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Archive: January 2020 (8 Posts)

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

Folklife at the International Level: Intangible Cultural Heritage Defined

Posted by: Michelle Stefano

If this series is a mountain, I am pleased to say that we are now climbing up to its peak: an examination of the 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). It is through the 2003 Convention that the concept and category …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

Lomax Birthday Challenge!

Posted by: John Fenn

This guest post from Todd Harvey, AFC reference staff member and Alan Lomax collection curator, is part of a short series related to the Library’s crowdsource platform and the campaign we helped launch in September 2019 focused on the extensive holdings AFC has of Lomax manuscript materials. The American Folklife Center wishes a happy birthday …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

Summer 2020 paid internships at the AFC!

Posted by: John Fenn

In summer 2018, the AFC at the Library of Congress launched a paid internship opportunity as part of a program established through a generous gift from the late AFC staff member Peter Bartis (1949 – 2017). These positions introduced interns to the research collections at the AFC and the Library; helped develop critical skills related …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

Help Folklife Research by Reviewing Lomax Transcripts!

Posted by: Stephanie Hall

When I was writing my blog on “Great Lakes Ships and Shipping” in 2018, I naturally wanted to look at the field notes Alan Lomax wrote when he was collecting these songs. But this was no easy task. His field notes were online, but only as page image scans. The notes were handwritten and they …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

Update: Lomax transcription review challenge

Posted by: John Fenn

At the start of this month we announced a “challenge” for the Lomax crowdsourcing campaign on the Library’s By the People platform. To refresh your memory, the campaign is focused on transcribing about 9000 pages of handwritten and typed Alan Lomax manuscripts. The ultimate goal is to create machine-readable electronic text versions of Lomax’s materials so …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

Pitch in to review crowdsourced Lomax transcriptions!

Posted by: John Fenn

Back in September, the American Folklife Center helped launch a crowdsourcing campaign focused on transcribing about 9000 pages of handwritten and typed Alan Lomax manuscripts. This campaign is running on By the People, the crowdsourcing platform developed by the Library of Congress. The ultimate goal is to create machine-readable electronic text versions of Lomax’s materials …