McGary in the late 1970s. It involves a system of call numbers (folder numbers) aimed at arranging items chronologically by author. The files are generally organized by author, and thereunder by date of ‘publication’ or ‘work’. In files with multiple authors, the first or earliest author is used. ‘Authorship’ should be interpreted loosely to include not only author in the traditional sense, but also collector, translator, transcriber, speaker, editor, compiler, or informant; these roles are generally indicated. The call number system codes the language series, author, and date. A brief explanation of the call number system follows:
The call number first notes the language, Upper Tanana, with the two-letter code “UT.” The second element of the call number is a three-digit number consisting of the last three digits of the year of the author’s first known work on or in the Upper Tanana language. When an item has more than one author, the date is that of the first-named author.
The third element of the call number is the first letter of the author’s surname, or several letters in the case of co-authors. For example, MJ refers to Milanowski and John. Note that this is a liberal use of the word “author.” In many cases it is actually referring to a collector, translator, transcriber, speaker, editor, compiler, or informant. Under certain circumstances, our assignment of authorship differs from that of the item itself, and refers to the person chiefly responsible in collecting, compiling, or editing the material. The same is true of wordlists collected by one person then published by another as part of a larger work. The role of the “author” is described in parentheses following his or her name, and where appropriate, additional “authors” are noted in the item description.
The fourth element of the call number gives the date of the item. The given date on the published item is used as the item date. When an item includes several editions, translations, or reprinting of a single item, the date of the specific edition in the archive is listed. In some cases, and academic year date appears on educational publications, such as 78/79; here the first year has been used as an item date. In the dating of unpublished materials, if a date appears on the item, it is used as the publication date, except in rare cases where we have concrete knowledge that the date is in error. Undated items have been assigned dates based on our knowledge of the authors work. Some of theses dates are quite approximate and this is usually noted in the description. If multiple items were published in the same year, they are distinguished by letters of the alphabet following the date, e.g. “1973a”, “1973b”.
Some examples:
UT961J1977 reads as an item produced in 1977 by Alfred John who began working on the Upper Tanana language in 1961. UT961MJ1972c reads as one of at least three items produced in 1972 by Paul Milanowski and Alfred John, who started working on the language in 1961.
List of Authors and Contributors
Subject List
Container List
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