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Posted by: Nicole Saylor
Recently, the American Folklife Center received a generous donation from the estate of Peter Bartis, a former AFC staff member, to support our internship program. In this post, we express our appreciation to the Bartis family and detail the excellent work of our former interns, who were supported by previous financial contributions.
Posted in: AFC History, ethnomusicologists, Internship program
Posted by: Nicole Saylor
The American Folklife Center is pleased to announce the appointment of Jessica Looman, Administrator of the Wage and Hour Division (WHD), to the American Folklife Center Board of Trustees. President Biden appointed Looman for a term expiring June 1, 2030. Looman had previously served as the Principal Deputy Administrator of WHD since Wednesday, January 20, 2021. WHD enforces worker protections and provides outreach and education about federal labor laws including minimum wage, overtime, child labor, and family and medical leave.
Posted in: AFC History, Archie Green
Posted by: Nicole Saylor
The American Folklife Center is pleased to announce the selection of three summer interns who will work on public programs, outreach activities and descriptive access work. One intern comes to us from the Utah State University folklore studies program, and two are supported by the AFC Internship Fund. Hanna Salmon is a PhD candidate in Ethnomusicology at the University of Texas at Austin. Her research examines how Palestinian storytellers foster affective atmospheres through their performances. Maggie Jones has just graduated magna cum laude from First Nations University of Canada’s Indigenous Languages Program with a Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics. They have an interest in Algonquian languages, Indigenous oral history, language revitalization, and journalism. Melanie Kimball is earning an MA in folklore studies at Utah State University. Her research interests include supernatural legends, folk beliefs, vernacular religion, and ethnomusicology. Her thesis investigates how people use music as an apotropaic and folk remedy for fear. Since 2017, the AFC Internship Fund has supported 12 paid internships. It was started by a generous donation from the late Peter Bartis, a former staff member. As the American Folklife Center approaches its 50th anniversary in 2026, we are committed to building this fund to help train a new generation of cultural workers.
Posted in: AFC History, Internship program
Posted by: Nicole Saylor
In this post, Nicole Saylor, Director of the American Folklife Center (AFC) at the Library of Congress, reviews the AFC's 2023 accomplishments.
Posted in: AFC Events, AFC History
Posted by: Nicole Saylor
Heather Hodges was elected chair of the American Folklife Center Board of Trustees at the fall board meeting September 15, 2023. Lori Pourier, CEO of the First Peoples Fund, was elected vice chair. Heather replaces Amy Kitchener, Executive Director for the Alliance of California Traditional Arts, who served as Board chair from 2019-2023. Heather is the Director of Institutional Advancement at the Historic New Orleans Collection, where she raises awareness and finds resources to support the museum's work. Heather has served on the AFC Board since 2020, and her collaborations with AFC date back to 2017. We are thrilled to have her leading the Board in the lead-up to the 50th anniversary of AFC in 2026. She sat down with me recently to talk about her background and her vision for her new role.
Posted in: AFC History
Posted by: Nicole Saylor
As 2022 draws to a close, we at the American Folklife Center want to take time to reflect on a year devoted to deepening our commitment to community-centered stewardship, adapting to hybrid work and planning for the future. The year was marked by the Library’s return to full onsite operations, leadership transitions, and moves to new public and staff spaces that make way for the transformation of the Jefferson Building. The year brought waves of change and staff rose to the challenge. Read about the year's highlights in this blog post from AFC's new director!
Posted in: AFC History, Archival Practice
Posted by: Nicole Saylor
This is a guest post by processing coordinator Ann Hoog, who among many other things, coordinates interns and volunteers at the American Folklife Center. One of the American Folklife Center’s long-time volunteers, Marshall Howard Kramer, passed away April 30, 2020, of COVID-19. Howard was a beloved member of AFC’s family for nearly 20 years. He …
Posted in: AFC History, Folk Music, Obituaries
Posted by: Nicole Saylor
This is a guest post by Todd Harvey, a folklife specialist and acquisitions coordinator at the American Folklife Center. John Cohen stopped by the other day to look at some photographs. Since the Library acquired John’s multi-format collection in 2011, we have gladly hosted his periodic visits. Here is a man who first walked through …
Posted in: AFC History, Fieldwork, John Cohen, Photographs
Posted by: Nicole Saylor
This is a guest post by AFC folklorist Ann Hoog, who has been the division coordinator for a mass digitization and access project to reformat and make accessible online a large body of American Folklife Center field projects from the mid-1970s through the mid-1990s. The American Folklife Center is pleased to announce a new online presentation of the South-Central …
Posted in: AFC History, Archival Practice