The Travelers' Project and Database

 

This is a project that consists of data collected and compiled by Alicia Lewis, working at the time for her Masters in Ethnomusicology at the University of Washington under the Direction of Daniel Neuman.

The data consists of over 1600 records of published travelers' observations in India on music and dance performances dating from 60 AD to the 1950s. Information on the observer, the observed, location, context, attitude, date etc. are provided in separate fields, with the last field being a list of terms. Importing this database into your own will enable you,for example, to search for all the instances of "sitar" or "nautch" from earliest to latest and from the regions or precise towns and cities where observations were made.

The fields are as follows:

AUTHOR NATIONALITY GENDER TITLE LOCATION REGION CONTEXT EVENT PERFORMER RELIGION/ETHNICITY SEX EVALUATION ORIGINAL SOURCE AUTHOR PUBLICATION ACCOUNT DATE PUBLICATION DATE SOURCE PAGE(S) CALL NO. 1 CALL NO. 2 CALL NO. 3 CALL NO. 4 TERMS

Two of the sixteen hundred records are as follows:

Ahmad, S. Maqbul Arab Male India and the Neighboring Territories DIBAJAT ISLANDS LACCADIVES COURT PUBLIC PROCESSION AL-IDRISI Leiden: E.J. Brill 1100 1960 24 913.34 Id5kE TRUMPET/

Ali, Mrs. Meer Hassan, British, Female, Observations on the Mussulmauns of India ,LUCKNOW UP, PATRON, RECREATIONAL PROFESSIONAL FEMALE POSITIVE & NEGATIVE ALI London: Oxford University Press 1915 1917 106107 915.4 M67o2 NAUTCHUNIES (IMPUDENT WOMEN)/ ZEENAHNAH/ CASTE: DOMENIE OR WOMEN OF THE DOM OR SINGER CLASS (ZEENAHNAH SINGERS AND DANCERS)/ HINDOOSTAUNIE LANGUAGE/ SAATARAH (GUITAR)/ SURRINGHEE (RUDE-SHAPED VIOLIN)/ DHOME OR DHOLLE (DRUM)/ DISRESPECT/ SONG/ DANCE/

If you use this at all, please let me know at dneuman@arts.ucla.edu

If you publish any work based on this database you ought to at least acknowledge the original source as Alicia Lewis who compiled the data. Her Master's thesis based on this database is at at the University of Washington and a copy is in the UW Ethnomusicology Archives.