What Folklorists Do

What Folklorists Do PDF Author: Timothy Lloyd
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253058414
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 268

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Book Description
What can you do with a folklore degree? Over six dozen folklorists, writing from their own experiences, show us. What Folklorists Do examines a wide range of professionals—both within and outside the academy, at the beginning of their careers or holding senior management positions—to demonstrate the many ways that folklore studies can shape and support the activities of those trained in it. As one of the oldest academic professions in the United States and grounded in ethnographic fieldwork, folklore has always been concerned with public service and engagement beyond the academy. Consequently, as this book demonstrates, the career applications of a training in folklore are many—advocating for local and national causes; shaping public policy; directing and serving in museums; working as journalists, publishers, textbook writers, or journal editors; directing national government programs or being involved in historic preservation; teaching undergraduate and graduate students; producing music festivals; pursuing a career in politics; or even becoming a stand-up comedian. A comprehensive guide to the range of good work carried out by today's folklorists, What Folklorists Do is essential reading for folklore students and professionals and those in positions to hire them. Audio book narrated by Walter Brown. Produced by Speechki in 2021.

What Folklorists Do

What Folklorists Do PDF Author: Timothy Lloyd
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253058414
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 268

Get Book Here

Book Description
What can you do with a folklore degree? Over six dozen folklorists, writing from their own experiences, show us. What Folklorists Do examines a wide range of professionals—both within and outside the academy, at the beginning of their careers or holding senior management positions—to demonstrate the many ways that folklore studies can shape and support the activities of those trained in it. As one of the oldest academic professions in the United States and grounded in ethnographic fieldwork, folklore has always been concerned with public service and engagement beyond the academy. Consequently, as this book demonstrates, the career applications of a training in folklore are many—advocating for local and national causes; shaping public policy; directing and serving in museums; working as journalists, publishers, textbook writers, or journal editors; directing national government programs or being involved in historic preservation; teaching undergraduate and graduate students; producing music festivals; pursuing a career in politics; or even becoming a stand-up comedian. A comprehensive guide to the range of good work carried out by today's folklorists, What Folklorists Do is essential reading for folklore students and professionals and those in positions to hire them. Audio book narrated by Walter Brown. Produced by Speechki in 2021.

Humble Theory

Humble Theory PDF Author: Dorothy Noyes
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253023386
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 471

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Book Description
A collection of fifteen essays exploring what folklore is, its history, and how it all connects to the world. Celebrated folklorist, Dorothy Noyes, offers an unforgettable glimpse of her craft and the many ways it matters. Folklore is the dirty linen of modernity, carrying the traces of working bodies and the worlds they live in. It is necessary but embarrassing, not easily blanched and made respectable for public view, although sometimes this display is deemed useful. The place of folklore studies among modern academic disciplines has accordingly been marginal and precarious, yet folklore studies are foundational and persistent. Long engaged with all that escapes the gaze of grand theory and grand narratives, folklorists have followed the lead of the people whose practices they study. They attend to local economies of meaning; they examine the challenge of making room for maneuver within circumstances one does not control. Incisive and wide ranging, the fifteen essays in this book chronicle the “humble theory” of both folk and folklorist as interacting perspectives on social life in the modern Western world. “Tying folklore to larger trends in Western cultural thought, leaving behind narrow concerns with genre or fossilized expressive forms, Humble Theory showcases the potential of folkloristics to contribute meaningfully to interdisciplinary conversations about culture.” —Journal of Folklore Research “Humble Theory is a big book. From a small scholarly field, it announces the most substantial, far-seeing insights into the world’s social life. By writing it, Noyes becomes the kind of public intellectual the United States needs.” —Journal of American Folklore

Theorizing Folklore from the Margins

Theorizing Folklore from the Margins PDF Author: Solimar Otero
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 025305608X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 353

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Book Description
The study of folklore has historically focused on the daily life and culture of regular people, such as artisans, storytellers, and craftspeople. But what can folklore reveal about strategies of belonging, survival, and reinvention in moments of crisis? The experience of living in hostile conditions for cultural, social, political, or economic reasons has redefined communities in crisis. The curated works in Theorizing Folklore from the Margins offer clear and feasible suggestions for how to ethically engage in the study of folklore with marginalized populations. By focusing on issues of critical race and ethnic studies, decolonial and antioppressive methodologies, and gender and sexuality studies, contributors employ a wide variety of disciplines and theoretical approaches. In doing so, they reflect the transdisciplinary possibilities of Folklore studies. By bridging the gap between theory and practice, Theorizing Folklore from the Margins confirms that engaging with oppressed communities is not only relevant, but necessary.

Living Folklore

Living Folklore PDF Author: Martha Sims
Publisher: University Press of Colorado
ISBN: 087421517X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 444

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Book Description
Living Folklore is a comprehensive, straightforward introduction to folklore as it is lived, shared and practiced in contemporary settings. Drawing on examples from diverse American groups and experiences, this text gives the student a strong foundation—from the field’s history and major terms to theories, interpretive approaches, and fieldwork. Many teachers of undergraduates find the available folklore textbooks too complex or unwieldy for an introductory level course. It is precisely this criticism that Living Folklore addresses; while comprehensive and rigorous, the book is specifically intended to meet the needs of those students who are just beginning their study of the discipline. Its real strength lies in how it combines carefully articulated foundational concepts with relevant examples and a student-oriented teaching philosophy.

Folklore Rules

Folklore Rules PDF Author: Lynne S. McNeill
Publisher: University Press of Colorado
ISBN: 087421906X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 114

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Book Description
Folklore Rules is a brief introduction to the foundational concepts in folklore studies for beginning students. Designed to give essential background on the current study of folklore and some of the basic concepts and questions used when analyzing folklore, this short, coherent, and approachable handbook is divided into five chapters: What Is Folklore?; What Do Folklorists Do?; Types of Folklore; Types of Folk Groups; and, finally, What Do I Do Now? Through these chapters students are guided toward a working understanding of the field, learn basic terms and techniques, and learn to perceive the knowledge base and discourse frame for materials used in folklore courses. Folklore Rules will appeal to instructors and students for a variety of courses, including introductory folklore and comparative studies as well as literature, anthropology, and composition classes that include a folklore component.

Folklore Concepts

Folklore Concepts PDF Author: Dan Ben-Amos
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253052440
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 246

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Book Description
By defining folklore as artistic communication in small groups, Dan Ben-Amos led the discipline of Folklore in new directions. In Folklore Concepts, Henry Glassie and Elliott Oring have curated a selection of Ben-Amos's groundbreaking essays that explore folklore as a category in cultural communication and as a subject of scholarly research. Ben-Amos's work is well-known for sparking lively debate that often centers on why his definition intrinsically acknowledges tradition rather than expresses its connection forthright. Without tradition among people, there would be no art or communication, and tradition cannot accomplish anything on its own—only people can. Ben-Amos's focus on creative communication in communities is woven into the themes of the theoretical essays in this volume, through which he advocates for a better future for folklore scholarship. Folklore Concepts traces Ben-Amos's consistent efforts over the span of his career to review and critique the definitions, concepts, and practices of Folklore in order to build the field's intellectual history. In examining this history, Folklore Concepts answers foundational questions about what folklorists are doing, how they are doing it, and why.

The Oxford Handbook of American Folklore and Folklife Studies

The Oxford Handbook of American Folklore and Folklife Studies PDF Author: Simon J. Bronner
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190840641
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 1033

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Book Description
The Oxford Handbook of American Folklore and Folklife Studies surveys the materials, approaches, concepts, and applications of the field to provide a sweeping guide to American folklore and folklife, culture, history, and society. Forty-three comprehensive and diverse chapters delve into significant themes and methods of folklore and folklife study; established expressions and activities; spheres and locations of folkloric action; and shared cultures and common identities. Beyond the longstanding arenas of academic focus developed throughout the 350-year legacy of folklore and folklife study, contributors at the forefront of the field also explore exciting new areas of attention that have emerged in the twenty-first century such as the Internet, bodylore, folklore of organizations and networks, sexual orientation, neurodiverse identities, and disability groups. Encompassing a wide range of cultural traditions in the United States, from bits of slang in private conversations to massive public demonstrations, ancient beliefs to contemporary viral memes, and a simple handshake greeting to group festivals, these chapters consider the meanings in oral, social, and material genres of dance, ritual, drama, play, speech, song, and story while drawing attention to tradition-centered communities such as the Amish and Hasidim, occupational groups and their workaday worlds, and children and other age groups. Weaving together such varied and manifest traditions, this handbook pays significant attention to the cultural diversity and changing national boundaries that have always been distinctive in the American experience, reflecting on the relative youth of the nation; global connections of customs brought by immigrants; mobility of residents and their relation to an indigenous, urbanized, and racialized population; and a varied landscape and settlement pattern. Edited by leading folklore scholar Simon J. Bronner, this handbook celebrates the extraordinary richness of the American social and cultural fabric, offering a valuable resource not only for scholars and students of American studies, but also for the global study of tradition, folk arts, and cultural practice.

A Companion to Folklore

A Companion to Folklore PDF Author: Regina F. Bendix
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1118863143
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 690

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Book Description
A Companion to Folklore presents an original and comprehensive collection of essays from international experts in the field of folklore studies. Unprecedented in depth and scope, this state-of-the-art collection uniquely displays the vitality of folklore research across the globe. An unprecedented collection of original, state of the art essays on folklore authored by international experts Examines the practices and theoretical approaches developed to understand the phenomena of folklore Considers folklore in the context of multi-disciplinary topics that include poetics, performance, religious practice, myth, ritual and symbol, oral textuality, history, law, politics and power as well as the social base of folklore Selected by Choice as a 2013 Outstanding Academic Title

Keepers of Tradition

Keepers of Tradition PDF Author: Maggie Holtzberg
Publisher: Univ of Massachusetts Press
ISBN: 9781558496408
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 220

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Book Description
Throughout Massachusetts, artists carry on and revitalise deeply rooted traditions that take many expressive forms - from Native American basketry to Yankee wooden boats, Armenian lace, Chinese seals, and Irish music and dance. This illustrated volume celebrates and shares the work of a wide array of these living artists.

The Practice of Folklore

The Practice of Folklore PDF Author: Simon J. Bronner
Publisher: Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN: 1496822641
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 397

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Book Description
Winner of the 2020 Chicago Folklore Prize CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title for 2020 Despite predictions that commercial mass culture would displace customs of the past, traditions firmly abound, often characterized as folklore. In The Practice of Folklore: Essays toward a Theory of Tradition, author Simon J. Bronner works with theories of cultural practice to explain the social and psychological need for tradition in everyday life. Bronner proposes a distinctive “praxic” perspective that will answer the pressing philosophical as well as psychological question of why people enjoy repeating themselves. The significance of the keyword practice, he asserts, is the embodiment of a tension between repetition and variation in human behavior. Thinking with practice, particularly in a digital world, forces redefinitions of folklore and a reorientation toward interpreting everyday life. More than performance or enactment in social theory, practice connects localized culture with the vernacular idea that “this is the way we do things around here.” Practice refers to the way those things are analyzed as part of, rather than apart from, theory, thus inviting the study of studying. “The way we do things” invokes the social basis of “doing” in practice as cultural and instrumental. Building on previous studies of tradition in relation to creativity, Bronner presents an overview of practice theory and the ways it might be used in folklore and folklife studies. Demonstrating the application of this theory in folkloristic studies, Bronner offers four provocative case studies of psychocultural meanings that arise from traditional frames of action and address issues of our times: referring to the boogieman; connecting “wild child” beliefs to school shootings; deciphering the offensive chants of sports fans; and explicating male bravado in bawdy singing. Turning his analysis to the analysts of tradition, Bronner uses practice theory to evaluate the agenda of folklorists in shaping perceptions of tradition-centered “folk societies” such as the Amish. He further unpacks the culturally based rationale of public folklore programming. He interprets the evolving idea of folk museums in a digital world and assesses how the folklorists' terms and actions affect how people think about tradition.