The University of Glasgow this week launched a collection of Gaelic recordings made in Nova Scotia.
The collection includes interviews, conversations, music, hymns and psalms, and songs largely from people in Nova Scotia. Most of the material is in Scottish Gaelic, but some recordings also feature English and French.
In its news release, the university said the new online collection of recordings will be a useful resource to all those interested in Gaelic folklore, language and song, especially in the context of Nova Scotia’s Gaelic communities.
The recordings by Professor Calum Iain N. MacLeod (1913–1977) will be held in the British Academy recognized project, Digital Archive of Scottish Gaelic, led by the university.
The collector, Prof. MacLeod, was an important figure in the history of the Gaelic community in Nova Scotia. The son of the Gaelic writer John N. MacLeod, he was brought up in Dornie and Kirkhill, Inverness-shire. He attended both Edinburgh and Glasgow universities and won recognition as a brilliant student in Celtic studies. In 1937, he won An Comunn Gàidhealach’s Bardic Crown.
During WWII, he was a major in the British Intelligence Corps serving in North Africa and across Europe.
He emigrated to Canada in 1949 to work as Gaelic advisor to the Education Department of the Nova Scotia government. He was also appointed as professor of Celtic Studies at St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, Nova Scotia.
Not user friendly
The challenge for me with this online collection is searching and browsing it for the Nova Scotian recordings. It doesn’t seem user friendly. I tried several times, but was unsuccessful and frustrated.
I also searched and browsed the audio recordings, without finding Nova Scotia. If there’s an easy way to explore, I couldn’t find it.
Nevertheless, it’s good to know these recordings have been preserved.
Here’s the university’s news release with a few links. Perhaps you’ll have better luck finding the collection than I did.
