The Evolution of Anthropological Research in Documenting Diversity: How Anthropologists Record Human Life

By Muna Ali and Ashley Ray     

Documenting Diversity: How Anthropologists Record Human Life is an exhibit that outlines the ways in which anthropologists have utilized changing technology to record various aspects of human life. The exhibit is organized into four sections: film, photography, paper, and sound. It includes the equipment used for documentation such as rolls of film, video cameras of various ages, wax cylinders, phonographs, and multiple notebooks. The objects shown in the exhibit come from the National Anthropological Archives (NAA) and the Human Studies Film Archive (HSFA), respectively. The NAA is a product of a 1965 merger between the Smithsonian Institution’s Bureau of American Ethnology (1879-1965) and the Department of Anthropology (1883-present). The collection holds anthropological material produced by anthropologists including fieldnotes, journals, manuscripts, correspondence, photographs, maps and more [1]. The NAA contains one of the largest archival collections related to North American archaeology, ethnography, indigenous artwork, and historical photographs in the world. The HSFA, a sister repository to the NAA, was founded in 1975. The HSFA possesses an audiovisual collection that documents the history of filmmaking worldwide, as it relates to anthropology. The documents and equipment included in this exhibit are a key part of tracking the evolution of the study of anthropology through time. One might even say that the documents are a more accurate representation of the attitudes of the researchers rather than the people they are attempting to record. In the following sections, we will explore two examples in which these attitudes are apparent. 

Garson & Read’s Color Swatch 

Underneath the exhibit’s “Documenting on Paper” section, a sample color swatch is displayed prominently across two pages from the 1899 work Notes and Queries on Anthropology by John George Garson (1854-1932) and Charles Hercules Read (1857-1929) [2, 3]. The exhibit designates the color swatch as “a practice borrowed from geology to describe skin, hair, and eye colors” [2]. Similar to the techniques used to classify geological typology, soil compositions, or categorical distinctions based on shared general characteristics, late 19th century anthropologists erroneously figured a scientific typology of humanity could similarly be created, based on variation in color. Both Garson and Read were affiliated with the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, with Read being appointed as the RAI’s President in both 1899 and 1917 [3]. Given anthropology’s complicated history with ascribing meaning to differences in human physical characteristics in the late 19th century (and prior), it’s certainly no surprise that anthropologists who replicated such rhetoric found themselves in positions of intellectual authority.

Garson & Read’s color swatch, as depicted in Notes and Queries on Anthropology, Smithsonian Libraries & Archives. 

Critiques of Garson and Read’s color swatch were generally limited to its inability to provide universal descriptors. In the September 1913 edition of a journal titled Folklore, reviewer John H. Weeks even provided suggestions on how to improve the color swatch through “standardise[d]” colors, as “scarcely two men will call an intermediate shade by the same name” [5]. Despite institutionally affiliated anthropologists such as Garson and Read perceiving the color swatch as an intellectual innovation, this exhibit vehemently rejects such attempts to seek meaning in physical differences, declaring “such techniques falsely assumed skin color as a meaningful marker of difference” [7]. The color swatch’s inclusion within the exhibit addresses troubling legacies in anthropology in a compelling manner: the exhibit distances our contemporary understanding of anthropology from harmful conclusions drawn during anthropology of the past, while simultaneously acknowledging that such conclusions are inextricably linked to the field.  

“No. 7 Song with Lacrosse Game” from Menominee Music by Frances Densmore 

In the “Documenting Sound” section, visitors will find a manuscript with marbled edges. The book is opened to a page of sheet music at the top, labeled “No. 7 Song with Lacrosse Game,” followed by an analysis of the notation. The description for this document states that this is a manuscript of “analyses and translations” of songs recorded and translated by ethnomusicologist Frances Densmore (1867-1957). The manuscript, Menominee Music, was published in collaboration with the Bureau of American Ethnology of the Smithsonian Institution in 1932. This book is one of many published by Densmore throughout her career of studying and advocating for the preservation of Native American music [6].  

 

“No. 7 Song with Lacrosse Game” from Menominee Music by Frances Densmore, 1932.
Smithsonian Libraries & Archives

There are many examples of non-Western forms of music that do not have a system for written notation. Instead, these songs are passed down orally, generation by generation, with each adding slight changes to a particular piece [7].  

From a musicological standpoint, there is the question of whether it is even possible to accurately notate Non-Western forms of music using classical Western notation. And perhaps whether one even should. Western musical notation is limited in what it can and cannot represent. It was designed with western instruments in mind and thus lacks the ability to fully accommodate the nuances of other instruments. On top of that, Western music relies largely on major and minor scales while non-Western music utilizes more diatonic and chromatic scales, differs greatly between the two groups [8]. As one composer aptly describes, “The Western system of notation is governed by rigid elementary mathematics inherited from the ancient past,” meaning that the Western system of notation is only ever able to create an imperfect outline, and the nuances of pitch and rhythm must be added in by the performer. Imposing the limiting Western system of notation on other forms of music creates a document that cannot fully capture the intricacies of the original piece [9].  

In summary, though the document has its flaws, that does not mean it is without value. On the contrary, it is more constructive to view this document as a type of translation which is inherently transformative and results in an end-product that cannot be identical to the source material. Documents such as this are valuable in that they offer a glimpse at what music was like at a specific point in time. In addition to that, present-day members of the Menominee Tribe could potentially use this manuscript to recover songs that may have been lost, suppressed, or erased from public consciousness and, more importantly, the community itself. It is the reader’s responsibility to read critically and remember that culture, and music, are dynamic and ever-changing.  

Densmore was able to mitigate weaknesses in her work of the types explored in this section through inclusion of audio recordings in her research. Densmore’s use of both aural and written mediums is an apt example of the ways anthropologists have adapted to emerging technologies so that methodologies are improving as well as the capacity to accurately record human life. 

Anthropology as an Advancing Field 

The thematic structure of the exhibit based on medium—along with its more general focus on technological advancements aiding anthropological fieldwork—presents anthropology to the general public as a constantly transforming field. The selection of objects within the exhibit is particularly effective in conveying this: for instance, in the “Documenting on Film” section, the description for Object 11, a diagram on synchronized sound from 1955, is placed strategically next to object 12, a 1995 Sony camera [4]. Visitors are able to easily envision advancements in recording tools used for fieldwork merely through the two descriptions’ adjacent positions. What’s particularly interesting about the position of these two descriptions is that objects 11 and 12 were used by the same individual, anthropologist John Marshall, exactly forty years apart. This choice allows for the exhibit to portray individual anthropologists and anthropology more broadly as advancing in the wake of major shifts in technology.

Photo of Exhibit Description, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution. 

Overall, the exhibit addresses anthropological discoveries in four mediums: photography, paper, sound, and film. Additionally, on the left side of the hallway, photography, paper, and sound are in one display case, while on the right side, an entire display case is solely dedicated to anthropological film. Given the heightened importance of ethnographic film in anthropological fieldwork, the exhibit’s choice to have film presented separately from the other mediums is certainly advantageous. The choice to separate film from the other anthropological mediums is also indicative of the two repositories mentioned in the exhibit: the National Anthropological Archives and the Human Studies Film Archives. Although the two repositories are closely related to one another, they operate separately. Visitors can envision the physical constraints in having the exhibit spread across two sides of a wide hallway in the context of the separate nature of the two repositories, ultimately complicating the expression of these four mediums as a coherent whole. Regardless of its physical limitations, the exhibit is successful in highlighting changing attitudes and technologies throughout anthropology’s history.

Acknowledgements

Documenting Diversity was co-curated by Diana Marsh, a former NMNH postdoctoral fellow who partook in a three-year long NSF-funded project on NAA collections, and Joshua A. Bell, who serves as NMNH’s Curator of Globalization, Director of the Recovering Voices Program and Acting Director of the National Anthropological Archives. The exhibit was made possible by close collaboration between the NAA, HSFA, Smithsonian Libraries, and Smithsonian Exhibits.

By Muna Ali and Ashley Ray

Natural History Research Experiences (NHRE) Interns

National Anthropological Archives, National Museum of Natural History 

Sources:

[1] “Documenting Diversity,” Smithsonian Libraries and Archives, accessed June 20, 2022, https://library.si.edu/exhibition/documenting-diversity. 

[2] Erdöl, Das " “Dr. J. G. Garson.” Nature 129 (1932): 931. https://doi.org/10.1038/129931a0 

[3] Balfour, Henry. “Sir Charles Hercules Read, July 6, 1857-February 11, 1929,” Obituaries. Accessed June 2, 2022. https://www.therai.org.uk/archives-and-manuscripts/obituaries/charles-hercules-read 

[4] Bell, Josh and Marsh, Diana. Documenting Diversity: How Anthropologists Record Human Life. Washington: Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, 2020. https://naturalhistory.si.edu/exhibits/documenting-diversity-how-anthropologists-record-human-life 

[5] Weeks, John H. Folklore 24, no. 3 (1913): 392–97. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1255441. 

[6] “Frances Densmore (1867-1957).” Smithsonian Institution Archives. 2005. https://siarchives.si.edu/research/sciservwomendensmore.html 

[7] Pasler, Jann. “Sonic Anthropology in 1900: The Challenge of Transcribing Non-Western Music and Language.” Twentieth-Century Music 11, no. 1 (2014): 7–36. doi:10.1017/S1478572213000157. 

[8] Robertson-Wilson, Marian. “The Challenges of Notating Music in General and Coptic Music in Particular: Observations of a Professional Cellist, Composer, and Linguist.” Library of Congress Web. https://www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200156229/

[9] Zon, Bennett. “Music in the Literature of Anthropology from the 1780s to the 1860s.” In Representing Non-Western Music in Nineteenth-Century Britain, NED-New edition., 48–68. Boydell & Brewer, 2007. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7722/j.ctt14brrwv.9.

Living Documents and Historic Postcards of Guinea

By Haley Steinhilber

Writing? On an archival document?! Traditionally, archives are known for their dedication to preserving original photographs, documents, and visual materials in their original condition and order—but what happens if the donor invites collaboration?

When former USAID Foreign Service officer Stephen Grant donated his annotated copy of Images de Guinée (1991) to the Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives (EEPA) in 2020, he hoped that the book should remain open for others—specifically Guineans and those with ties to Guinea—to share in the margins their own reflections of the historic postcards.

Adding to a collection is not a rare occurrence. In fact, Grant himself has donated over 10,000 photographic postcards from Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, Senegal, and the Republic of Guinea in separate instances in 2001, 2018, and 2020. The EEPA also accepts new donations to the African Postcard collection (EEPA.1985-014) every year, continuously altering the make-up of the collection. One of the many things that makes Images de Guinée unique is the concept of a typically static item (a book) remaining active in a concept known as a “living” document. 

A living document is a text that is continually edited and updated, and perhaps limited by a set of frameworks.(1) This term has been applied to materials like the United States Constitution, but it can also refer to a website like Wikipedia, the digital encyclopedia that allows account holders to update articles freely.(2)  In the context of the archive, a living document can be a way for visitors to connect in a more personal way—no longer an observer, but an active participant in history making. 

In a 2020 interview with museum staff, Grant explained how postcards helped him relate to others in the countries where he lived: 

I learned something about introducing oneself when you go abroad for the U. S. government. You can say your name, and shake hands, and that’s it. Or, soon after you meet someone, you can surprise them by pulling out of your pocket a small stack of picture postcards of the country and see how your new friend or colleague reacts. There will be astonishment that you have these items in the first place; most people throw away postcards.

Secondly, the person will invariably make a comment comparing what the scene looked like in the past, and looks like today. Thirdly, for more impact, show the postcards simultaneously to children, young adults, and older adults, and listen to their different reactions! Picture postcards open up conversations. They provoke the beholder to compare the past with the present. They prompt unsuspectedly rich exchanges in a family setting.

When Grant helped put together the book of postcards in 1991, he had already been collecting postcards for over 10 years. He was inspired by an exhibit at the National Library in Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire, in 1980, which featured hundreds of old picture postcards of the country. In turn, while living in Guinea as a USAID officer, Grant inspired others with his own postcard exhibit, which took place at the Franco-Guinean Cultural Center in Conakry. The exhibit attracted around 1,700 visitors in March 1991.

German Ambassador to Guinea, Dr. Hubert Beemelmans, was so taken with the exhibit that he approached Grant about turning it into a book. They could repair and use a printing press at the Catholic Mission in Conakry—they only needed the staff and supplies.(3) Beemelmans requested money from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Bonn, Germany to buy paper, ink, materials for binding, and to train additional local staff on the printing press. Postcard collectors from France, Bernard Sivan and Pierre Dürr, also provided images from their large collections. The resulting publication became the first book published in Guinea in the private sector. All previous publications had been printed by the Patrice Lumumba National Printing Office, according to Seydouba Cissé, the Assistant Director of National Archives in Conakry.

Stephen Grant (left) speaking with German Ambassador to Guinea, Dr. Hubert Beemelmans, at the postcard exhibit, 15 March 1991, Conakry, Guinea. 

From the beginning, the book was grounded in remembering Guinea’s past. As Dr. Beemelmans writes in the preface (translated from French): 

The past is the foundation of the present and future. Humankind and nations that ignore their past do not know each other and do not know where they are going. One can criticize the past, but at the end of the day one must accept it or at least come to terms with it...This book is the memory and the messenger from the past...This book is intended to appeal to those Guineans and foreigners who love Guinea and want to know its past in order to better understand its present and be able to accompany its future.

At first, only Grant’s fellow contributors wrote in the book: the collectors Sivan and Dürr, printer Augusto Bindelli, and Seydouba Cissé, Assistant Director of the National Archives in Conakry. But soon, Grant began inviting others to leave inscriptions before he departed for his next assignment in Indonesia. 

What resulted was an assortment of experiences, from fellow USAID officers to local politicians and educators to a descendant of one railroad family in Conakry. The inscriptions date from 1991 to 2020, when Grant invited the current Ambassador from Guinea to add his own recollection to the book. 

Stephen Grant’s leather-bound annotated copy of Images de Guinée, 1991.
The cover was designed by Annick Grant.

From the Pages of History

Education For All 

Une école primaire indigène en Guinée Française - F.N. [An indigenous primary school in French Guinea], Ag. Ec. De l’A. O. F., c. 1910, Postcard, collotype, EEPA 2001-001-0940, Stephen H. Grant Postcard Collection, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, Smithsonian Institution.

Page 119 of Images de Guinée, featuring postcard and text from inscription by Aïcha Bah Diallo, 2. Une école primaire indigène en Guinée Française - F.N. [An indigenous primary school in French Guinea], Ag. Ec. De l’A. O. F., c. 1910, Postcard, collotype, EEPA 2001-001-0940, Stephen H. Grant Postcard Collection, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, Smithsonian Institution.

Mr. Grant, thank you for asking me to write something about this photo. You recognize my role as mother and responsible for education. I love school and aim to do something significant for this sector with which I have been entrusted.

Which school is this? I’ve asked a lot of people. Not one could tell me. Nevertheless, I am leaning toward the region of Mamou because of the Moslem leader (almamy) holding a child. 

Thank you, Mr. Grant. You have led me to relive the olden days thanks to your photos. We realize how much we have lost by not saving mementos (photos, postcards). With your cards, how many memories come back, and with what emotion! It is the history and the culture of our country that we relive. This is what explains the triumph of your exhibit. Thank you for that. I wish you good luck. 

--Aïcha Bah Diallo, President of the Network for Education for All in Africa, and former Minister of Education of Guinea. Original French:

Mr. Grant, Merci de m'avoir demandé d'écrire quelquechose devant cette photo. Vous me reconnaissez mon rôle de mère et de responsable de l'Education. J'aime l'école et je souhaite faire quelquechose pour ce secteur qui m'est confié depuis Juin 1989.

Quelle école est-ce? Je l'ai demandé à beaucoup de monde. Personne n'a pu me le dire. Cependant on peut dire que cette école doit être dans les environs de Mamou à cause de l'Almamy tenant un enfant.  Merci Mr. Grant. Vous nous avez fait revivre les temps anciens grâce à vos photos.

Nous avons realisé combien nous avons perdu en ne gardant pas les souvenirs (photos, cartes postales). C'est une leçon que vous nous avez donnée. Avec vos cartes combien de souvenirs nous remontent et quelle émotion! C'est l'histoire et la culture de notre pays que nous vivons. C'est ce qui explique le succès de votre exposition. Merci pour tout cela. Je vous souhaite beaucoup de succès.

Diallo braids several themes into her inscription—her role as a mother, a friend to Grant, and an elected local official entrusted with the education of the community. She writes about connecting with others around her and asking about the history of the school, which further highlights Grant’s observation that the postcards inspire conversation. 

Nostalgia of the Railroad

During the 1930s when the Conakry-Niger Railway was a real railroad, you could count more than ten trains per day from Conakry to Kankan and back. My father was a station master at Kolenté where I was born. My father trained five other members of our family as station masters. Of the thirty or so stations in the Conakry Niger, my parents occupied half a dozen.

Image Caption: 682. C.F.C.N. (Guinée Française) - Station de Siffray [ C.F.C.N. Chemin de fer, Conakry, French Guinea - Siffray Station, Collection de la Guinée Francaise, A. James, Postcard, collotype, c.1907, EEPA 2001-001-1032, Stephen H. Grant Postcard Collection, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, Smithsonian Institution. 

I spent several vacations at Siffray station (Dagomet) where my father's last little brother served as a station master for a long time. In short, I experience a great admiration for this beautiful collection characterized by discipline and perseverance exceptionally moving for connoisseurs.

I like the rails, I like the train, I like the stations, I like everything related to the railroad because I belong to the family of railway workers. Thank you, Mr. Grant, for this beautiful work which makes me very nostalgic. Thank you for your warm friendship.

[El Hadj] Tafsir H. Thiam, 6/30/92, Deputy Director of Peace Corps in Conakry and child of prominent railroad family in Guinea

Guinée - Une Station de chemin de fer. [A railway station.], unknown photographer, c. 1910, Postcard, collotype, EEPA 2001-001-1057, Stephen H. Grant Postcard Collection, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, Smithsonian Institution. 

Pendant les années 30 lorsque le Chemin de fer Conakry-Niger était un vrai chemin de fer, lorsqu'on pouvait compter plus d'une dizaine de trains par jour de Conakry à Kankan et retour. Mon père était chef de gare à la Kolenté où je suis né. Mon père a formé cinq autres membres de notre famille comme chef de gare. Sur la trentaine de gares que comptait le Conakry Niger, mes parents en occupaient une demi douzaine.

J'ai passé plusieurs vacances à la gare de Siffray (Dagomet) où le dernier petit frère de mon père a servi pendant longtemps comme Chef de gare. En bref, j’éprouve une grande admiration devant cette belle collection caracterisée par une discipline et une perseverance exceptionellement émouvantes pour les connaisseurs.

J'aime les rails, J'aime le train, j'aime les gares, j’aime tout ce qui est lié au chemin de fer car j'appartiens à la famille de cheminots. Merci Mr. Grant pour cette belle d’oeuvre qui me rend très nostalgique. Merci pour votre chaude amitié.

In this recollection, nostalgia infuses every word Thiam writes. From the Siffray station where he spent several vacations with his uncle, to the crowded platform that reflects a typical day on the railroad, the impact of these two postcards of the railroad draws memories of his family history that may not have been written down elsewhere.

The Familiar Crocodile 

Colonies Françaises-- Guinée - Le Niger à Kouroussa [French Colony – Guinea - Niger river at Kouroussa], unknown photographer, c. 1910, Postcard, Collotype, EEPA 2001-001-1135, Stephen H. Grant Postcard Collection, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, Smithsonian Institution.

Boda Kudu:

 A little downstream, there was a familiar crocodile, guardian of all the children of Kouroussa. He hunted any foreign crocodile, but alas! also munched on the foreign children who ventured into his domain.

Page 89 of Images de Guinée, featuring postcard and text from story by Yvonne Condé, Colonies Françaises- Guinée - Le Niger à Kouroussa [French Colony – Guinea -- Niger river at Kouroussa],  EEPA 2001-001-1135, Postcard, Collotypes, Stephen H. Grant Postcard Collection, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, Smithsonian Institution.

We would hang onto his back; we would dive with him ... My God, time stood still. By Grant‘s magic! For this emotion that you created by your photos, for these tears shed on the fled treasures of my childhood, for the happiness of seeing again in photos all the places that I knew and loved in my childhood, those places whose destruction has been an amputation in my soul, for all that and for the delicacy of the gesture, you are blessed." - Yvonne Condé - Key member of the Comité transitoire de redressement national (CTRN). She is also responsible for the writing of Loi fondamentale in 1990.

Un peu en aval, il y avait un crocodile familier, tuteur de tous les enfants de Kouroussa. Il chassait tout crocodile étranger, mais hélas! croquait aussi les enfants étrangers qui s’avanturaient dans son domaine. 

On s'accrochait à son dos, on plongeait avec lui... Mon dieu, le temps s'est arrêté; Par la magic de Grant! Pour cet émoi que tu as créé par tes photos, pour ces larmes versées sur les trésors enfuis de mon enfance, pour ce bonheur de revoir en photo tant de lieux que j'ai connus et aimés dans mon enfance, ces lieux dont la destruction a été une amputation dans mon âme, pour tout cela et pour la délicatesse du geste, sois béni. - Yvonne Condé

This entry is particularly interesting in the context of Guinean politics. Condé, a key member of the Comité transitoire de redressement national (CTRN), shares a story almost like a fairy tale--about a place that may not exist anymore, or perhaps she is far from home. As a member of the organization trying to establish democracy in Guinea, Condé describes this allegory of a territorial crocodile.

Into the Future, As We Look Towards the Past

Although these are just a few examples, each of these inscriptions marks a separate significance to the postcards. The work for improving education, steady livelihood through a stable career on the railroad, or the treasures of childhood and reflecting on change in Guinea. How many other countless memories of the past could be provoked by these images?

Advances in technology and digitizing collections provide more options for archives to connect with the communities they serve, to preserve history, and invite collaboration. Over the last few years, EEPA has worked to digitize and catalog postcards from Grant’s postcard donations in 2001 and 2019. In the future, the EEPA will provide access to the full collection of historic postcards from Guinea and other African countries for folks to inscribe. Soon, anyone with access to the Internet (and a device) can view the historic postcards.

If you are interested in sharing your own memories of Images de Guinée or sending a message to the EEPA about the postcards below, please send an email to elisofonarchives@si.edu with the subject line “Images of Guinea.”

Due to Covid-19, the EEPA is currently closed to the public. In accordance with Smithsonian Libraries and Archives, it will reopen to visitors and researchers projected January 2022. Please email the Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives to set up a visit to view the physical Images de Guinee. 

Notes:

 1. Shanahan, D.R. A living document: reincarnating the research article. Trials 16, 151 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13063-015-0666-5

  2. Marshall, Thurgood. "The Constitution: A living document." Howard LJ 30 (1987): 915. Kitchin, Heather A. "The Tri-Council Policy Statement and research in cyberspace: Research ethics, the Internet, and revising a ‘living document’." Journal of Academic Ethics 1, no. 4 (2003): 397-418.

  3. Phone call with Stephen Grant, October 2021. 

Haley Steinhilber, Photo Archivist

Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, National Museum of African Art

Also visit Stephen’s website at www.stephenhgrant.com

More from the Stephen Grant Postcard Collection

Collection de la Guinée - A. James, Conkary. 82 – Conakry (Guinée Française). Le Ramadam: Le Salam (4e phase). [Guinea Collection – A. James, Conakry. 82- Conakry (French Guinea) Ramadan: Salam (4^th phase).] Photograph by A. James, c. 1932. Postcard, Collotype, EEPA 2001-001-0917. Stephen Grant Postcard Collection, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution

549. Guinée Française - Konakry [French Guinea, Conakry], Collection Fortier Dakar, c. 1906, Postcard, Collotype, EEPA 2001-001-0972, Stephen Grant Postcard Collection, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution

"Jeune négresse et petit Européen," French Guinea, unknown photographer, c. 1910, Postcard, Collotype, EEPA 2001-001-0981, Stephen Grant Postcard Collection, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution

Afrique occidentale - Guinée[,] 1042. Femme Foulah [West Africa, Guinea, 1042. Foulah Woman]

Collection Générale Fortier, Dakar, c. 1911, Postcard, Collotype, EEPA 2001-001-1176, Stephen Grant Postcard Collection, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution

 

 

Silver Horn’s Winter Count: An Archival Record of Indigenous Time Featured in a Smithsonian Exhibition

Elena Myers, Diana Marsh, and Candace Greene

Documenting Diversity: How Anthropologists Record Human Life is an exhibit showcasing the history of anthropological fieldwork through rare archival and print materials from the National Anthropological Archives and the Smithsonian Libraries. The exhibit, two cases in the Evans Gallery (ground floor) of the National Museum of Natural History, opened on March 12 and will be on view for 16 months when the museum reopens.

Specifically, the show traces the progress of technologies used to record human life, from paper to film to today’s digital media. The exhibit also grapples with the limits of such documents. Some ethnographic “data” resist documentation. It may be hard to record, or Indigenous community members may not choose to share it (especially with white anthropologists collecting it). But this is not always the case.

Figure 1: Page from Silver Horn's winter count depicting the years 1832-1835. As anthropologist Candace Greene describes in her book on Silver Horn, the wolf drawn in the first summer indicates that the Medicine Lodge Ceremony was held at Wolf Creek that year. The following summer (represented by a tree in leaf, because no Medicine Lodge Ceremony was held) marks the massacre of a Kiowa village in which the Osage attackers carried off the sacred Taime, the figure shown shrouded in feathers. After that was the winter the stars fell, when a meteor shower was visible across the Plains. MS 2531, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.

The exhibit features an exquisite piece in the hand of master illustrator Silver Horn, or Haungooah. Silver Horn (Figure 1) was a Kiowa artist distinguished for his prolific career and intricate drawing style.

The “Silver Horn pictorial calendar,” as it is listed in the Smithsonian Collections catalog, is called a “winter count” (sai-guat) by the Kiowa. Smithsonian anthropologist James Mooney commissioned the calendar in 1904, and today it stands as an exceptional record of Native historical knowledge preserved in document form.

In Silver Horn’s rendering, time passes left to right across the page, marking winters with bare trees and summers with the forked pole that was erected in the annual Kado, Medicine Lodge Ceremony. The drawings associated with each season marker depict noteworthy events of communal memory. For example, the winter of 1833-34 is remembered as “The Year the Stars Fell,” after the striking Leonid meteor shower (Figure 1).

As a collective history standardized for use by all Kiowas, the events chosen to “name” specific seasons were not necessarily the most important, but rather the most memorable—the death of a well-known warrior, the outbreak of a deadly disease, or the location of the Kado that brought the entire tribe together.

Figure 2: As Greene writes in One Hundred Summers: A Kiowa Calendar Record, in this “Pawnee killed winter,” Silver Horn’s detailed rendering of the dress and decoration of a noted brave Pawnee warrior demonstrates his respect for the figure. MS 2531, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.

Knowledge of history was held in communal memory and passed down through the oral tradition. The responsibility for recording year names their chronological order was assigned to calendar-keepers (a role Silver Horn inherited from his great-uncle Tohausan, a principal chief of the Kiowas, by way of his father also called Tohausan).

Figure 3: Summer of 1849: Entry for the summer of the Cramp Kado. The crouched figure represents the cholera epidemic that swept the Plains that year. Silver Horn also notes the death of On the Arrow from the disease with a unique pictorial convention, the death owl. The cradles in the bottom right corner denote two significant births. MS 2531, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.

All members of the community could then refer to the calendar when placing their own life’s events, when the calendar made appearances at social gatherings. Silver Horn told Mooney that he was born in the summer that Bird Appearing was killed, 1860 (Figure 4).

Figure 4: Summer 1860: Entry for “Bird Appearing killed summer,” shown with a bullet streaking toward his name glyph. MS 2531, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.

Most winter counts were intended as utilitarian mnemonic devices (Figure 5). Detailed narrative illustration conventions were reserved to tell stories of war. Silver Horn appears to have merged these two traditions, creating a novel form of historical storytelling.

Figure 5: James Quitone (Wolf Tail), winter count page representing the years 1847-1849. MS 2002-27, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.

The calendar commissioned by Mooney in 1904 is actually a copy, reproduced from Silver Horn’s less-elaborate original. Silver Horn maintained the original for several decades after the copy ends, and passed many of the stories on to his family. The calendars thus stand not only as a record of the past, but as an investment in the future: the endurance of Kiowa history.

Documenting Diversity was curated by postdoctoral fellow Diana E. Marsh and Curator of  Globalization and Acting Director of the NAA Joshua A. Bell, and collaboratively produced by the National Anthropological Archives and Human Studies Film Archives, the Smithsonian Libraries, and Smithsonian Exhibits. When it reopens, it will be on view in the Evans Gallery on the ground floor of the National Museum of Natural History for 16 months.

Elena Myers is a senior and student archivist at Bryn Mawr College where she is majoring in History. In summer 2019 she was an intern at the National Anthropological Archives. Diana Marsh is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the National Anthropological Archives.

Diana E. Marsh is a postdoctoral fellow at the National Anthropological Archives where she researches access to Indigenous archival collections.

Candace Greene is an anthropologist of the Plains Indians who was based at NMNH until her retirement, and worked closely with the Silver Horn family and other Kiowa people to combine Indigenous perspectives with archival research on Mooney and other turn-of-the-century anthropologists. Greene has published extensive “translations” of these calendars, and this post relies heavily on her research and publications.

Bibliography

Greene, Candace S. Silver Horn: Master Illustrator of the Kiowas. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2001.

———One Hundred Summers: A Kiowa Calendar Record. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2009

Mooney, James. Calendar History of the Kiowa Indians. In The Seventeenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, 1895-96. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1898.

Sydel Silverman: A New Virtual Finding Aid for a Scholar Committed to Anthropology’s Legacy

by Diana Marsh and Katherine Christensen

Photo: Photographs of Sydel Silverman, undated, Series 9, Sydel Silverman Papers

Last March, a giant in the field of anthropology passed away. Sydel Silverman (1933-2019) was a scholar of Italian and other (as she called them) “complex” societies, as well as the history of anthropology. In her doctoral work and first book (Three Bells of Civilization: the Life of an Italian Hill Town 1975), she combated stereotypes of rural communities through her ethnography of Montecastello di Vibio, a small Umbrian hilltop town.

Photo: Photographs of Sydel Silverman, undated, Series 9, Sydel Silverman Papers.

Silverman advocated for anthropology throughout her career. At the City University of New York (CUNY) Graduate Center in the 1970s, Silverman argued that anthropology was an “essential” discipline, convincing Margaret Mead to join her fight. Robert J. Kibbee, then CUNY’s Chancellor, proposed a restructuring plan that would eliminate the anthropology departments in a number of CUNY’s colleges. As a result of Silverman’s activities, when the restructuring occurred in 1976, no anthropology departments were affected. In so doing, she resurrected the anthropology program at CUNY, turning it into one of the top ten anthropological doctoral programs in the U.S.

Silverman’s perhaps most influential contribution to the field was her leadership of the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, anthropology’s most prominent funding organization, where she served as President from 1987 to 1999. Through Wenner-Gren, Silverman built anthropology’s intellectual community and reach. She championed unity among all four of anthropology’s often disconnected fields—archaeological, biological, cultural, and linguistic anthropology. She also published on the field’s scholarly process, reflecting in her writing about its networks and conferences (see The Beast at the Table: Conferencing with Anthropologists, 2002).

Photo: Sydel Silverman Papers in the National Anthropological Archives pod, Museum Support Center, Suitland, Maryland.

Silverman was also a major proponent of preserving anthropology’s legacy through archival records. She helped to found the Council for the Preservation of Anthropological Records (CoPAR), which published works on the topic and created a registry of anthropologists’ archival papers. As Silverman said in 2014, “Those of us who created CoPAR had as our primary objective to save the unpublished field notes and other primary documents of field research for the benefit of scholars, members of the subject communities, and others with serious purposes for consulting this material” (Personal correspondence). For more on her foundational CoPAR work, see this 2012 blog post.  In 2015, Silverman participated in a workshop to revitalize CoPAR for the digital age, which initiated the development of new working groups and a new website (Marsh et al. 2019).

Photo: Screen shot of the new Sydel Silverman Papers finding aid on sova.si.edu

This month, the NAA published a digital, keyword searchable (‘encoded’, in archives-speak) finding aid (created by Katherine Christensen) to Silverman’s collections. The collections are made up of about 25 linear feet of material documenting Silverman’s fieldwork in Italy, educational and administrative roles, participation in research networks, and vast collection of informal observational notes taken throughout her career. Media include field notebooks and journals, correspondence, news clippings, unpublished writings, meeting notes, teaching files, photographs, slides, and audio recordings.

Photo: Screen shot of archival image of Sydel Silverman from the new online finding aid

Given Silverman’s interest in anthropological legacies, we look forward to seeing how Silverman’s legacy—archival papers now more easily searchable online—are used and repurposed by the field’s next generation.

The finding aid for the Sydel Silverman Papers is available online at https://sova.si.edu/record/NAA.2011-11

Acknowledgements

Funding for the processing of Sydel Silverman’s papers was provided by a grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation; processing was completed by Christy Fic. Funding to convert pdf and Word finding aids to encoded finding aids was provided by the FY2019 Collections Information System (CIS) pool. With this funding the NAA has recently added 6 other finding aids to SOVA for the papers of Anthony Leeds, Richard L. Hay, Marvin Harris, Ethel Cutler Freeman, Richard Lynch Garner, and Chris Gjording.

Bibliography

Marsh, Diana E., Ricardo L. Punzalan, and Jesse A. Johnston 2019. "Preserving Anthropology's Digital Record: CoPAR in the Age of Electronic Fieldnotes, Data Curation, and Community Sovereignty." The American Archivist (online first): https://americanarchivist.org/doi/abs/10.17723/aarc-82-02-01 

Schneider, Jennifer 2019. “In Memoriam: Dr. Sydel Silverman,” The Graduate Center, The City University of New York: https://www.gc.cuny.edu/getmedia/ad326c60-a6dd-484d-9cda-9d6425171cf7/sydel-silverman-in-memoriam-v2  

Silverman, Sydel 1975. Three Bells of Civilization: the Life of an Italian Hill Town. New York: Columbia University Press.

Roberts, Sam. "Sydel Silverman, 85, Dies; Defended Anthropology in Academia." New York Times, April 5, 2019.