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Manuel and Delia Zapata Olivella Collections
Manuel Zapata Olivella, noted Afro-Colombian novelist, anthropologist, folklorist, physician and playwright was known throughout Latin America as the “Dean of Black Hispanic Writers.” The Vanderbilt University Library acquired his papers in 2008; they provide a unique window on the history and society of Colombia and on people of African descent in the Americas as a whole. We hope the collection will serve as an exceptional resource for researchers in Latin American and Afro-Hispanic Studies engaged in a variety of fields, including literature, cultural studies, history, folklore and anthropology.
Delia Zapata Olivella, a Colombian dancer, choreographer, folklorist, and sister of Colombian author Manuel Zapata Olivella, committed her life’s work to recording, disseminating, and promoting Colombian folkloric culture.
Vanderbilt recently acquired the Delia Zapata Olivella Papers and has created a useful finding aid to make them available. Scholars, researchers, and those interested in the study of performance arts, dance and music will find them particularly engaging. The papers have recently been made available digitally by Vanderbilt and are openly accessible via JSTOR's open access portal.
As part of Grupo Etnografico, the Manuel Zapata Olivella and a team of researchers documented Indigenous and Afro-descendent communities through interviews and sound recordings, including music and dance. Here is a link to those interviews which are (for now) only accessible on Vanderbilt's campus: Grupo Etnografico Music.
Getting Started - Reference Sources
Reference Sources and Bibliographies can be a great way to explore your research interests before you have decided on a topic.
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Oxford Music Online This link opens in a new window
Includes: Grove Music Online, The Oxford Dictionary of Music, and the Oxford Companion to Music. These may be searched together or individually. Grove Music Online contains the following important music reference sources: The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, and The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz.
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Smithsonian Global Sound for Libraries This link opens in a new window
Encyclopedia of the world's musical and aural traditions. Contains music recordings.
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Oxford Reference: Performing Arts This link opens in a new windowPerforming arts reference sources: Oxford Companion to the American Musical, Oxford Companion to American Theatre, Oxford Dictionary of Dance, Oxford Encyclopedia of Latinos and Latinas in the United States, Grove Encyclopedia of Materials and Techniques in Art, Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music, Oxford Companion to Music, Dictionary of Opera Characters, New Grove Book of Opera Singers, Grove Book of Operas, Concise Oxford Dictionary of Opera, Encyclopedia of Popular Music, Oxford Companion to Shakespeare, Oxford Encyclopedia of Theatre and Performance, and the Concise Oxford Companion to the Theatre.
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Handbook of Latin American Studies This link opens in a new windowPrimary database for research on Latin America, indexing books and articles on Latin America in the social sciences and humanities. Covers the principal research worldwide and is especially strong in its inclusion of Latin American publications, articles, etc. Includes abstracts. Includes unpublished volumes in draft form.
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Oxford Bibliographies This link opens in a new windowExpert Guide to sources on a huge variety of subjects. Check on the guides on the Black Experience in Latin America, Afro-Latinos, the Black experience in Colonial Latin America, Slavery and Empire, Latin Jazz, Music Tradition in Latin America, and many many more.
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African American Music Reference This link opens in a new window
Text and liner notes of blues, jazz, spirituals, civil rights songs, slave songs, minstrelsy, rhythm and blues, gospel, and other forms of black American musical expression.
