1981 SMITHSONIAN FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL: SOUTH SLAVIC AMERICANS AUDIO LOG SHEETS

About the Project

Audio documentation has played a crucial part in capturing the many stories, performances, exchanges, and demonstrations that have taken place on the National Mall as part of the Festival of American Folklife (now Smithsonian Folklife Festival). For each program, documentation volunteers generated detailed "class style" notes to accompany audio recordings which often include presenter and participant names, subject keywords, song titles, and brief descriptions of the events taking place in real time. These notes are often the richest (or only) source of information about who was present and provide key references for understanding and interpreting the recorded content. While the styles, formats, and spelling accuracy vary across logs, they nevertheless serve as fundamental link between what actually took place and what is documented in audio, photo, and, video formats. Like other ethnic or immigrant communities in the United States, South Slavs (Slovenes, Croats, Serbs, and Macedonians of Yugoslavia as well as Bulgarians) cherish, nurture, and thoroughly enjoy the musical traditions of their homeland. At the 1981 Festival, music and dance ensembles from Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Illinois, Ohio, and Wisconsin brought Balkan and South Slavic traditions to life, drawing Festival visitors onto the dance floor to join the fun. More information about the program including participant names can be found here.

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Completed!

Project Progress (details)

39 pages completed

Difficulty

4 out of 5

(details)

About Project Difficulty

Level 1 - BEGINNER

Content: all typed
Language: English
Format: letters, diaries, flyers, pamphlets, and one-page documents
Subject Area Expertise/Special Skills: none required

Level 2

Content: mostly typed, handwritten in print, or otherwise very clearly written/readable
Language: English
Format: memorabilia, advertisements, image captions, telegrams, diaries, letters, notes
Subject Area Expertise/Special Skills: none required

Level 3 - INTERMEDIATE

Content: typed and handwritten materials in cursive or print
Language: English
Format: newspaper clippings, scrapbooks, letters/diaries/notes that may include annotations or margin notes
Subject Area Expertise/Special Skills: experience reading cursive writing may be useful

Level 4

Content: handwritten materials, primarily in cursive or somewhat difficult to read (predominantly from the 19th and 20th centuries) , audio recordings that are relatively easy to hear/decipher, and scientific materials
Language: English and/or other languages that use Roman script but may require the use of diacritics (French, Spanish, German, Italian, etc.)
Format: audio recordings, letters, diaries, notes and other written materials, projects with templated fields and special instructions
Subject Area Expertise/Special Skills: some knowledge of non-English Roman-character/script languages and diacritics may be useful, as well as experience reading cursive handwriting. A general knowledge or familiarity with scientific terminology.

Level 5 - ADVANCED

Content: handwritten materials in cursive (from the 19th century or earlier) or in a non-Roman script language, audio recordings that are difficult to hear or are not in English, specialty materials/projects such as numismatics projects and the Project Phaedra notebooks
Language: foreign languages that use non-Roman characters (Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, Greek/Cyrillic, Native American and Indigenous languages, etc.) and English
Format: audio recordings, columned data/tables, manuscripts, letters, diaries, notes, currency sheets, coins
Subject Area Expertise/Special Skills: knowledge of a specific language and access to a keyboard with the characters in that language may be required for certain projects. Experience reading cursive handwriting and familiarity with 19th century (or prior) handwriting and conventions/abbreviations may be useful, as well as knowledge of scientific terminology, astrophysics data, or linguistics.

Contributing
members

Total
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Complete