The collection consists of materials acquired or collected by Elmer K. Nelson, primarily relating to the UBC criminology programme and his work for the B.C. Office of Corrections. It includes biographical information (1954-2007), correspondence (1952-1987), newspaper clippings (1952-1957), and publications (1953-1957). Also included is an audio cassette recording (catalogue # UBC 3415) of an interview with Nelson. Corrections Branch History Committee, dated 1978. Additionally, a copy of an article written by Gary Parkinson in 2007, "Recovering the early history of Canadian criminology: Criminology at the University of British Columbia, 1951 to 1959", is included at the request of the collector.

Fonds consists of departmental records from Anthropology and Sociology (1964-2000); Canadian Sociology and Anthropology Association records (1970-1979); and material relating to the Simon Fraser University dispute concerning the Department of Political Science, Sociology and Anthropology (1969-1971). Ames assembled this group of records through his participation on the C.S.A.A. team, which studied the situation. The papers also include Ames's descriptions of the Board of Directors of the Canadian Museums Association (1980-1983) and the Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute (1967-1995). The material relating to the Shastri Institute includes records generated or collected by Ames and other members of the Institute at UBC. The names of other members are indicated in the file title. Also, the fonds contains manuscripts and drafts, records about Ames's research, courses taught by Ames, a variety of conferences and seminars, and records about Ames’ participation in several museum studies program reviews. Finally, the fonds also contain Ames' involvement with the Museum of Anthropology (MOA). Most records as Director and Acting Director of MOA are held at the MOA Archives. In total, there are 16 series: UBC Department of Anthropology and Sociology series, Canadian Sociology and Anthropology Association series, Department of Political Science, Sociology, and Anthropology (Simon Fraser University) Dispute series, Canadian Museums Association series, Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute series, Assorted Associations and Conferences series, Manuscripts, Drafts, and Papers series, General Correspondence series and a Biographical series, Course Materials series, Program Review series, Research series, Museum of Anthropology (MOA) series, Photographic series, Audio Cassette series and Computer Tape series (last three series were added were acquired in 2007).

The fonds consists of two series: the Roma Research series and a Publications series composed of copies of Cohn's publications. The first series includes material generated or collected by Cohn in the course of researching Roma. It includes audiotaped interviews of Rom with notebooks containing descriptions and analysis of the conversations; a computer-generated inventory of kinship ties among hundreds of North American Roma; a transcript of a New York trial (1962) of a Roma fortune teller; miscellaneous printed and published materials on Roma, collected by Cohn; and materials from a correspondence course for learning Romani (1969/70). The research series also contains photographs (1968-74) of Roma taken by Cohn throughout North America and Europe. The Publications series includes copies of Cohn articles (1959-1993) and a bibliography of his works (1950-1993).