These notes are contained in eighteen notebooks and on 200 miscellaneous pages, and include translations of selected words and phrases. Includes vocabulary, paradigms, sentences, texts, and English translations. Covers multiples Sahaptian languages and dialects: Cayuse, Celilo, Kittitas, Molale, Nez Percé, Palouse, Pšwanwapam (Wenatchi?), Qayáwlali (Tenino), Rock Creek, Tayx (or Tygh), Umatilla, Walúla (Walla Walla), Walúpam (Walla Walla), Wanapam, Wayakma, Wayam, Wuxinsyáy (Umatilla), Yakama. Includes list of Umatilla speakers.

This collection consists of two manuscripts volumes containing vocabularies from numerous Indigenous languages primarily from what is now Washington, Idaho, Oregon, British Columbia, and Alaska, as well as some from the Great Lakes and central Canada, obtained by dictation from native speakers and traders of the Hudson's Bay Company.

The Virginia D. Hymes Papers focus primarily on the Sahaptin language research of Virginia Hymes and several others between the 1970s and 1980s. They contain several extensive lexical card files of Sahaptin, original field notes, Sahaptin texts and a dictionary, notes toward an unpublished dissertation, works by others (especially Eugene Hunn, David and Kathrine French, and Bruce Rigsby on Sahaptin, and Noel Rude on Nez Perce/Niimi'ipuutímt), and smaller amounts of teaching files, conferences, correspondence, and personal and administrative files.

This is part of the large inventory for the Franz Boas Papers (Mss B B61). For complete information concerning this collection, please view the Collection Description .

Dell Hymes' doctoral research on Kathlamet Chinook (Indiana University, 1955) grew into a lifelong interest in the relationship between ethnography and linguistics. Following academic appointments at Harvard University (1955-1960) and the University of California, Berkley (1960-1965), Hymes joined the Department of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania in 1965. During twenty-two years tenure at Penn he was a professor of folklore, linguistics, sociology and education. In 1975, he was promoted to Dean of the Graduate School of Education (1975-1987). A principal proponent of the emergent field of sociolinguistics, his most influential works include Reinventing Anthropology and Language in Culture and Society. The Hymes papers cover all aspects of Dell Hymes' professional life. Subcollection I is concentrated on his years at the University of Pennsylvania, his presidencies of the American Association of Anthropology and the Linguistic Society of America, and his editorship of the journal Language in Society. Subcollection II is broader, focusing much more on published and unpublished linguistic work on dozens of languages, mostly of North America. Of particular interest is his rich correspondence with colleagues and students on linguistic issues. The papers reflect Hymes' interests in the history of linguistics and anthropology, Native American languages (especially oral literatures), and his comparative ethnographies of communication.