Title and statement of responsibility area
Title proper
Werner Cohn fonds
General material designation
- Sound recording
- Textual record
- Photographic material
Parallel title
Other title information
Title statements of responsibility
Title notes
- Source of title proper: The title is based on the provenance of the fonds.
Level of description
Fonds
Repository
Reference code
Edition area
Edition statement
Edition statement of responsibility
Class of material specific details area
Statement of scale (cartographic)
Statement of projection (cartographic)
Statement of coordinates (cartographic)
Statement of scale (architectural)
Issuing jurisdiction and denomination (philatelic)
Dates of creation area
Date(s)
Physical description area
Physical description
75 cm of textual records
181 audio tapes
473 photographs: col. slides; 35 mm
Publisher's series area
Title proper of publisher's series
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Statement of responsibility relating to publisher's series
Numbering within publisher's series
Note on publisher's series
Archival description area
Name of creator
Biographical history
Werner Cohn was born in Berlin; he later received his BSS in Sociology from City College, New York, in 1951. He completed his MA (1954) and Ph.D. (1956) at the New School for Social Research. He joined the University of British Columbia's Department of Anthropology and Sociology in 1960 and remained there until taking early retirement in 1986. Cohn's research focused on the sociology of Jewish people and small political movements. In particular, Cohn developed an interest in researching Roma. He began his research on this topic in 1966/67 during a sabbatical in France. Cohn continued his culture and language studies and returned to Europe, meeting with Roma and many well-known Roma scholars. Over the years, Cohn wrote numerous articles in various scholarly journals. In 1973, he wrote The Gypsies, which summarized his findings in the field.
Custodial history
Scope and content
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).
Notes area
Physical condition
Immediate source of acquisition
The slides were donated to UBC Archives by Professor Cohn’s daughter-in-law in March 2020.
Arrangement
Language of material
Script of material
Location of originals
Availability of other formats
Restrictions on access
Terms governing use, reproduction, and publication
Finding aids
Uploaded finding aid
Associated materials
Accruals
No further accruals are expected.
General note
Please be aware that researchers will encounter terms that are no longer acceptable. In instances where these terms are used in original titles, they have not been changed.
General note
The colour slides have been allocated series 194.1 and are located in the vault. These photos have not been digitized.
Alternative identifier(s)
Standard number area
Standard number
Access points
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Control area
Description record identifier
Rules or conventions
Status
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Dates of creation, revision and deletion
Revised in January 2021, JM.