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Frances Densmore recording Mountain Chief

[edit]
Original - Frances Densmore at the Smithsonian Institution in 1916 during a recording session with Blackfoot chief Mountain Chief for the Bureau of American Ethnology.
Not for voting - Unrestored image for comparison.
Reason
Quite encyclopedic image of ethnographer Frances Densmore in the actual process of preserving Native American language and culture. The picture shows Densmore with Mountain Chief, a Blackfoot chief she was recording for the Bureau of American Ethnology.
Articles this image appears in
Blackfoot, Frances Densmore, Bureau of American Ethnology, Ethnomusicology
Creator
Unknown photographer, part of the Library of Congress' National Photo Company Collection. Restored by Michel Vuijlsteke
Google to the rescue[1]! I came across the picture completely by accident on the Library of Congress site, but apparently, in the words of National Geographic[2]:
This 1916 image of Frances Densmore and Blackfoot leader Mountain Chief listening to a cylinder recording has become a symbol of the early songcatcher era.
He's most probably not listening, of course: Densmore is recording onto a wax cylinder. The picture was published in Mickey Hart, K.M. Kostyal, Songcatchers: In Search of the World's Music, National Geographic, 2003 (ISBN 079224107X). Weird restoration on the NG site, by the way. :D -- Michel Vuijlsteke (talk) 17:43, 26 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Except this now raises an issue with accuracy - see Criterion 6. NatGeo are saying they're listening, the image page description, presumably generated from the LoC notes, are saying they're recording. I've had issues with the accuracy of LoC information before (see the recent Heckler nom below for one example), and would be inclined to believe NatGeo. Is there a way to distinguish whether this is a recording or listening device (and how much does that then verge on OR)? --jjron (talk) 07:25, 27 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I was wrong. But neither LoC nor NatGeo are wrong: Densmore was most probably "recording Mountain Chief", i.e. Mountain Chief was there to be recorded, had been recorded or was about to be recorded (the date of the photo coincides with recordings of Mountain Chief[3]). This picture however is not of a recording: the listening horn is on the device.
This photo, taken in Washington, D.C., reflects the special aims and conditions not of the "oral poetry act" but rather of what might be called the "photography act." For the benefit of the photographer and posterity, Mountain Chief has donned his ceremonial native dress (his own?). At his side are emblems of the vanishing Native American culture that Densmore was doing her best to document. The collector adopts a non-assuming pose, eyes lowered on the machine. Mountain Chief gestures as if declaiming, although any sound that he is uttering at this moment would not be registered, for he is seated before the listening horn of the machine, not the recording horn. [4]
-- Michel Vuijlsteke (talk) 12:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • You do realise it's a different picture? Admittedly the device looks to be the same, but accuracy and EV are sliding IMO. And shouldn't captions and image page be changed if it's not a recording? (Not to mention filename, etc). --jjron (talk) 07:49, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • That's overstating the case a bit. It's a series of pictures taken on the same day. I found at least one picture in the series (this one) where Densmore has her eyes lowered on the machine, but at least one other (the one in the link above) doesn't. Some have Mountain Chief gesturing (cf. link above), some don't (cf. this image). I can't rename the picture, but I've modified the caption. -- Michel Vuijlsteke (talk) 14:07, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm not overstating anything. I don't know how you know that these images were taken on the same day - I can see no date associated with the one at [5], certainly the background is completely different, the chair the chief is on is different, and while that image is pretty low res, either his pants are different or he's got something hanging over his knee, and Densmore's hair also looks to be different. Regardless, there seems to be a lot of guessing going on here from all parties. You even accidentally misquoted the image caption from the above link which in fact says "...Mountain Chief has donned ceremonial dress (his own, or someone else's?)..." - so even that caption is guessing at what's going on, and they're unsure whether the ceremonial dress is genuine, i.e., it might not even be his. BTW you can get files renamed I believe, or upload under a new name and request a deletion. --jjron (talk) 06:31, 31 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Urgh. I really should check things before I reply. I was wrong (again), but the sources can be reconciled, and both the proposed caption and the original reason is correct. You can't be a 100% sure, I agree. But then again, you can't be sure of *anything*. Al you can go by is the sources. Here's a couple of different versions of the images I found:
    1. LoC: "Piegan Indian, Mountain Chief, having his voice recorded by ethnologist Frances Densmore", dated "1916" [6] (scanned photographic print) and "Blackfoot Chief, Mountain Chief making phonographic record at Smithsonian, 2/9/1916" [7] (scanned glass negative)
    2. LoC: "Frances Densmore using wax cylinder phonograph to record Mountain Chief, a Blackfoot Indian", dated "1916" [8]. Location is different: stone wall and stairs in background instead of dark cloth screen. Densmore is dressed the same but looks dark-haired, not gray; Mountain Chief is dressed differently.
    3. Niles, Homo Narrans, 1999: "Frances Densmore, collector, with Mountain Chief of the Blackfoot Tribe, 1906. [...] donned ceremonial dress (his own, or someone else's?)" [9]. Dated 1906 in caption. Probably same session but slightly different from (2): same paraphernalia in front of Mountain Chief but Densmore looks up, not down. (Note that the missing "or someone else's" in my quotation above was not an accidental misquote: I didn't feel like retyping everything and copy-pasted from [10])
    4. NatGeo: "This 1916 image of Frances Densmore and Blackfoot leader Mountain Chief listening to a cylinder recording has become a symbol of the early songcatcher era." [11] = retouched version of (1)
    5. Smithsonian: CD cover, "Healing Songs of the American Indian" [12] = cropped version of (2)
    6. Nettl and Bohlman, Comparative Musicology and Anthropology of Music, 1991: "Frances Densmore, ethnomudicologist, with Mountain Chief, a Blackfoot Indian, who is interpreting in sign language a song being played on a phonograph" [13] = version of (3), but dated 1916
    7. Becker, Selling tradition, 1998: "Ethnomusicologist Frances Densmore and Mountain Chief of the Blackfoot tribe listen to a cylinder recording in 1906. [...] This photograph was taken outside the Smithsonian in Washington." [14] = version of (3)
    8. Adolf Hungry-Wolf, The Blackfoot Papers: "Mountain Chief, having some of his songs recorded on wax cylinders [...] during a visit he made to Washington, D.C. around 1915. He has on his intertribal outfit, with Sioux headdress and fringed backskin suit" [15] dated around 1915 = version of (1)
There are more sources on Google Book Search. With a heavy dose of Occam's razor: there were two photo sessions, one in 1906 (at least once misreported as 1916) and one ca. 1916 (sources say 1914, ca. 1915, 1916). Both were staged. The sources seem to agree that Mountain Chief is not in the process of being recorded but rather listening, in both photos. Mountain Chief was however recorded by Frances Densmore: all sources agree that he was. The more recent photo (1) is dated quite precisely "2/9/1916" at the LoC; there is a recording of Mountain Chief dated quite precisely 2/16/1916 [16].
Conclusions? This picture is beyond any reasonable doubt a picture of Frances Densmore and Mountain Chief. According to the sources, the picture was taken in February 1916; Frances Densmore recorded Mountain Chief; recordings of Mountain Chief in February 1916 survive. "Frances Densmore recording Mountain Chief" is a reasonable image name; "Frances Densmore at the Smithsonian Institution in 1916 where she was recording Blackfoot chief Mountain Chief for the Bureau of American Ethnology. In this picture, Mountain Chief is listening to a recording." is a reasonable image caption. -- Michel Vuijlsteke (talk) 19:47, 31 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The conversation about the caption is legitimate, but easily solved by making the caption more vague. I also quoted both captions at the Commons image page. When two very trustworthy sources disagree, might as well just make it vague because Wikipedians can't determine which is right. Otherwise, this is has obvious support. Promoted Image:Frances Densmore recording Mountain Chief2.jpg ~ ωαdεstεr16«talkstalk» 19:57, 1 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

LOL. There's a fine solution for lack of EV - just make the supposed information in captions etc vaguer! :-) --jjron (talk) 06:39, 3 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The photo shows a RECORDING session. If nothing else, the recording attachment (special arm and horn) clearly visible proves it. The tonearm and horn for listening on this type of machine look very different. We can even determine the exact moment of the photo shoot: Densmore has just started the machine and is lowering the recorder onto the blank wax - during actual recording OR playback her hand would have not been touching the tonearm! - and Mountain Chief is visibly concentrating, ready to launch his song or speech as soon as she gives the sign that the phonograph is running.

Here's a period illustration (from the original user's manual of the Edison machine) showing the _recording_ arm and horn: https://www.technogallerie.com/wp-content/uploads/1a-23.jpg

and here's a photo of Densmore's machine set up for playback. Note how the much larger playback horn sits on top of the back bracket, and there is an angled tonearm with the reproducer hanging vertically over the cylinder, while the recorder is placed at an oblique angle with the horn directly protruding from it. https://scontent.flej1-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/307684032_1148534619202358_3479030545063488219_n.jpg?_nc_cat=100&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=dbeb18&_nc_ohc=ntMGnpdaDr8AX8VQ7EH&_nc_oc=AQknQRQNgEshUbqauJN95IgPwkl8yZq0n_2Zb4tZZKNG9DEYrF4xRp6xucMehMRFYLQ&_nc_ht=scontent.flej1-1.fna&oh=00_AT9GcCAdPiPjj3aGjC36HYm1pn6PkI0xMCSdodUGy4Za-A&oe=6332B7A7

One obvious nonsense in the Smithsonian description is of course that he "interprets a song in Plains Indian sign language". One could record SIGN LANGUAGE on a movie camera I suppose, but we have an AUDIO recording session here so he must be reciting or singing. At any rate, "interpreting" is clearly not used in the sense of "translating" or "explaining", but means "performing" (like a pianist "interprets" a Chopin piece by playing it, and an actor "interprets" a role by speaking the words. 91.65.175.94 (talk) 15:17, 23 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

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