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

Navigating AFC Collections Geographically: Great Plains

Posted by: Stephanie Hall

The following is a guest post by American Folklife Center head of reference, Judith Gray. Staff at the American Folklife Center continue to use new digital tools to support remote discovery and access for our resources by users of all kinds. Whether you are a community scholar, a teacher, an academic researcher, a creative artist, …

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

The Folklore and Folksong of Trains in America, Part One

Posted by: Stephanie Hall

Part two of this article is available at this link. Part One:  The Development of the Railroads The advent of railroads in the United States is part of the country’s coming-of-age story as an industrial power during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Because of this, trains and people associated with the developing railways became …

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

Poetry Afield

Posted by: Stephanie Hall

When ethnographers collect poetry in the course of a fieldwork project, they are often looking for something in addition to a recitation of an entertaining poem. Poetry, like songs or stories, can tell us something about the culture in which it is found, the local ideas about what makes a good poem, information about languages …