Integrating Folklore, Music, &
Traditional Culture Into K-12 Education

 

National Folklore and Folklife Related Organizations

Additional University Home Pages of Interest to Folklorists

Regional Societies

Alabama Folklife
Mid-Columbia Folklore Society
The North Carolina Folklore Society
Virginia Folklife Society

Folklore and Folklife Around the United States

American Folklore Society Traditional Arts Program Net by the NEA Public Sector Directory: Potential Partnership Organization
AFS Public Program Section Folklorist Directory
1999 Public Folklorist Directory and Special Interest Sites
AFS membership directory, AFS members can be located by typing in their name

PUBLIC NOMINATIONS SOUGHT FOR INAUGURAL (2002) NATIONAL Recording Registry
The Library of Congress - Sound recordings in the National Recording Registry. In accordance with the National Recording Preservation Act of 2000 (P.L. 106-474), the Librarian of Congress James H. Billington will name culturally, historically or aesthetically significant sound recordings to the National Recording Registry. The Act sets forth a program to ensure the preservation of our heritage in sound and includes the establishment of the National Recording Preservation Board and National Recording Preservation Foundation, in addition to founding the Registry in the Library of Congress. Sound recordings must be culturally, historically or aesthetically important, and/or reflect life in the United States. They must also be at least ten years old. A complete listing of the criteria, as well as further information about the Registry and the National Recording Preservation Board may be found at the National Recording Preservation Board www.loc.gov/nrpb. National Recording Registry, c/o M/B/RS, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540-4698.

Research, Projects, and Additional Sites of Interest

• CopyRight Issues: Use of early recordings for documentary video
• African Web Links, an Annotated Resourse List at U. Penn.
• Voice of the Shuttle: a webpage for Humanities Research
• Folk Venue, a large database folk-related venues throughout Canada, the United States, and Mexico
• Oral History Association
• Tapnet Links:  Websites of Traditional Arts Program
• John Mehlberg's collection of Bawdy Songs
• Musical Traditions The Magazine for Traditional Music throughout the world

2007 AFS has joined with history and oral history organizations in this present campaign to advocate for the exemption of most folklore research from IRB review. Threat Seen To Oral History

ORAL HISTORY EXCLUDED FROM IRB REVIEW 10/2003
The U.S. Office for Human Research Protection (OHRP), part of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), working in conjunction with the American Historical Association and the Oral History general do not involve the type of research defined by HHS regulations and are therefore excluded from Institutional Review Board oversight. At the October 2003 meeting of the Oral History Association in Bethesda, Maryland, George Pospisil of the OHRP’s Division of Education and Development, explained the OHRP decision regarding the application of the “Common Rule” (45 CFR part 46), which sets regulations governing research involving human subjects. These federal regulations define research as “a systematic investigation, including research development, testing and evaluation, designed to develop or contribute to generalizable knowledge.” The type of research encompassed by the regulations involves standard questionnaires with a large sample of individuals who often remain anonymous, not the open-ended interviews with identifiable individuals who give their interviews with “informed consent”that characterizes oral history. Only those oral history projects that conform to the regulatory definition of research will now need to submit their research protocols for IRB review.
Following is the text of a policy statement that was developed by the Oral History Association and the American Historical Association in consultation with the Office of Human Research Protection. This policy applies to oral history that takes place within an institution that has filed a multiple project assurance with OHRP. As one of the seventeen federal agencies that have signed on to the Common Rule, the Department of Health and Human Services deals most directly with the type of clinical research that the federal regulations were originally intended to cover, and its concurrence with the policy statement should set the way for a uniform interpretation by other federal agencies. Oral historians should make this statement available to department chairs, directors of graduate study, deans, and other officers concerned with institutional compliance with federal regulations.

Donald A. Ritchie, Don_Ritchie@sec.senate.gov
Oral History Association
Linda Shopes
American Historical Association

Application of the Department of Health and Human Services Regulations for the Protection of Human Subjects at 45 CFR Part 46, Subpart A to Oral History Interviewing
Most oral history interviewing projects are not subject to the requirements of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) regulations for the protection of human subjects at 45 CFR part 46, subpart A, and can be excluded from institutional review board (IRB) oversight because they do not involve research as defined by the HHS regulations. HHS regulations at 45 CFR 46.102(D) define research as “ a systematic investigation, including research development, testing and evaluation, designed to develop or contribute to generalizable knowledge.” The Oral History Association defines oral history as “a method of gathering and preserving historical information through recorded interviews with participants in past events and ways of life.”
It is primarily on the grounds that oral history interviews, in general, are not designed to contribute to “generalizable knowledge” that they are not subject to the requirements of the HHS regulations at 45 CFR part 46 and, therefore, can be excluded from IRB review. Although the HHS regulations do not define “generalizable knowledge,” it is reasonable to assume that they term does not simply mean knowledge that lends itself to generalizations, which characterizes every form of scholarly inquiry and human communication. While historians reach for meaning that goes beyond the specific subject of their inquiry, unlike researchers in the biomedical and behavioral sciences they do not reach for generalizable principles of historical or social development, nor do they seek underlying principles or laws of nature that have predictive value and can be applied to other circumstances for the purpose of controlling outcomes. Historians explain a particular past; they do not create general explanations about all that has happened in the past, nor do they predict the future.
Moreover, oral history narrators are not anonymous individuals, selected as part of a random sample for the purposes of a survey. Nor are they asked to respond to a standard questionnaire administered to a broad swath of the population. Those interviewed are specific individuals selected because of their often unique relationship to the topic at hand. Open-ended questions are tailored to the experiences of the individual narrator. Although interviews are guided by professional protocols, the way any individual interview unfolds simply cannot be predicted. An interview gives a unique perspective on the topic at hand; a series of interviews offer up not similar “generalizable” information but a variety of particular perspectives on the topic.
For these reasons, then, oral history interviewing, in general, does not meet the regulatory definition of research as articulated in 45 CFR part 46. The Office for Human Research Protections concurs with this policy statement, and it is essential that such an interpretation be made available to the many IRBs currently grappling with issues of human subject research.

The Folklore Jobs

The web version is available at: http://lcweb.loc.gov/folklife/
Announcements for new jobs should be sent to <folklife@loc.gov>
Stephanie A. Hall, <shal@loc.gov>
Library of Congress American Folklife Center
101 Independence Ave, SE
Washington, DC 20540-461

About Bess Lomax Hawes TOP

STEP IT DOWN

NEA is establishing an award named for the noted folklorist and performer Bess Lomax Hawes.
Hawes started performing in the 1930s, joining Pete Seeger as a member of the groundbreaking Almanac Singers and co-writing the classic "Charlie on the MTA." In 1975 Hawes started and helped produce the Smithsonian's Bicentennial Folklife Festival and then joined the NEA in 1977 as an administrator. She created the Heritage Fellowships Program during her 16-years as director of the NEA's folk arts division. President Clinton honored her with a National Medal of Arts in 1993. The Bess Lomax Hawes National Heritage Fellowship recognizes extraordinary 'keepers of tradition' who teach, collect, preserve and advocate folk and traditional arts.
The Hawes award will be part of the annual National Heritage Fellowships, the government's tribute to artists who have spent their creative lives in traditional crafts, such as ironwork, or preserving musical, vocal or dance forms.
Hawes represents one of the most influential families in American folklore. Her father, John Lomax, a collector of the songs and stories of the South, headed the folk song archive at the Library of Congress. Her brother, Alan Lomax, stands as one of the leading documentarians of folk singing.
First recipient of the Hawes award will be Chris Strachwitz, a German refugee who founded Arhoolie Records in 1960. The label records little-known musicians in the areas of blues, gospel, norteno conjunto, Cajun, zydeco and old-time country, and has brought their music to broader audiences.
The other honorees for this year's fellowships: Bounxou Chanthraphone, a Laotian weaver from Brooklyn Park, Minn.; the Dixie Hummingbirds, an African American gospel quartet from Philadelphia; Felipe Garcia Villamil, an Afro-Cuban drummer from Los Angeles; Jose Gonzalez, a hammock weaver from San Sebastian, Puerto Rico; Nettie Jackson, a Klickitat basketmaker from White Swan, Wash.; Santiago Jimenez Jr., a Tejano accordionist and singer from San Antonio. Also: Genoa Keawe, a singer and ukulele player from Honolulu; Frankie Manning, a Lindy Hop dancer and choreographer from Corona, N.Y.; Joe Willie "Pinetop" Perkins, a blues piano player from La Porte, Ind.; Konstantinos Pilarinos, an Orthodox Byzantine icon wood carver from Astoria, N.Y.; Dorothy Thompson, a weaver from Davis, W.Va.; and Don Walser, a western singer and guitarist from Austin.
Each recipient, including Strachwitz, will receive $10,000 and be honored at a ceremony in Washington in September 2000

About Ella Jenkins

From the beginning of her career in 1956, GRAMMY-nominated folk singer Ella Jenkins has been a cornerstone of children's music. Over the course of the past five decades, she has established herself as a musician whose reach extends beyond her target audience into the realm of adults and educators. Jenkins was the first performer to take her music into schools and teach music while incorporating respect for diversity. She has educated children about everything from reading and geography to multiculturalism and the environment, and through her famous Adventures in Rhythm workshops, she has taught music teachers as well. Literally thousands of musicians who now make their living performing in schools and family concerts are indebted to Jenkins for paving the way.