The J. P. Harrington Database Project, funded by NSF since 2001, consists principally in transcribing and coding the linguistic and ethnographic notes on American Indian languages collected by J. P. Harrington during the first half of the twentieth century. During the 1980s, Harrington's original handwritten field notes, currently housed in the National Anthropological Archives at the Smithsonian Institution, were microfilmed, resulting in 504 reels from which the J. P. Harrington Database has been created. The current phase of this project expands the original focus of transcribing the notes, to include the compilation of a biographical study, and several indices essential to accessing Harrington's work.
Harrington's data constitute a wealth of information on one of the most linguistically diverse regions of the earth. Although his focus was specifically on language, the information is invaluable not only to linguists, but to a much larger scholarly and scientific community including biologists, geographers, historians, anthropologists, and archaeologists. This project also directly impacts two unique and often underserved groups: the native people of California and the West, and students of these communities. The men and women Harrington interviewed were often among the last remaining speakers of their languages, and most of the California languages he recorded are now either no longer spoken, or have only a few elderly speakers. Harrington's notes have proven to be a treasure of indigenous knowledge that otherwise would be lost.
The J. P. Harrington Database Project (administered through the Native American Language Center at the University of California, Davis, with funding from the National Science Foundation awards BCS0111487, BCS0418584, BCS0642463) consists principally in transcribing and coding the linguistic and ethnographic notes on American Indian languages collected by John Peabody Harrington. His notes, currently housed in the National Anthropological Archives at the Smithsonian Institution, were microfilmed in 504 reels from which the J. P. Harrington Database is being created. Hired in 1915 by the Bureau of American Ethnology, Harrington devoted a half century to field work on Native American languages. Most of the California languages he recorded are either no longer spoken, or have only a few elderly speakers. The men and women Harrington interviewed were often among the last remaining speakers of their languages, and his notes have proven to be a treasure of indigenous knowledge that otherwise would have been lost. His data constitute a wealth of information on one of the most linguistically diverse regions of the earth. Although his focus was specifically on language, the information is invaluable not only to linguists, but to the entire scholarly community including biologists, geographers, historians, anthropologists, and archaeologists. This project directly impacts two unique and often under-served groups: the native people of California, and students of these communities and their heritage languages. The project has been underway for over twelve years, and will continue for the indefinite future. The funding for this report period supported two graduate students (one in Native American Studies, one in Linguistics) to continue with the coding of Harrington's field notes, and to train, coordinate, and oversee a half dozen student and community volunteer coders. For additional information about the project, see our website and project newsletters at: http://nas.ucdavis.edu/NALC/JPH.html
