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Finding Aid for the Jonathan Friedlander collection of Middle Eastern Americana, 1875-2006
1314
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Title: Jonathan Friedlander collection of Middle Eastern Americana
Date (inclusive): 1875-2006
Collection number: 1314
Creator:
Friedlander, Jonathan.
Extent:
33 boxes (16.5 linear feet)
21 oversize boxes
Abstract: The several thousand items contained in the Middle Eastern Americana collection document the substantial and significant presence
of the Middle East in the annals of American popular culture. Over the course of more than 150 years and well into the present
public interest in the Middle East has engendered a consumer appetite for a material culture that ranges from popular fiction
and cinema to tobacco and coffee. In all its parts and subsets this diverse and multifaceted collection is geared for academic
research and scholarly exploration of issues related to the representation of the Middle East in various popular culture domains
including literature, cinema, music, photography, graphics and visual art, the performing arts, and entertainment.
Language: Finding aid is written in
English.
Repository:
University of California, Los Angeles. Library. Department of Special Collections.
Los Angeles, California 90095-1575
Physical location: Stored off-site at SRLF. Advance notice is required for access to the collection. Please contact the UCLA Library, Department
of Special Collections Reference Desk for paging information.
Selected digitized images from this collection.
COLLECTION STORED OFF-SITE AT SRLF: Open for research. Advance notice required for access. Contact the UCLA Library, Department
of Special Collections Reference Desk for paging information.
Restrictions on Use and Reproduction
Property rights to the physical object belong to the UCLA Library,
Department of Special Collections. Literary rights, including copyright,
are retained by the creators and their heirs. It is the responsibility of
the researcher to determine who holds the copyright and pursue the
copyright owner or his or her heir for permission to publish where The UC
Regents do not hold the copyright.
Provenance/Source of Acquisition
Gift of Jonathan Friedlander, 2006.
Processed by Lorraine Pratt (2006), Sina Rahmadi (2007), and Audra Eagle (2008) in the Center for Primary Research and Training
(CFPRT), with assistance from Kelley Bachli, 2008.
UCLA Library Special Collections collaborated with Jonathan Friedlander on the creation of this finding aid. Friedlander
served as the primary author for the Abstract, Biography, and Scope and Content sections.
[Identification of item], Jonathan Friedlander collection of Middle Eastern Americana (Collection Number 1314). Department
of Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library, UCLA.
Jonathan Friedlander, former assistant director of the UCLA Center for Near Eastern Studies, began collecting this wide array
of print, audio visual, and electronic materials and ephemera in the early 1970s. His interest in the commercialization and
wide dissemination and marketing of products and services bearing Middle Eastern iconography, images and brand names has yielded
several publications, exhibitions, videographs, websites, and most importantly a sizable collection of primary sources including
his own photography of parades and festivals, jazz musicians, belly dancers, Arabian horses and their trainers and caretakers,
and architectural styles deemed Moorish, ancient Egyptian and Assyrian, Saharan, and otherwise inspired by the Arabian Nights
and seen across America.
The largest part of the collection consists of hard cover and paperback books, pulp fiction and men's adventure magazines,
graphic novels, and comics, along with a special collection of materials on the Arabian Nights. Middle Eastern subjects and
themes are in evidence throughout the print genre, in thrillers and mysteries, romances, tales, science fiction and fantasy,
geographies, historical and religious fiction, and youth literature. An important sub section of the collection focuses on
the influences of the Middle East on the American musical landscape and showcases various genres of music that have appropriated
and popularized the Middle East notably in jazz, rock, heavy metal, classical, and in movie soundtracks and sheet music. The
collection also features a cache of electronic games and vintage board games, product advertisements, merchandise and ephemera,
souvenirs, mementos, as well as a sizable number of stereographs, Hollywood movies, reference books, and catalogues. Related
materials are available at the Media and Music Libraries, and the UCLA Film and Television Archive.
The bulk of the Middle Eastern Americana collection was acquired on the road, in bookstores, book fairs and antiquarian shows,
antique stores, and shopping malls across the United States. Increasingly the Internet has become an important venue for the
acquisition of select and rare items.
The collection is arranged into ten series, five of which have been further arranged into subseries. Sound recordings, books,
serials, sheet music, motion picture films, and Arabian Nights books are arranged alphabetically. The series and subseries
arrangement is as follows:
- Sound Recordings
- Phonograph records
- Compact discs
- Books
- [Books]
- Children's books
- Romance novels
- Pocket-sized books
- Serials
- Pulp fiction
- Comic books
- Men's adventure magazines
- Magazines
- Advertisements
- Games
- Board games
- Video games and manuals
- Card games
- Artifacts and Objects
- Sheet Music
- Motion Picture Films
- Digital video discs (DVDs)
- Laserdisks
- VHS cassettes
- Arabian Nights Books
- Stereographs
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.
Friedlander, Jonathan --Archives.
Arabian nights.
Middle East specialists --California --Los Angeles --Archival resources.
Video cassettes from the collection are available through the Office of Instructional Development at the Instructional Media
Lab in Powell Library at UCLA.