Blair Rudes papers
acqinfo: label: Provenance
content: Materials were held at the U.N.C. Charlotte Department of English after Rudes's death until 2008, when his brother Bryan Rudes donated them to the National Anthropological Archives (accession 2009-16).

In 2015, Rudes's former graduate student Craig Kopris donated an appendix draft from his dissertation (A Grammar and Dictionary of Wyandot, 2001) that contained comments and annotations from Rudes. This file is located in sub-series 4.4: Writings by Others.
setName: label: See more items in
content: Blair Rudes papers
abstract: label: Summary
content: Blair Arnold Rudes was a linguist who specialized in Native American languages. The Blair Rudes papers document his research and professional activities from 1974-2008 and primarily deal with dictionaries and other linguistic materials he created and studied, as well as the culture and history of various Native American groups around the Eastern United States and the rest of North America. His involvement in language education, federal recognition of tribes, and the use of authentic Native American dialog in film are also represented. The collection consists of research files, linguistic research and data, correspondence, papers and other writings written by Rudes and his colleagues, movie scripts and related materials, and audio/visual recordings.
bioghist: label: Biographical / Historical
content: Blair Arnold Rudes was a linguist specializing in Native American languages, particularly those originating in eastern North America. Aside from working in academia for many years, Rudes also used his linguistic skills as a language education expert and consultant and was involved in projects related to film dialog translation, federal recognition of Native American tribes, and education for migrant and Native American students in the United States. He was best known in the Native American community for his extensive work documenting endangered indigenous languages (such as Tuscarora) as well as reconstructing Native languages that were dormant or lost to history and assimilation (such as costal Algonquian and Catawba). At the time of his death in 2008, he was an Associate Professor of English at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte. 

Rudes was born in Gloversville, NY on May 18, 1951. He attended the State University of New York at Buffalo where he studied linguistics at the undergraduate and graduate level. As a masters student in the mid-1970s, he was exposed to the Seneca language through his landlady who was also a graduate student studying the language. As Rudes learned more about Seneca, he quickly became interested in it and the rest of the Iroquoian languages, particularly Tuscarora. Before long Rudes was visiting the Tuscarora Reservation near Buffalo and learning the language from fluent speakers. He was awarded his Doctorate in linguistics in 1976. After graduating, he briefly spent time as a Fulbright scholar in Romania and as a lecturer at the University of Maryland, College Park before being hired as a consultant for Development Associates, Inc. 

For almost twenty years, Rudes worked on various language-related projects for Development Associates and as an independent contractor. Most of these projects studied academic programs and performance of minority, migrant, and Native American students with special language issues. Rudes was also hired as a researcher and consultant by the Golden Hill Paugussett Tribe between 1994 and 2003 to assist in their petition for federal recognition. In 1999, Rudes returned to academia and was hired as an Assistant Professor of English in the Applied Linguistics Program at U.N.C. Charlotte. That same year he published his seminal Tuscarora-English/English Tuscarora Dictionary.

Aside from his academic duties, Rudes continued to work independently as a language consultant and was hired in 2004 to reconstruct the Virginia Algonquian language for the New Line film The New World (2005). Rudes also assisted in coaching actors in speaking the language, which had been dormant since the early 18th century. In order to finish translating dialog into Virginia Algonquian on time, Rudes was reported to have shut himself into his Williamsburg hotel room for nearly a month, working feverishly until his task was completed. Rudes was also hired as a Mayan dialog coach for the Paramount Pictures film The Ruins (2008). 

Throughout his career, Rudes was active in the Foundation for Endangered Languages, the Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas, the annual Algonquian Conference, and the American Society for Ethnohistory. He presented and published regularly about his work with Native American languages, especially Virginia and Carolina Algonquian, Catawba, Mohawk, and Tuscarora. Rudes died of a heart attack on March 16 in Charlotte, North Carolina. 

Sources consulted:

Whitford, Sara. "The Algonquian Language Reborn: An Interview with Blair Rudes." Coastal Carolina Indian Center, 2011. Accessed April 12, 2016. 
http://www.coastalcarolinaindians.com/the-algonquian-language-reborn-an-interview-with-blair-rudes/

Whitford, Sara. "Obituary: Blair A. Rudes, PhD – Linguistics Advisor to CCIC." Coastal Carolina Indian Center, 2011. Accessed April 12, 2016.
http://www.coastalcarolinaindians.com/obituary-blair-a-rudes-phd-linguistics-advisor-to-ccic/

Chronology

1951 -- Born on May 18 in Gloversville, New York.

1973 -- Awarded Bachelors of Art in linguistics from the University of Buffalo.

1974 -- Awarded Masters of Art in linguisitcs from the University of Buffalo.

1976 -- Awarded Ph.D in linguistics from the University of Buffalo.

1976-1978 -- Awarded Fulbright Scholarship to teach linguistics at the University of Bucharest in Romania.

1980-1981 -- Hired as a lecturer at the University of Maryland, College Park.

1981-1999 -- Worked for Development Associates, Inc. as an educational consultant.

1994-2003 -- Hired by the Golden Hill Paugussett Tribe to assist in their petition for recognition from the federal government.

1999 -- Hired as an Assistant Professor in the Applied Linguistics Program in the Department of English at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte.

2004-2005 -- Worked as a Virginia Algonquian translator and dialog coach for The New World.

2005 -- Promoted to Associate Professor at U.N.C. Charlotte.

2006 -- Recognized by the Tuscarora Nation for contributions to preserving the Tuscarora language.

2007 -- Worked as a Mayan dialog coach for The Ruins. Recognized by the South Carolina General Assembly in a resolution for work done for the South Carolina Commission for Minority Affairs.

2008 -- Awarded the University at Buffalo's Distinguished Alumni Award. Died on March 16 in Charlotte, North Carolina.
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 13 Linear feet
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1974-2008
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Anthropological Archives
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NAA.2009-16
objectType: label: Type
content: Collection descriptions
label: Type
content: Archival materials
arrangement: label: Arrangement
content: This collection is arranged in 7 series: Series 1. Biographical, 1999-2007; Series 2. Correspondence, 1975-2007; Series 3. Linguistic Research and Data, 1969-2008, undated; Series 4. Writings, 1967-2007, undated; Series 5. Dialog Translation, 2003-2008; Series 6. Grants, Contracts, and Foundations, 1997-2007; Series 7. Golden Hill Paugussett Federal Recognition, 1994-2003.
processinfo: label: Processing Information
content: The series delineated in this collection are based on the original order and groupings of the materials upon their arrival at this institution. Original folder titles were used where appropriate, however, many of the materials in this collection were originally unfiled and stored loose. All other folder titles were created by the archivist. 

A significant amount of materials were removed from the collection during processing including photocopies of published materials (mostly related to linguistics and Native American history), duplicates and photocopies from the Golden Hill Paugussett petition for federal recognition (including many legal documents from the case and photocopies of archival documents used for tribal research), and photocopies of NAA archival materials (mostly numbered manuscripts and materials created by William Sturtevant, Albert Gatschet, and J.N.B. Hewitt). 

Processed and encoded by Tyler Stump, 2016.
bibliography: label: Bibliography
content: 1987. Tuscarora Roots, Stems, and Participles: Towards a Dictionary of Tuscarora. Winnipeg: Algonquian and Iroquoian Linguistics.

1999.  -- Tuscarora-English/English-Tuscarora Dictionary -- . Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

1999. "Holding Ground Along the Housatonic: Paugussett Land Loss and Population Decline from 1639 to 1900". In:  -- Proceedings of the 30th Algonquian Conference -- . Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press.

1999. "Why Collect Texts?: The Native and the Americanist Traditions Among the Tuscarora". In:  -- Theorizing the Americanist Tradition -- . Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

1999. "You Can't Say that in Tuscarora: Obstacles to Literacy in an Oral Language". In:  -- Proceedings of the Third Conference on Endangered Languages and Education -- . Bath, England: Foundation for Endangered Languages.

2000. "Resurrecting Coastal Catawban: The Reconstituted Phonology and Morphology of Woccon."  -- Southern Journal of Linguistics -- .

2000. "Resolution to Some Uncertain Wampano (Quipiri) Etymologies". In:  -- Proceedings of the 29th Angonquian Conference -- . Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press.

2001. "Using Data from Early Sources for Dictionary Development: Cautionary Notes". In:  -- Indigenous Languages Across the Community -- . Flagstaff: Northern Arizona University Press.

2003. "Catawba Phonemes". In:  -- Essays in Algonquian, Catawban, and Siouan Linguistics in Memory of Frank T. Siebert, Jr. -- . Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press.

2004. "Catawba". In:  -- Handbook of North American Indians, Volume 14: Southeast -- . Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution.

2004. "Four Catawba Fables: Comet, Barred Owl, A Dog's Tale, and Rabbit Steals Fire from the Buzzards". In:  -- From the Four Corners: Contemporary Translations of the Native Literatures of North America -- . Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.

2004. "Place Names of Cofitachequi"  -- Anthropological Linguistics -- .
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: The Blair Rudes papers 1967-2008, document his research and processional activities from his time in graduate school at the University of Buffalo in the 1970s through the end of his career at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte. Materials primarily deal with linguistic and historical research on Native American languages, particularly those in eastern North America. There is also a significant amount of material related to the Golden Hill Paugussett Tribe and their petition to the federal government for recognition, and Rudes's work as a consultant on language education projects. The collection consists of research files, linguistic research and data, correspondence, papers and other writings written by Rudes and his colleagues, official documents for the Golden Hill Paugussett federal recognition case, movie scripts and related materials, and audio/visual recordings.
separatedmaterial: label: Separated Materials
content: Two VHS recordings were transferred to the Human Studies Film Archive (HSFA.2016.10)