Dunham's Data: Katherine Dunham and Digital Methods for Dance Historical Inquiry, Everyday Itinerary, 1947-1960

The Everyday Itinerary Dataset is the first public-use dataset in the Dunham's Data series, a unique data collection created by Kate Elswit (Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London) and Harmony Bench (The Ohio State University) to explore questions and problems that make the analysis and visualization of data meaningful for dance history through the case study of choreographer Katherine Dunham. It is a manually curated dataset of Katherine Dunham's touring from 1947-1960, encompassing Dunham's daily locations, travel, and performances every day over fourteen years of her most substantial period of consistent international touring. During this time, Dunham's personal and professional travels took her to 190 unique cities over 433 trips. This dataset tracks geographic location (with 97% of 5,110 days accounted for); and, less comprehensively, the accommodation in which Dunham stayed each night; the theatres, nightclubs, television studios, and other places where she and the company performed; the modes of transportation used when travel occurred; additional transit cities through which she passed; and whether or not Dunham was likely to be in rehearsals or giving public performances. Dunham's Data: Digital Methods for Dance Historical Inquiry is funded by the United Kingdom Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC AH/R012989/1, 2018-2022) and is part of a larger suite of ongoing digital collaborations by Bench and Elswit, Movement on the Move. The Dunham's Data team also includes digital humanities postdoctoral research assistant Antonio Jiménez-Mavillard and dance history postdoctoral research assistants Takiyah Nur Amin and Tia-Monique Uzor.