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Posted by: Stephanie Hall
I remember a history class my junior year in high school dealing with the period in United States history when Indian tribes were being forced onto reservations. Presented as a better option were Indian schools where children were taught to assimilate into American society. To ensure that they would learn English and American customs these …
Posted in: Languages and Dialects, Native American History, Religion
Posted by: Lisa Taylor
November 10, 2015 marks the 240th birthday of the United States Marine Corps. Semper fidelis! It just so happens that this birthday falls during November, the month set aside to celebrate the rich history and culture of Native Americans/American Indians. Interestingly enough, while recently doing some research for a media event, I came across a …
Posted in: Cultural Heritage, Narratives, Native American History, Oral History, Storytelling, Veterans History Project
Posted by: Stephanie Hall
As some of our readers may remember, tomorrow is the second anniversary of Folklife Today, and our very first post was about Halloween. Last year, we did a series of posts about collecting Halloween and Day of the Dead photos through a special hashtag. You can see some of the results here and here and …
Posted in: Folksong, Halloween, Halloween Stories, Hispanic American History, Holidays, Narratives, Native American History, Storytelling
Posted by: Stephen Winick
To launch the annual International Conference of Indigenous Archives, Libraries and Museums, the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress (AFC) and the Association of Tribal Archives, Libraries and Museums (ATALM) present a symposium. Titled Civil Rights, Identity and Sovereignty: Native American Perspectives on History, Law, and the Path Ahead, it will take place …
Posted in: AFC Events, Native American History, Uncategorized
Posted by: Stephen Winick
In my last post for Folklife Today, I shared some of the great recordings on the Library of Congress’s National Recording Registry, a program of the Library that honors historically significant recordings and draws attention to the importance of audio preservation and audio archives in the stewardship of American culture and history. Specifically, I discussed …
Posted in: AFC History, Folk Music, Folklorists, Folksong, Native American History, Preservation
Posted by: Stephen Winick
Last week, the Library announced this year’s inductees to the National Recording Registry. There, along with classics by The Doors, Radiohead, Steve Martin, and Joan Baez, was a fascinating AFC collection: The Benjamin Ives Gilman Collection Recorded at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition at Chicago. This collection of 101 wax cylinder recordings was created by …
Posted in: AFC History, African Americans, Alan Jabbour, Alan Lomax, Cultural Heritage, ethnomusicologists, Folk Music, Folklorists, Folksong, Narratives, Native American History, Oral History, Preservation
Posted by: Nicole Saylor
This is a guest post by American Folklife Center’s Judith Gray, an ethnomusicologist who curates the largest body of early recordings of indigenous American songs and stories recorded in the United States. After all the identifying, rehousing, cataloging, labeling, barcoding, and databasing activity on the part of AFC staff over the past year, the actual …
Posted in: AFC History, Archival Practice, ethnomusicologists, Native American History, Uncategorized
Posted by: Nicole Saylor
Judith Gray, a specialist in Native American cultures, has been spending a lot of quality time down in the chilly decks of the Library’s Jefferson building lately. She curates the largest body of early recordings of indigenous American music and stories in the United States contained on nearly ten thousand wax cylinders. When not on …
Posted in: Archival Practice, ethnomusicologists, Folklorists, Native American History, Preservation