American Folklore Society Centennial
odd: label: Introduction
content: It seemed especially appropriate to the Smithsonian Institution's Office of Folklife Programs to help celebrate the American Folklore Society's Centennial. For twenty years the Smithsonian's Festival of American Folklife had embodied many of the perspectives of the Society's founders: to observe and collect traditional performances and practices of the American peoples; to study this expressive life scientifically; to celebrate the diversity of American culture through presenting publicly the accomplishments of master performers and artisans. Both the Smithsonian and the Society had worked for a century with this common approach.

In celebrating the folklore collector as a cultural mediator, bringing together traditional performers and craftspeople with the public, the Smithsonian dramatized what folklorists actually do in their chosen tasks. Folklorists observe the life of groups at human scale; they interact with those working and playing in their everyday environments, places in which traditions live; they seek out new ways of informing and delighting each other. In short, folklorists face traditions newly invented and quickly traditionalized. Guardians of "authentic" traditions, folklorists today also pursue fresh, emergent ones. During the Festival, visitors could see and sense, in a tent on the National Mall, the living traditions of folklorists themselves - values and practices forged a century ago by pioneers, and now conserved, traditionalized, and elaborated by a new generation of their cultural descendants.

Rayna Green, Diana Parker, Nicholas R. Spitzer, and John Michael Vlach served as Curators, and Ronna Lee Widner as Program Coordinator.

The American Folklore Society Centennial Program was made possible in part by the L.J. Skaggs and Mary C. Skaggs Foundation through the American Folklore Society.
label: Research assistance
content: Barry Jean Ancelet, Erika Brady, Andrew Connors, Frank Proschan, Olga Najera Ramirez, Nicholas R. Spitzer, Patricia Turner, John Michael Vlach, D.K. Wilgus
label: Presenters
content: Charles Camp, Timothy Lloyd
label: Participants
content: Roger D. Abrahams, folklorist, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Barry Jean Ancelet, folklorist, Lafayette, Louisiana

Dewey Balfa, Cajun fiddle player, Basile, Louisiana

Louis Bashell, Slovenian accordion player, Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Barry Bergey, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Horace Boyer, 1935-, ethnomusicologist, Amherst, Massachusetts

C. Ray Brassieur, folklorist, St. Martinville, Louisiana

Olivia Cadaval, 1943-, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Norma Elia Cantú, 1947-, folklorist, Laredo, Texas

Nora Dauenhauer, Tlingit narrative specialist, Juneau, Alaska

Richard Dauenhauer, anthropologist, Juneau, Alaska

Carl Fleischhauer, media folklife specialist, Washington, D.C.

Gladys-Marie Fry, 1931-, folklorist, College Park, Maryland

Henry Glassie, folklorist, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Kenny Goldstein, folklorist, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Teresa Maria Gonzalez, Matachines dancer, Laredo, Texas

Rayna Green, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Clifford Hardesty, 1921-, Anglo fiddle player and maker, West Lafayette, Ohio

Bess Lomax Hawes, 1921-, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Joseph C. Hickerson, 1935-, archivist, Washington, D.C.

Marjorie Hunt, 1954-, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Alan Jabbour, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Mary Jackson, 1945-, sweetgrass basket maker, Charleston, South Carolina

Geraldine Johnson, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Suzi Jones, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Susan Kalcik, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Richard Kurin, 1950-, anthropologist, Washington, D.C.

Michael S. Licht, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Alan Lomax, 1915-2002, folklorist, New York, New York

Worth Long, folklorist, Atlanta, Georgia

Richard March, 1946-, folklorist, Madison, Wisconsin

Lynn Martin, folklorist, Honolulu, Hawaii

Margarita Mazo, ethnomusicologist, Washington, D. C.

Robert McCarl, folklorist, Boise, Idaho

Clydia Nahwooksy, Native American cultural specialist, Rochester, New York

Barry Lee Pearson, folklorist, College Park, Maryland

Lonnie Pitchford, blues guitar player, Lexington, Mississippi

Frank Proschan, 1953-, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Bernice Johnson Reagon, 1942-, cultural historian, Washington, D.C.

Ralph Rinzler, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Howard Sacks, sociologist, Gambier, Ohio

Raymond Sedotal, 1924-2006, Cajun boat builder, Pierre Part, Louisiana

Anthony Seeger, ethnomusicologist, Washington, D.C.

Daniel Sheehy, ethnomusicologist, Washington, D.C.

Nicholas R. Spitzer, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Richard K Spottswood, discographer, Washington, D.C.

William C. Sturtevant, anthropologist, Washington, D.C.

Thomas Vennum, Jr., ethnomusicologist, Washington, D.C.

John Michael Vlach, 1948-, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Stephen Wade, musician, Washington, D.C.

Joseph T. Wilson, 1938-2015, folklorist, Washington, D.C.

Margaret R. Yocom, folklorist, Fairfax, Virginia
name: label: Collection Creator
content: Smithsonian Institution. Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage
setName: label: See more items in
content: Smithsonian Folklife Festival records: 1988 Festival of American Folklife
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections
identifier: label: Identifier
content: CFCH.SFF.1988, Series 2
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials