Archived interviews record precolonial memories of the last living members of 19 societies

Evidence

When the data collection phase of the CCSE project was complete, the field notes (retyped in standardized format) were archived with the Human Relations Area Files at Yale University, where they are available in bound form as a HRAFlex book series (Brewer, 1972). The series contains transcripts of detailed interviews with informants from 19 cultures, in many cases representing discussions with the last living members of those societies who had personal memories of life prior to European contact. To this day, those interviews constitute a yet largely unmined source of rich data about intergroup relations, attitudes, and stereotypes among small, stateless societies in precolonial times. — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 2475

Categorization

• QUESTION: A largely unmined dataset of precolonial intergroup attitudes — worth investigating whether anyone has mined these HRAFlex transcripts since.
• SEED: Could write about this largely forgotten ethnographic treasure trove and its untapped potential for understanding pre-contact societies.
• SHARE: Niche dataset that a cultural anthropologist or ethnography enthusiast would want to know about.