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Podcast: Episode 14, on “The Dodger,” is Ready for Listening

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Episode Fourteen of the Folklife Today Podcast (or Season 2, Episode 2) is ready for listening! The episode presents a deep dive into a single song, known either as “The Candidate’s a Dodger” or simply as “The Dodger.” In the episode, Thea Austen, Jennifer Cutting, and I look at the classic folksong , discussing the song’s meanings in oral tradition, its use by Aaron Copland as an art song, and its involvement in political controversy in the 1930s, when Charles Seeger first published it. We examine the song’s history and lay out new evidence about its relationships to other folksongs and to a musical theater song from 1840s England. We also discuss the possibility that Charles Seeger, a founder of ethnomusicology and a pioneering federal folklorist, was himself a “dodger!” The episode includes performances by folksingers Pete Seeger, Mike Seeger, and Peggy Seeger, as well as baritone Thomas Hampson, and five field recordings from the Library of Congress.

Folklife at the International Level: Happy Anniversary to the 1999 UNESCO-Smithsonian Meeting

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The Folklife at the International Level series has set out on a winding road, tracing the concept of “intangible cultural heritage” (ICH) as developed through a series of international initiatives over the course of the late 20th century. As the signs posted throughout have indicated, this road leads to the global framework for ICH promotion and […]

NAMES project special display on view until Dec. 2

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On November 20th, the American Folklife Center participated in an event at the Library of Congress announcing the “next chapter” of the AIDS Memorial Quilt project. You can read about that event in a previous blog post that also includes a link to the livestream video of the event, and also view some photos by American […]

AFC Is Acquiring the Archival Collections of the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt

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The NAMES Project Foundation (NPF) today announced that the National AIDS Memorial will become the new caretaker of the AIDS Memorial Quilt and NAMES Project programs.  As part of the transition, the NAMES Project and the National AIDS Memorial have agreed to jointly gift care and stewardship of The Quilt’s archival collections to the prestigious American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, making this collection available through the world’s largest public library.

Snapshots of AFC Women in the Field: Celebrating Our Own

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The following is a guest post by Jennifer Cutting. Continuing on the momentum set by the American Folklife Center’s symposium Women Documenting the World: Women as Folklorists, Ethnomusicologists & Fieldworkers (September 26, 2019), we’d like to showcase some women ethnographers who are very close to home. This blog post takes a scrapbook-style look at photographs […]

VHP’s Newest Online Exhibit: Veterans and the Arts

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Today, the Veterans History Project (VHP) launches a new online exhibit to feature the stories of veteran artists. The online exhibit acts as a companion to VHP’s Veteran Art Showcase, a series of cultural events held at the Library of Congress from November 5-9, 2019. At first glance, artistic expression might seem an unlikely subject […]

Veterans Art Showcase

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Whether crafting, performing, cooking, writing, or painting, art has the dynamic power to alleviate stress, build connections, and even stimulate recovery. For veterans and active duty service-members, art affords an outlet through which they can articulate – and process – what they experienced during their service. From November 5-9th, the Library of Congress Veterans History […]