Sociolinguistic interviews with descendants
of former African-American slaves and freedmen who settled in
the Samaná Peninsula (Dominican Republic) in 1824. 21 native
speakers of English, born between 1878 and 1933, are represented.
Settled by Black Loyalists in 1784 and refugee slaves in 1815,
North Preston is the largest African Nova Scotian community, topographically
and socially separated from nearby Dartmouth-Halifax. Informal
interviews collected by in-group members with 41 members of their
extended social networks, born between 1903 and 1971.
Guysborough
Guysborough, a cluster of settlements in northeastern Nova Scotia,
was settled in 1783 by Black Loyalists. Informal interviews collected
by group members with 38 members of their extended social networks,
born between 1894 and 1938.
Audio recordings made between 1935 and
1974 under the auspices of the U.S. Federal Works Progress Administration
with former slaves born between 1844 and 1861.
Audio recordings (7 reel-to-reel tapes
(copied from originals in the Archive of Folk Song in the Library
of Congress [Washington, D.C.])), transcriptions, concordances.
4. Nigerian Pidgin English
Informal conversations among 13 members of a
Nigerian social network in Ottawa recorded by a participant observer.
A collection of letters written between 1790
and 1865 by semi-literate free and recently freed African Americans.
41 letters from Sierra Leone, copied from originals in the National
Archives of Canada (Ottawa) and the University
of Illinois, Chicago; 496 letters written to the American
Colonization Society from Liberia or the United States, copied
from originals housed at the Library
of Congress (Washington, D.C.). Most have never been published,
nor subjected to linguistic analysis. Transcriptions, concordances.