Audiotape Sound Recordings

Description

The majority of the tapes in this series contain fieldwork recordings made by students pursuing undergraduate and postgraduate courses in folk life or dialect at the University of Leeds, through the Departments of English Language and Medieval English Literature, English Literature and the Institute of Dialect and Folk Life Studies. These items were submitted with the students' dissertations and theses.


The sound recordings embrace a wide variety of subject areas, and present personal recollections, descriptions, observations and thoughts relating to community/social life, social, economic, political and industrial relations and history. More particularly, subjects covered include calendar custom events observed locally (for example, the Haxey Hood game in Lincolnshire, Soulcaking at Antrobus in Cheshire, Pace Egging in West Yorkshire), and nationally (traditions associated with Christmas, Easter and Bonfire Night); traditional customs and beliefs associated with health and well being, the weather, luck and rites of passage; foodways (customs and beliefs associated with the production and preparation of food); traditional narratives (folk tales, anecdotes, jokes); children's traditions (games, rhymes, riddles, jokes and songs); traditional music (solo/group singing and instrumental music making), dance (sword, clog, morris), drama (the mummers' play); traditional crafts, work techniques
and material culture (for example, barrel making, basket making, drystone walling, the fishing, mining and textile industries).


Sound recordings made as part of the Survey of English Dialects are also included in this series. These were made by fieldworkers revisiting original (and some new) localities, either because a tape recording had not previously been possible, or to check and clarify earlier responses to individual questions from the Dieth-Orton Questionnaire. In such cases the recordings contain both free conversation and more formal question and answer exchanges. Allied to these recordings are a number of independent dialect survey recordings made in England by individual researchers (most notably from Scandinavia).


A small number of items in this series are copies of radio broadcasts, and commercially published educational (language development and use) tapes.

Provenance

Students very often chose their place of residence or birth as the focus for studies of local dialect, folklore or folk life. Likewise, informants were often drawn from family and friends already known to the student. The interviews, comprising free conversation, were generally conducted on a one-to-one basis, although other family and friends known to the informant are sometimes present, and in the case of recordings made of children's traditions, group interviews were often undertaken. Interviews were generally recorded in the informant's home, but the series also contains recordings made in the workplace, pubs, folk clubs, schools and school playgrounds and at calendar custom events in street and field.


A number of sound recordings in this series relate to individual students' studies of the dialect of a particular locality. In some cases students undertook the fieldwork recording themselves, whilst in others where tape recording equipment was not available, students either drew on copies of recordings made previously as part of the Survey of English Dialects, or new field recordings made for them by Stanley Ellis, for their analysis.


Original reels and audio cassettes were transferred to the British Library in March 2019 for long term preservation and digitisation as part of a national programme 'Unlocking our Sound Heritage.' [Funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund].The physical originals (masters) are retained by the British Library for preservation purposes with digital masters and copies held by the University thereafter.

System of arrangement

The tape items were originally arranged in three sections, according to their physical size and format. All 3" (7.6cm) open reel spools and audiocassettes were assigned a shelf list number, prefixed by the letter A, 5" (12.7cm) spools by the letter B and 7" (17.8cm) spools by the letter C. Each section had its own shelflist numbers, starting with number 1.


This arrangement has, by and large, been retained. Alterations have been made only where provenance has not been identified, or where tapes with the same provenance but different letter prefixes have been identified and brought together. The arrangement now reflects recordings made by University of Leeds' students (known provenance), non-student recordings (known provenance) and non-student recordings (unknown provenance).

Access and usage

Reproduction

Access

This material has not yet been assessed under Data Protection and/or other relevant legislation that may limit the access that can be provided. Cultural Collections staff will need to review the material before the access level(s) can be determined. Limits on access may include items being closed, being only available for viewing onsite and/or limitations on copying or photography.

This material is in copyright. Photocopies or digital images can be supplied by the Library for research or private study. It is the responsibility of the researcher to obtain the copyright holder's permission to reproduce for any other purpose. Guidance is available on tracing copyright status and ownership.

Physical and technical conditions

Mono half-track; playback speeds 19cm/sec., 9.5cm/sec., 4.8cm/sec.

Related material

Student dissertations, theses and coursework are held within LAVC/SRP. Papers relating to the Survey of English Dialects are held at LAVC/SED.


A programme of audio tape transcription within the Institute of Dialect and Folk Life Studies was evidently in place at some stage, and a number of recordings have accompanying ms. transcriptions, made by Penelope Hammond and Margaret Jackson [Institute archivist] in blue spiral-bound notebooks.


All audio-related items, including transcripts, printed items, Tape Tables of Contents, field notes and information relating to informants, are held separately in ARI files. These are referred to in individual tape catalogue records, with the reference LAVC/SRE/ARI/xxx. An ms. list of tapes to be checked and transcribed (undated), and a resumé of the tape transcription programme at the Institute of Dialect and Folk Life Studies (undated), are included in the first box of related items.

Related subjects / tags

WARNING: many of our records have not been classified by subject. So if you search our catalogue by subject using the links below then you are unlikely to find all relevant records. But you will find some...